Description. Body above black, with three vittæ; vertebral vitta ocraceous, occupying the dorsal series of scales and a moiety of each one of the second series each side; lateral vitta greenish-yellow, occupying more than the moiety of the seven and eight series of scales: beneath the lateral vitta the black is tinged with greenish-blue; head with seven olivaceous plates above; parietal ones with a double, white, longitudinal spot: intermaxillary plate pentangular, the superior termination obtusely rounded; posterior canthus of the eye three-scaled, of which the two inferior ones are white; anterior canthus white; supermaxillary plates bluish-green; maxillary angles with a small black dot; inferior maxilla white beneath; beneath pale greenish-blue.
Plates 178, scales 86.
| Total length | 2 ft. | 7¼ in. |
| Tail | 7¾ in. |
Resembles Coluber saurita, ordinatus and parietalis. Numerous longitudinal, abbreviated white lines, may be observed by dilating the black portion of the skin as in ordinatus; these lines or spots are obsolete upon the neck and upon the posterior portion of the body. The extreme tip of the tail is wanting in this specimen.
It differs from saurita in the numerical proportion which its subcaudal scales bear to its plates; from ordinatus it may be distinguished by being destitute of the two series of black points beneath; it is a much more slender serpent than parietalis, and the tail is proportionally longer.—James.
[195] The name of this dance is apparently a derivative of the Canadian-French gingue (se mettre en), meaning to engage in the gaiety of a lively company. The verb ginguer means to run or jump hither and thither; it is a derivative of the Norman giguer, which has the same meaning.—Ed.
[196] Lucien Fontenelle, born in New Orleans of French parents, fled from his home when fifteen years of age, and engaged in the fur-trade at St. Louis. Later he became a leader in the mountain explorations of the American Fur Company. His wife was an Omaha woman, and some of his descendants were prominent in the history of Nebraska; a son, Logan Fontenelle, became a chief of the Omaha tribe. Fontenelle is supposed by some to have committed suicide at Fort Laramie, about 1836, but the manner of his death is uncertain.—Ed.
[197] The Gens des Feuilles (People of the Leaves) were the Assiniboin tribe of the Siouan family. Lewis and Clark reported their numbers at two hundred and fifty men. At that time they lived on White River, in South Dakota.—Ed.
[198] In Dickinson County, Iowa.—Ed.
[199] Sha-mon-e-kus-se.—James.