The present species, which is commonly exhibited under the popular but erroneous title of the Boa Constrictor, appears to be the Pedda Poda of Dr. Russell’s Indian Serpents. It is said by that writer to attain a length of eight or ten feet; but living specimens have been brought to this country of twice that size, and some of those now in the Tower are fifteen or sixteen feet long. The number of transverse plates on the under surface of the body is stated to be two hundred and fifty-two, and that of the pairs of scales beneath the tail sixty-two. The back is elegantly marked with a series of large irregular brown blotches bordered with black; and numerous smaller spots are scattered along the sides. The ground colour is yellowish brown, lighter beneath. The extent of muscular power which these serpents possess in common with the Boas is truly wonderful. To the smaller among them the lesser quadrupeds and even birds fall an easy prey; but the larger, when excited by the stimulus of hunger, are capable of crushing within their spiral folds the largest and most powerful of beasts. The sturdy buffalo and the agile stag become alike the victims of their fatal embrace; and the bulk of these animals presents but little obstacle to their being swallowed entire by the tremendous reptile, which crushes them as it were into a mass, lubricates them with the fetid mucus secreted in its stomach, and then slowly distending its jaws and œsophagus to an extent proportioned to the magnitude of the object to be devoured, and frequently exceeding by many times its own previous size, swallows it by one gradual and long-continued effort. Of the mode in which this operation is effected, a detailed description is contained in Macleod’s Voyage of His Majesty’s Ship Alceste; and an excellent account has been subsequently given by Mr. Broderip in the second volume of the Zoological Journal from actual observation of the specimens now in the Tower. The vivid description of the latter almost brings before the reader’s eye the lightning dash of the serpent; the single scream of its instantly enfolded victim, whose heaving flanks proclaimed that it still breathed; and its last desperate effort, succeeded by the application of another and a deadly coil. With equal force and fidelity it sketches the continuation of the scene, when the serpent, after slowly disengaging his folds, placed his head opposite to that of his victim, coiled himself once more around it to compress it into the narrowest possible compass, and then gradually propelled it into his separated jaws and dilated throat; and finally presents a disgusting picture of the snake when his meal was at an end, with his loose and apparently dislocated jaws dropping with the superfluous mucus which had been poured forth.