PROCEEDINGS 
OF THE 
CALIFORNIA ACADEMY OF SCIENCES 
FourtH SERIES 
Vot. III, pp. 41-48 DeEcEMBER 31, 1908 
DESCRIPTION OF A NEW SPECIES OF SEA SNAKE 
FROM THE PHILIPPINE ISLANDS, WITH A 
NOTE ON THE PALATINE TEETH IN 
THE PROTEROGLYPHA 
BY 
JOHN VAN DENBURGH 
Curator of the Department of Herpetology 
AND 
JOSEPH C. THOMPSON 
Assistant Curator of the Department of Herpetology 
The correctness of the suggestion of the unity of the genera 
Aydrophis and Disteira has been most clearly brought out by 
an examination recently made by Dr. Thompson of the dental 
characters of nearly every known species of sea snake. In 
the species referred by authors to Hydrophis, as well as in 
those placed in the genus Disteira, the teeth behind the fangs 
normally are grooved. This grooving varies from deep and 
wide channels extending the entire length of the tooth and 
readily visible to the unaided eye, to the merest trace, present 
only at the base of the tooth and requiring for its demon- 
stration a magnification of sixty diameters. In the widely 
distributed D. cyanocincta and D. fasciata one not rarely finds 
specimens in which the grooving is absent, or present on the 
December 31, 1908 
