MlSCELLANEOUhi AOTES. ' . 373 



No. XXXII.— THE SEA-SNAKE, HYDROPHIS 

 C^RULESCENS (Shaw.). 



A CORRECTION. 



In Volume XXII of this Journal, page 63;^, I remarked upon a melanotic 

 specimen of the sea-snake IT^ii/'o^jMs torquatus {Oxwathev) . Since examining 

 this snake I have had an opportunity of investigating all the sea-snakes in 

 the Indian Museum and in our Society's collection, I find the numbers of 

 the teeth behind the fangs in the maxilla are of the greatest assistance in 

 identifying these snakes, especially many species that have a very similar 

 range of costal rows and ventral shields. 



I have re-examined the snake referred to and can now very positively 

 correct my previous identification. The snake is without doubt Shaw's 

 ecerulescens. I find that the teeth in the maxilla number 15, the usual 

 number in this species. I have examined the jaws of some 20 specimens 

 and find these teeth vary from 13 dubiously in one specimen to 1 7. In 20 

 other species of Hydrophis I find there are from 10 to 12 teeth in two 

 species and from 1 to 10 in all the rest. In torquatus (Giinther), vel 

 diadema (Giinther) there are 8 to 10. In addition I find that the parietal 

 shields in this specimen do not touch the postocvilars on either side, a 

 feature I drew attention to in my monograph of the sea-snakes and men- 

 tioned as quite peculiar to this species. This escaped my notice when I 

 first examined the specimen, or I would not have fallen into error. 



F. WALL, Major, c.m.z.s., f.l.s., i.m.s. 

 Almoka, IQth July 1914. 



No. XXXIII.— A CASE OF CANNIBALISM BY BUNGARUS 

 CMRULEU8. 



A large krait was killed at dawn; when 1 first saw it I thought it had eggs 

 inside, later when I came back from shooting, hours afterwards, on further 

 examination I found that it had swallowed another snake which on extrac- 

 tion proved to be another krait. I regret I was unable to save the snakes 

 entire; so I sent the heads in Boric Lotion for maceration, etc. The big 

 snake was killed in a Mama Field. — 



The measurements were as follows: — 



I fancy the host was killed almost immediately after accommodating the 

 guest, practically no damage from digestion. The guest was just about to 

 cast its skin. Guest was swallowed head first and nose of guest was 4-| 

 inches from host's vent. 



0. A. SMITH, Major. 



Hazaribagh District, August 1914. 



[ In Major Wall's article on the krait (A popular treatise on the Common Snakes 

 of India) at p. 720, Vol. XVIII, it will be seen that the food of kraits consist almost 

 exclusively of other snakes. — Eds.] 



