422 F. Stoliczka — On Indian and Burmese Ophidians. [No. 4, 



Messrs. Sehlagintweit, and other collectors, and these apparently 

 authenticated statements have given rise among European Zoolo- 

 gists to all kinds of strange ideas, either about the adaptitude of the 

 Himalayas to different faunas, or about the plasticity of the organiza- 

 tion of certain species enabling them to inhabit very different eleva- 

 tions and climates. There is, in reality, no foundation for such ideas, 

 and the sooner these wrong notions and interpretations are dissipat- 

 ed, the better will our fauna be understood, as well as the physical 

 character of the Himalayas themselves. Tropical and subtropical 

 forms often occur in the Himalayas far in the interior, and in very close 

 proximity, but they are always confined to the deep, warm and damp, 

 valleys, while at the greater elevations of the neighbouring ranges an 

 altogether different fauna exists. Titus, although frequent reference 

 is made to one place as the locality of a species, this may really refer 

 to an entirely different division of the fauna, and this is what consti- 

 tutes the great peculiarity of the Himalayas regarding the distribu- 

 tion of animal and vegetable life, and the difficulty of understanding 

 it, as I have pointed out (in Journ. Asiat. Soc. Bengal, 1868, vol. 

 xxxvii, p. 4 et seq.) with reference to the Sutlej valley. 



As a particular instance in illustration of these remarks, I 

 give the following list of species of snakes which were obtained 

 by Mr. Mandeli, or by myself, in the Eangnu and Tista valleys 

 below and S. E. of Darjiling, mostly at elevations varying from 

 1500 to 3000 feet. They are— 



Tgplilops Horsfieldi, (rare) ; T. braminus, (common) ; T. por rectus, 

 (n. sp., rare) ; Traehiscium ftcscum, (common) ; Ablabes collaris and 

 IZappii, (common) ; Simotes punctulalus, var. a, (B and y, apud Griin- 

 ther, (common) ; S. bicatenatus (not common) ; Zaocys nigromargi- 

 natus, (rare) ; Compsosoma reticulars, (not common) ; Comps. radia- 

 tum, (common) ; Comps. Hodgsoni, (rare) ; Coluber porphgraceus, 

 (common) ; Tropidonotus subminiatus, (common) ; T. quincunctiatus, 

 (common) ; T. macrops, (not common) ; T. junceus, (rare) ; T. 

 Uimalayanus, (rare) ; T. platgceps, (common) ; Dendrophis picta, 

 (common) ; Ckrysopelea ornata, (not common) ; Tragops prasinus, 

 (common) ; Passerita mycterizans, (not common) ; Psammodynastes 

 pulwrulentus, (rare) ; Pareas monticola* (rare) ; Dipsas bubalina, 



* Giinther I. R., p. 327. In a specimen no labials enter the orbit, a small 



