Schlegel and Dumeril are two authorities on serpents much quoted by English writers, and both give us a list of all the naturalists of repute who have done service to herpetology, up to the date of their works. As many of these are introduced in the body of my work, let us glance at the progress of ophiology since the date of these two distinguished authors. In zoology as much as in any branch of science progressiveness is observable; and in zoology the advance of ophiology has of late years been remarkable. In 1843, when Schlegel’s _Essai sur la Physionomie des Serpents_, 1837, was translated into English by Dr. Thos. Stewart Traill, of the University of Edinburgh, he mentioned as a reason for curtailing the original (and not adding the atlas containing 421 figures, with charts and tables), that the low state of ophiology in this country did not invite a larger work, and ‘deters booksellers from undertaking such costly illustrations;’ but he hoped to be useful to science by cultivating a branch of zoology hitherto neglected. Ten years prior to that date, viz. 1833, the monthly scientific magazine _The Zoologist_ was started; in introducing which the Editor, Mr. Ed. Newman, wrote: ‘To begin, the attempt to combine scientific truths with readable English has been considered by my friends one of surpassing rashness;’ that he had ‘many solicitations to desist from so hopeless a task,’ and many ‘supplications to introduce a few Latin descriptions to give it a scientific character,’ science being then confined to the scientific alone. Nevertheless the _Zoologist_ has survived half a century, and under able editorship has taken its stand as a popular as well as scientific journal. Formerly you might have hunted the pages of such magazines year after year without finding mention of an ‘odious snake;’ but within the last decade, not only this but other periodicals have frequently opened their pages to ophiology, and a considerable removal of prejudice is noticeable.