232 
MOUNT EDGECUMBE. 
The Black Snake is subject to considerable vari- 
ation in colour. The most common variety (a) is 
black, highly polished ; with the ventral plates bluish 
grey, and iridescent. Var. /3 is black with a dead 
lustre, like the bloom on a plum ; and has a row of 
large square palish spots on each side of the back, 
but not on the tail. It appears as if obscurely 
banded. The chin is white, mottled with brick-red. 
Var. y is polished black, like a, but has a single 
scale here and there pale yellow. Var. d has the 
upper parts dark brownish grey; the abdominal 
shields lead grey ; the chin and sides of the face 
whitish, mottled with brick-red and dark grey. This 
was a remarkable deviation from the normal colouring. 
It was killed in January, at Mount Edgecumbe grass- 
piece, by the seaside. I took from its stomach a 
common Anolis, and a young Woodslave {Mahouya) 
both considerably digested. Lizards constitute the 
principal food of our Snakes. The greatest length 
attained by any Black Snake that I have measured 
was thirty-nine inches, of which the tail occupied 
exactly one-third. The irides are dark hazel, or 
golden brown during life, and the pupil is circular. 
NEGRO PROPER NAMES. 
I learned a very curious fact from an old coloured 
lady, which may probably be as interesting to others 
as it was to me. The names which in anecdotes and 
tales we often see applied to negroes, as Quashy, 
Cudjo, &c. are not promiscuously appropriated, nor 
are they meaningless. They indicate the day of the 
