SNAKES OF CEYLON. 129 



The green bright though it is, is not due to green pigment. 

 A yellow pigment overlies the scales like a varnish. This 

 is soluble in spirit, to which it imparts its colour, leaving 

 the specimen first bluish, then blue, and finally plumbeous. 

 Boiling the skin rapidly dissolves out the yellow pigment, 

 and reveals the underlying blue of the scales. Some speci- 

 mens are darker than others, and when the yellow pigment 

 is removed acquire a plumbeous hue. The skin is slate- 

 coloured or dun, spotted and mottled with whitish, except 

 in the flanks, where it is white. Short white lines arranged 

 so as to form chevrons pointed forwards are seen in the skin 

 where it is dun. There is also a series of white ring-like 

 spots in the skin, on either side of the 9th and 10th costal 

 rows above the ventrals, a feature I have not observed in 

 any other snake. 



Habits. — (a) Haunts : Its colouration is protective, for 

 it frequents grass and low terrestrial vegetation. It does not 

 usually clamber into trees and bushes, but one sent to me 

 from Coorg was reported found on a coffee branch. It very 

 frequently strays into bungalows, and I have had many sent 

 to me with a history of its incursion into habitations. Miss 

 Montgomery found one at Broach in an empty soda water 

 bottle in damp straw in her godown. 



(b) Disposition: It is a singularly gentle and inoffensive 

 snake. When provoked I have never seen it bite, nor when 

 it has been picked up in its native haunts. 



(c) Posture of Menace : When encountered and alarmed, 

 it erects its forebody and flattens the neck like a cobra to 

 a remarkable degree, and it is, no doubt, this attitude which 

 has gained for it the name of green cobra, which some estate 

 coolies call it in India. Some specimens are very timid and 

 crouch, flattening the whole body to the vent on to the 

 ground. 



(d) Nocturnal or Diurnal : It is frequently encountered in 

 the daytime in grass and low scrub jungle, and appears to 

 be loath to quit such an environment by day. I have fre- 

 quently, however, encountered it at night crossing roads or 

 in open spaces. 



22 6(6)20 



