92 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



brown, are females. There are also brown males with the 

 markings of an intense black, and grey males with brown markings. 

 A very pretty colour-variety, which affects only females, is olive 

 with brick-red band and spots. Some males have the lower 

 surface of a pale greyish blue (Coluber cceruleus, Sheppard), with 

 the outer ends of the ventrals and caudals black. Specimens 

 with yellowish white chin and throat, which may be tinged with 

 red, are females ; males have the throat black, or whitish with 

 the scales spotted or edged with black. In some Vipers the 

 zigzag band is partly broken up into rhomboidal spots, but I have 

 not yet seen or heard of British specimens in which it is entirely 

 absent. Spanish and Italian specimens are known with a broad 

 straight dorsal band, edged on each side by a lighter streak. The 

 wholly black Vipers (Coluber prester, L.), of which two British 

 specimens (Kent and Isle of Arran) are in the British Museum, 

 are said to be usually females, and to bring forth normally- 

 coloured young. However, black males exist, as testified by Jan 

 and by Blum ; the former author figures one from the Tyrol, the 

 latter records another from Baden. An entirely black male, from 

 Denmark, is in the British Museum, together with a female, from 

 the same locality, which is black above and bluish grey beneath. 

 J. Geithe (in A. B. Meyer's iv. Jahresb. d. Ornithol. Beobachtung. 

 im K. Sachsen, 1889, p. 149) regards the statement that the so- 

 called V. prester are mostly females as erroneous. According to 

 his experience the deep-black Vipers are males ; so-called black 

 females are only of a very dark brown, showing more or less 

 distinctly the black zigzag band. A female of the latter description 

 produced in confinement 17 young, of which only one was black, 

 and that one was a male. My own experience is that melanism 

 has nothing to do with sexes, for, as stated above, I have examined 

 perfectly black examples of females, as well as of males. Prof. 

 Mobius has observed that in North Germany the black variety is, 

 generally speaking, confined to fens, the brighter specimens to dry 

 localities. Another variety (Coluber scyiha, Pallas), black above 

 and white below, is only known from Germany and Eussia. Any 

 notes on the variations in colour and markings will prove of inte- 

 rest, provided the sex of the specimens has been ascertained. 



9. The Size. — Vipera berm, according to some continental 

 authorities, may reach a length of 39 inches (900 millimetres), 

 although but rarely exceeding 2 feet. Mr. G. E. Lodge (Zool. 





