92 BRITISH SERPENTS. 
and found a regular collection of reptiles and ai- 
phibians. There were six slow-worms and a fine 
specimen of the great water-newt, Molge crastata. 
Whether the adder knew all that was under that 
stone or not may be doubted, but if she contem- 
plated swallowing the lot, I am very sorry that we 
did not come an hour or so later. In the summer 
of 1900 1 killed an adder in Kentchureh Park, which 
was also lying on a stone under which were three 
specimens of the small smooth newt; and probably 
in both these cases the adder was on the point of 
feeding. The smooth newts are shown in the illus- 
tration on opposite page. 
How to distinguish the sexes. 
At first sight 
it would appear to be a matter of some difficulty 
to tell a male from a female adder, but careful 
exannation of a few specimens will soon enable 
the field naturalist to determine the sex without 
trouble. External appearances alone are quite suff- 
cient for this purpose, without going into any inter- 
nal anatomical details. The pomts to be noted are 
the total leneth of the specimen, the length of the 
tail, the shape of the tail, the number of shields on 
the body and tail, and the colouration of the adder, 
Total lenglh.—n order that this may be of as- 
sistance, it 18 necessary for the observer to know 
the average length of adders in the particular loeal- 
ity from which the specimen is taken. Given this 
knowledge, it will be found that the females are from 
