760 MB. G. A. BOULENQBB. ON VIPBEA BENAEDI. [DeC. 5. 



two series of small spots on the sides ; belly whitish, dotted or 

 spotted with black. Those from Varaoe are intermediate between 

 the latter and the Sarepta ones ; whilst two specimens, both males, 

 from Saratov and JSmeinogorsk are dark brown above with a 

 darker zigzag band, the one from the latter locality being fiu-ther 

 remai'kable in having the underparts uniform blackish, as in 

 V. herus. In all the specimens examined by me the labials and 

 the rostral are spotted, speckled, or margined with black or brown ; 

 a weU-marked dark postocular streak, extending or not to the 

 side of the neck, and one or two ^-shaped markings on the back 

 of the head are present. The tip of the tail is never yellow. 



Christoph found V. renardi common in the bare steppe around 

 Sai'epta ; only on one occasion did he come across a specimen in 

 a locahty overgrown with willows and small shrubs. The following 

 sketch of its distribution is taken from fcJtrauch's ' Synopsis der 

 Viperiden,' p. 53 : — 



" The Viper occurs also in the district of Uralsk, apparently in 

 abundance, as our collection has received, through Count A. 

 Keyserhng, numerous examples from the vicinity of that town ; 

 and it is, according tp Becker (Bull. Mosc. 1855, i. p. 473), very 

 common in the steppe around Sarepta, where Christoph obtained 



the variety described by him as Pelias renardi 



The first record of its occurrence in the Kirghiz Steppes we owe 

 to the elder Gmelin (lieise d. Sibir. iv. p. 318), who met with 

 great numbers on the Tschebarkul Lake, in the httle Kirghiz 

 Horde ; it was afterwards found in the Emba Steppes by the late 

 Dr. Lehmann, and in the steppes between the Emba and Temir 

 by Dr. Moritz ; more recently a specimen was captured by Dr. 

 Severzow on the Issembai, an affluent of the Ilek. We know 

 nothing of its occurrence in the Middle Kirghiz, but numerous 

 specimens were caught about 1840 by Dr. v. Schrenck in the steppes 

 near the Alatau, on the borders of the Urdshar, and in Tarbagatai, in 

 the Semipolatiusk district, whence Pallas (Eeise, ii. p. 493) 

 recorded it from the Semijarskaja Stanija." 



In concluding I beg to express my thanks to Dr. Herzenstein 

 and Dr. E. MuUer for their assistance in procuring the material 

 on which these notes are based. 



EXPLANATION OP PLATE LXIV. 

 Vipera renardi, from Sarepta. a-c. Male. d-f. Female. 



