246 Mr. J. E. Gray on three new Genera and Species of Snakes. 



XXVII. — Description of three new Genera and Species of Snakes. 

 By J. E. Gray, Esq. 



The greater part of the genera of innocuous Colubrine Snakes 

 have only a small number of shields on the sides of the lips, the 

 eyes being generally placed over the fourth, or the suture between 

 the fourth and fifth upper labial shields. In the very long- 

 headed genera, as Dryophis, the eye is over the fifth, and in one 

 species, D. Catesbyi, it is over the suture between the fifth and 

 sixth. Periops of Wagler and Chilolepis of Fitzinger, exhibit 

 the greatest number of these shields amongst the snakes hitherto 

 recorded ; the eyes in them are placed over the fifth, sixth and 

 seventh shields, which are of small size. In the two genera I am 

 about to notice the shields are large, and the eye is placed over 

 the suture between the sixth and seventh shields. 



1. Cynophis. — Head moderate, elongate, rather compressed 

 on the sides ; crown flat, shielded, frontal shields four, anterior 

 small between the nasals, hinder larger, bent down on the sides ; 

 vertebral elongate, narrower behind ; superciliary shield narrow 

 in front, wider behind and bent down on the outer side ; occi- 

 pital shields large, elongate, subtrigonal ; nostrils rather large, 

 lateral, between two shields, the hinder rather the largest ; loreal 

 shields moderate ; one very large, squarish, five-sided, anterior 

 and a small posterior ocular ; temple with elongate shields, the 

 upper one linear, oblique, margining the occipital ; rostral shield 

 rather broad and high, subtrigonal, convex ; upper labial shields 

 rather large, the five front ones rather narrow and high, the sixth 

 and seventh broader, placed under and forming the lower mar- 

 gin of the orbit, the eighth, ninth and tenth rather large, subtri- 

 gonal, with the temporal shield above them ; the lower rostral 

 small, the first, second, third and fourth lower labial narrow, the 

 fifth and sixth much larger and broader, the hinder ones rather 

 narrow; chin shield two pair, elongate, strap -shaped. Eyes 

 rather large, pupil round. Body elongate, compressed ; back 

 rounded ; belly flattened ; scales lanceolate, closely imbricate, 

 smooth, the lower series rather broadest ; ventral shield rather 

 broad, flat in the middle, and rather angularly bent up on the 

 sides. Tail rather short, slender, conical, tapering; subcaudal 

 plates two-rowed, flat on the inner and somewhat bent up on the 

 outer sides. 



This snake has somewhat the external appearance of a small 

 Boa, 



Cynophis bistrigatus. — Yellow, rather paler beneath ; a narrow 

 erect streak under the eyes on the suture of the sixth and seventh, 

 and an oblique one from the back edge of the eyes to the suture 

 of the eighth and ninth upper labial, a short broad streak on each 



