1904.] N. Annandale — Collection of Oriental SnaJces, 211 



Coloration. — Dorsal surface intense black: ventral surface dark- 

 grey with a pearly lustre. Chin and throat yellow ; a yellow bar across 

 the top of the head slightly behind the nostrils : head-shields sparingly 

 dashed with yellow : an incomplete yellow collar on the nape. On the 

 tail and body about sixty yellow rings, narrow and more or less V-shap- 

 ed above, expanding below, sometimes joined together longitudinally by 

 irregular blotches of the same colour on the belly. 



VIPERID^. 

 24. Eristocophis macmahonii* Ale. and Finn 

 E. Macmahonii, Ale and Finn, op. cit. p. 664. 



25. PSEUDOCERASTES PERSICUS* (Pall. ?) 



P. persicus, Blgr. Cat. SnaJces iii, p. 601. 



A specimen, collected and presented by Lieut. F. 0, Webb- Ware, 

 from Koh Malik, Sujah, Baluchistan. I am not aware that this snake 

 has hitherto been recorded from British India. Boulenger gives the 

 distribution as Persia. 



26. Ancistrodon rhodostoma* (Boie) 



A, rhodostoma, Blgr. Oat. Snakes iii, p. 527 ; Fascic. Malay. Zool. i, 

 pp. 170, 171, 176. 



Several specimens from the Royal Natural History Society of 

 Batavia. 



This snake has recently been recorded by Boulenger from the 

 Siamese Malay States and from the island of Salangka, Salang or Junk 

 Ceylon. Probably it will be reported from Tenasserim also, as it is said 

 to occur in Siam. The Malays of Patani, where Mr. H. C. Robinson and I 

 have collected it, deny that its bite is deadly. A servant of mine was bitten 

 in the foot by a snake which he stated to belong to this species near the 

 Siamese border in Upper Perak; The effect was very little more serious 

 than that of a hornet's sting. Boulenger, however, talks of " this large and 

 deadly Crotaline snake," and probably the venom is more powerful in 

 specimens from Java, where the snake would appear to be far more 

 common than it is in most parts of the Malay Peninsula. All poison- 

 ous snakes except the Hydrophinee are, however, scarce in both the 

 Federated and the Siamese Malay States. In the latter, where I have 

 spent, in the aggregate, more than a year collecting reptiles and other 

 animals, I have only twice come across a cobra. 



