204 [DreceMBER, 
upper jaw, immediately below the nostril, on each side of the head, is a curved 
and perforated immovable fang about three lines in length; there is no pit between 
the eye and the nostril, and this space is not channelled as in L. gracilis and Kirt- 
landii; several of the anterior teeth in the lower jaw are much larger than the 
others; the longest is slender and deeply fissured anteriorly. The neck is contract- 
ed, the body long, thicker about the middle, covered above with long and smooth 
quadrangular scales, arranged in thirteen rows; the scales nearest the abdomen 
are shorter than the others; the tail is quite long, covered above with four rows 
of short hexagonal scales, with margins more or less rounded posteriorly; the 
plates upon the under part of the tail are bifid. 
Color.—Head olive colored above, lighter upon the sides; the posterior margins 
of the labial plates black ; posterior margin of inferior labials also black; neck, 
upper part and sides of body green, the scales upon the posterior part of the 
body bordered with black; abdomen greenish, without spots or blotches; tail 
greenish olive, many of the scales bordered with black. 
Dimensions.—Length of head 1 inch 4 lines; greatest breadth 9 lines; length 
of body 3 ft. 11 inch. 24 lines; length of tail 1 ft. 5 inch. 7 lines; total length 
5 ft. 7 inch. 2 lines; greatest circumference 2 inch. 8 lines. 
I have named this serpent after my friend Ogden Hammond, Esq., of Charles- 
ton, S. Carolina. 
Dimensions of a larger specimen.—Length of head 1 inch 6} lines; greatest 
breadth 11 lines; breadth between the orbits posteriorly 9 lines ; length of body 
4 ft. 64 inches; of tail 1 ft. 5 inch. 9 lines; total Jength 6 ft. 1. in. 93 lines ; 
greatest circumference 3 inches. Abdom. scuta 225; 112 pairs of subcaudal 
lates. 
: Habitat.—Liberia, W.Africa. Two specimens in the Museum of the Academy, 
presented by Dr. Goheen. 
Remarks.—The dentition of this anima] is very remarkable, no serpent with 
which I am acquainted having a single immovable perforated fang on each side 
of the anterior portion of the upper jaw. It is well known to Herpetologists 
that, although in Vipera, Naja, and other genera of venomous snakes, the exte- 
rior row of teeth is wanting, the poisonous fangs in certain serpents have behind 
them a number of smaller grooved teeth. This condition exists, according to 
Prof. Owen, in all the family of marine serpents, four such being found in Hy- 
drophis striata, and five in Hydrophis schistosa. This is the case also in Bun- 
garus, a land serpent, and in Hamadryas, a genus of poisonous tree snakes* in 
India, established by Dr. Cantor. In our own venomous serpents, Elaps, Tri- 
gonocephalus and Crotalus, the exterior row of teeth is wanting. In this re- 
spect they resemble Dinophis, but the fang in the latter genus is, as above stated, 
quite immovable. In one of the specimens a movable perforated fang was ob- 
served on the right side behind the other immovable one. 
Dr. Edward Whitaker Gray, in the Philosophical Transactions of London for 
1789, makes some interestiug observations on the “ class of animals called by 
Linnzeus, amphibia; particularly on the means of distinguishing those serpents 
which are venomous from those which are not so.”’ He arrives at the conclusion 
that the only mode of distinguishing a venomous from a non-venomous serpent 
is by an examination of their teeth; the tail; which is usually short in the 
venomous species, being sometimes short in the innocuous. This is the case 
in Pityophis affinis, and melanoleucus, both harmless serpents, with very 
short tails. Serpents whose appearance indicates inoffensiveness are not unfre- 
quently very dangerous, as in the instance above cited, and in that of the genus 
Sepedon of Merrem, and Distichurus maculatus, which is quite small, and resem- 
bles in its general appearance an ordinary Coluber, but is provided with a small 
isolated fang on each side of the upper jaw. One of these, I have been informed, 
* These poisonous tree snakes are probably more numerous in the East than 
is generally supposed. Dr. Ruschenberger informs me that in Siam he observed 
a large green tree snake, which was said by the natives to be very venomous. 
| Proceedings of the Zoological Society 6f London, 1838, p. 72. 
