EAST AFRICAN SNAKES. 873 



TYriiLors dinoa Peters. 



Blgr. Cnt. Snakes, i. 1893, p. 45. 



A specimen measuring 33g inches (850+10) was caught on 

 27.xii.22 at Kilosa, having come above ground after the first 

 heavy downpour of the lesser rains. In colour it was almost 

 identical with the figure in Peters' ' Reise nach Mossambique,' 

 but a week later it was a dark metallic silver, doubtless a sign 

 that it was abovit to cast its skin. 



TypHLOPS MUCEUSO var. humbo Peters. 



Blgr. Cat. Snakes, i. 1893, p. 46. 



Thirteen specimens fiom Ilonga, Kilosa, Kipera, Madazini, 

 Kidenge, Mpwapvva, und Usshora. 



The largest female of these measured 231 inches (590 + 5) and a 

 male measured 18^ inches (460 + 6) ; it was unearthed by some 

 boys digging a trench at Kilosa on 27. i.21, when 1 made a note 

 " whitish or flesh-coloured, eyes comjdetely hidden.'" It had 35 

 mid-body scale-rows, diameter went 36 times into total length 

 and the tail 77 times. 



On 18,ii. 21, having turned the " colourless Typhlops " out of 

 the earth where I had been keeping it, I was astonished to find 

 that it was now the colour of ordinary Kilosa specimens of var. 

 humbo and the eyes distinct having taken up pigment. I do not 

 know what the explanation was unless that it had sloughed just 

 before capture and pigmentation was delayed in the new skin, but 

 I am perfectly certain that there was no trace of the eyes on 

 27. i. 21, as I examined it very closely with a lens believing I had 

 something new. As the visibility or otherwise of the eyes is an 

 important key-character this is rather interesting. 



The coloration was now as follows : — Black above, marbled or 

 speckled (the specks being sometimes confluent) with pale bluish 

 grey. Beneath, the pale blue is about equal to the black in 

 extent. A young specimen had the pale blue brighter, almost 

 bluish slate. It is the constant colouring of all my specimens 

 from Morogoro, Kilosa, and Mpapua. 



The eye in my specimens is partly under the prseocular, not as 

 shown by Peters * or figured by Sternfeld f for T. mucruso. 

 Both these authors show one scale (prseocular) between the ocular 

 and the nasal in forma typica, whereas in specimens of var. 

 humbo from Tanganyika Territory there are distinctly two. In 

 one young specimen the nasal is in contact with its fellow behind 

 the rostral, and nearly so in the adult mentioned above. 



The Usahora specimen was swallowed by a Bii-d Snake (T. kirt- 

 landii) with which it shared the vivarium. 



* Petev3, Tleise Mossamb. iii. p. 95, pi. xiii. fijj. 3. 



t Sternfeld, Fauna der deutschen Koloiiien, lleilie III. Heft 2, p. 12, fig. 8. ' 



