CXELOPELTIS MOILENSIS. 293 
equalling or slightly exceeding the distance between its anterior border and the end of 
the snout, and as long as or a little longer than the parietals ; its greatest breadth 
exceeds one-half of its length ; parietals longer than broad, posterior border more or less 
rounded ; one loreal resting on the second and third labials ; one prseocular, occasionally 
divided, broadly excluded from contact with the frontal, rarely in contact ; two or 
three postoculars ; temporals 2 + 3, 2 + 4, or 1+2 ; 8 upper labials rarely 7, the fourth 
and fifth entering the orbit ; posterior pair of chin-shields the shorter, separated by 
two large and a few small scales ; anterior pair in contact with four or five labials. 
Scales in 17 rows, very obscurely grooved. 157-176 ventrals ; anal 1/1 ; subcaudals 
48-73. 
General colour pale sandy yellowish or yellowish brown above, irregularly marked 
with brown or blackish spots, generally a vertical black bar through the eye, more or 
less defined and involving the margin of the supraocular and the fourth and fifth labials ; 
a large deep brown or blackish spot from the hinder half of each parietal to the angle 
of the mouth, with a narrow yellow or .whitish area behind it, followed by another but 
smaller dark brown spot ; underparts yellow, with a dark spot occasionally on the 
angles of the ventrals, and in some two lines of small dusky spots or brick-red spots 
along the ventrals. 
Attains to 1030 millim., of which the tail measures 195 millim. 
In Lower Egypt this species is found on the margin of the desert amid arid 
surroundings. At Suakin and Durrur, where it is not rare, it is found on the 
shrub-covered grassy plain. 
To the west it ranges to Algeria, to the south as far as Sennaar in the Egyptian 
Sudan. In Asia it is present in Arabia, Syria, and Western Persia. 
I have removed a Stenodactylus elegans and the remains of beetles from its stomach. 
The coleoptera had doubtless been introduced in the stomachs of its prey. 
The natives do not appear to have any name for it, and indeed, as pointed out 
by Gasco, they do not distinguish, in some cases, between it and Cerastes vipera, 
which it resembles in its general tint. 
