532 SNAKES OF CEYLON, 



Usually the ground colour in the echis is a light shade of 

 brown, buff, or tawny, and the markings are darker brown or 

 even blackish. In sandy places, where I have usually met with 

 it, it harmonizes wonderfully with its surroundings. Sir A. H. 

 McMahon writes to me : " The Echis adapts itself to the 

 colouring of the locality. I have found them of all shades of 

 colour, from the lightest fawn in sand to almost black in dark 

 rocky country." The body dorsally is more or less mottled 

 or blotched with darker shades, sometimes with a decided 

 regularity of pattern, more frequently, I think, irregularly 

 distributed with no special arrangement. These marks may 

 be so obscure as to be hardly noticeable in light specimens, 

 or so heavily abundant that they form the predominating 

 colour, when the specimen is deep umber or blackish. A light 

 undulatory line in the flanks is nearly always more or less 

 evident. The head often bears a light patch on the middle 

 of the crown, which is frequently shaped like a dagger, a broad 

 arrow, or the imprint of a bird's foot, and there is often a more 

 or less conspicuous streak behind the eye. The belly is light, 

 often whitish, and is more or less profusely specked, mottled, 

 or spotted with darker, and often rufous, bistre, or ruddy 

 tints. I have sometimes seen a pinkish band down the middle 

 of the belly. 



Habits. — (a) Haunts : It is essentially a desert snake, but 

 occurs plentifully in semi-desert tracts where the soil, though 

 sandy and poor, supports some sparse vegetation, so long as 

 open patches intervene. In Delhi it appeared to be most 

 plentiful on the ridge, where the broken and rocky nature 

 of the ground afforded special facilities for concealment or 

 retirement in the face of danger ; but there are many waste 

 sandy tracts where rocks do not occur where it thrives in 

 great numbers. Blanford obtained 2 or 3 specimens in thin 

 jungle about Ellore, and expressed surprise at finding a desert 

 form like the echis in wooded country. It is not found in 

 dense jungle, for the reason, I suppose, that its colouration 

 in such an environment would no longer be protective, added 

 to which it does not appear to need shade, enjoying as it does 

 the fiercest rays of the tropical sun, and at the hottest seasons 

 of the year. It may be seen lying in the sand exposed to 



