llEPTILES OF BRITiail BIEMA. 59. 



Family ACROCHOEDID^. 



CiiEiiSYDEUS, Cuvier. 



C, GEANULATUS, Schn. 



a. Adult. Body .... 2000 



Tail .... 200=2200. 

 Scales of body in over one hundred rows, irregular or polygonal, 

 tubercular on body, bitubercular on the tail. One row of scales 

 on each side of the median line of the belly, spinous, forming a 

 doubly serrated ventral keel. 



Colour above dark grey; the colour descending in regular 

 stripes to the abdomen, where it insensibly fades. Belly yellow- 

 ish, ascending in regular sharply defined stripes to the median 

 line of the back. The dark and pale stripes alternate regularly ; 

 but some of the pale ones join on the back, giving rise to irregular 

 annuli. 



h. Body .... 33-25 



Tail .... 3-75=3700. 



Colours similar to the last, but much duller. 



This species is plentiful in the Basscin Eivcr, in salt water 

 below Gnaputau, and, with various other sea-snakes, is frequently 

 swept by the tide into the fishing-baskets or stakes near that 

 village. These baskets or creels are long and conical, very narrow 

 at the end, and made of wicker or bamboo. The broad mouth is 

 fixed to face the ebb tide and supported by bamboos firmly driven 

 into the river-bed. The ebb tide, running like a sluice, sweeps 

 fish, Crustacea, snakes, and even porpoises occasionally, into the 

 broad mouths of the baskets, where they are at once jammed into a 

 mass at the narrow end of the creel. At slack tide the fishermen 

 push off", and take up each basket in turn and empty out its hetero- 

 genous contents into their boats ; and a rare treat it is to the 

 naturalist to be present ; but unfortunately I was only a few days 

 in the neighbourhood, and could not profit by the abundance of 

 riches which this locality produces, but which will well rej)ay the 

 attention of any resident at Bassein or that neighbourhood. This 

 species is more nearly connected with the llydrophidre than the 

 last, being as essentially aquatic as any of that family, to which, 

 save from its wanting the poiaon-gland, it might be appropriately 

 referred. 



