818 REPTILIA. 



the hinder part of the body and tail, tend to bifurcate or divide at their free 

 extremities. Stoliczka ' has recorded that the male of S. platyceps, Blyth, is also 

 distinguished from its female by the stronger keeling of the scales. This male of 

 >S'. modestus was captured in the Khasia Hills by the late Lieutenant Bourne in 

 the Very same locality in which he obtained the females which have been com- 

 pared with the types of the species. Its sex was determined not by any fancied 

 external characters distinctive of the sexes, but by actual dissection. Comparing 

 this specimen with a female of nearly the same dimensions of body, the tail in the 

 latter is 8 inches to 6*20 inches in the male; but the comparison of a large series 

 of females reveals the fact that the tail in them is, at the same time, liable to vary 

 slightly in its length. 



The Yunnan specimens, two in number, have 8 and 10 ventrals less than the 

 smallest number of ventrals in the Cherra Poonjee snakes, viz., 162, whereas their 

 sub-caudals are respectively 122 and 110 ; the largest number of sub-caudals that 

 I have met with in specimens from the Khasia Hills being 108. 



In the Yunnan snakes, the colour is uniform dark olive-brown above, the ground 

 colour of the under surface being yellow, but each ventral has a black spot on its 

 angle, these spots becoming confluent on the hinder part of the body, and prolonged 

 on to the sub-caudals as a black line. A narrow pale-olive yellow lateral band runs 

 along the body above the spots, disappearing on the posterior half of the body. 

 There is an obscure short pale-yellow band from the gape on to the side of the nape, 

 followed by a lateral series of pale spots separated from each other by an interval of 

 two scales. On the posterior half of the trunk, these spots become confluent, and 

 are prolonged on to the tail as an obscure yellowish band. All the labials have 

 blackish posterior margins, and their surfaces, and those of the chin-shields and the 

 sub-caudals, are more or less speckled with dusky-brown. 



In the examples from the Khasia Hills the coloration somewhat differs from the 

 foregoing. The colour of the upper surface is dark olive-blackish, the pale band on 

 the sides of the nape is hardly visible, and the pale lateral spots and band are very 

 obscure, and are almost lost. The dark colour of the upper parts passes on to the 

 sides of the ventrals, and meets from either side nearly in the mesial line on the 

 anterior part of the body, and wholly so posteriorly, and on the sub-caudals ; but a 

 narrow yellow area is generally left along the free margin of each plate, and is the 

 representative of the yellow lateral line of the Yunnan snakes. The labials, chin- 

 shields and throat are speckled or clouded with dusky. In the male from Cherra 

 Poonjee, the pale lateral spots are very distinct, and the pale Hne along the angles of 

 the ventrals is observable, also the two rows of dark or black spots, one above, 

 and the other below the pale lateral spots. In this specimen, as in some Cherra 

 Poonjee females, the pale narrow line from the gape, along the side of the nape, is 

 also observable. 



The types of this species were in all probability from the Khasia Hills. It is 

 closely allied to T. platyceps, Blyth. 



^ Journ. As. Soc, Bengal, 1870, vol, xxxix, p. J9l. 



