other oviparous quadrupeds, it is capable of existing a long time without food. Some of them have been kept in bottles, without any nourishment, for up

wards of six months.

In the southern countries of Europe, the Nimble Lizard revives, very early in the spring, from the torpid state in which it had passed the cold weather of the winter; and, recovering its activity, begins its sportive evolutions, which increase in agility in proportion to the heat of the atmosphere. In the beginning of May, the female deposits her eggs, which are nearly spherical, and about five lines in diameter, in some warm situation; as, for instance, at the foot of a wall fronting the south. Here they are hatched by the heat of the sun.

Previously to laying the eggs, both male and female change their skins, which they again do about the beginning of winter.-They pass that season in a state of torpor, more or less complete, according to the rigour of the season, either in holes of trees, or walls, or subterraneous places. They quit these retreats on the first appearance of spring*.

This little animal seems occasionally to lay aside the gentleness and innocence of disposition which is attributed to it; still, however, no further than for the purpose of obtaining food. Mr. Edwards once surprised one of them in the act of fighting with a small bird, as she sate on her nest in a vine against the wall, with newly-hatched young. He

*La Cepede, i. 370.

supposed the Lizard would have made them a prey, could be but have driven the old bird from her nest. He watched the contest for some time; but, on his near approach, the Lizard dropped to the ground, and the bird flew off *.

THE CHAMELEON †.

The Chamæleon is a native of India, Africa, and some of the warmer parts of Spain and Portugal. The usual length of its body is about ten inches, and that of the tail nearly the same.

Though an animal extremely ugly and disgusting in its appearance, it is perfectly harmless, feeding only on insects, for which the structure of its tongue is peculiarly adapted, being long and missile, and furnished with a dilated, glutinous, and somewhat tubular tip. By means of this it seizes insects with the greatest ease, darting it out, and instantaneously retracting it, with the prey secured on its tip, which it swallows whole. The skin is covered with small warts or granulations, and down the middle of the back it is serrated. The feet have five toes united three and two, to enable it to lay firmly hold of the branches of trees, in which it principally resides; and to this end also its tail is prehensile, and is always coiled round the branch till the animal has secured a firm footing. Its mo

Edwards, i. 34.

+ Lacerta Chamæleon. Linn.-Le Caméleon. La Cepede.Shaw's Gen. Zool, vol. iii. tab. 76.

tions are very slow. The lungs are so large as to allow it to inflate the body to a vast size. The structure and motions of its eyes are singular: these are large and globular, and so formed that at the same instant it can look in different directions. One of them may frequently be seen to move when the other is at rest; or one will often be directed forwards, while the other is attending to some object behind, or in the same manner upwards and downwards.

The Chamæleon is principally celebrated for the singular property that it has of occasionally changing its colour. Not having myself witnessed this operation, I shall present the reader with the accounts of three persons who have: there appears a considerable difference in the relations; this, however, he must reconcile as well as he is able.. The writers I allude to are D'Obsonville, Hasselquist, and Dr. Russel.

The colour of the Chamæleon, says D'Obsonville, is naturally green, but it is susceptible of many shades, and particularly of three very distinct ones; Saxon green, deep green, and a shade bordering on blue and yellow green. When free, in health, and at ease, it is a beautiful green, some parts excepted, where the skin, being thicker and more rough, produces gradations of brown, red, or light gray. When the animal is provoked, in open air, and well fed, it becomes blue-green; but when feeble, or deprived of free air, the prevailing tint is the yellow-green. Under other circumstances, and especially at the approach of one of its own

species, no matter of which sex, or when surrounded and teased by a number of insects thrown upon him, he then, almost in a moment, takes alternately the three different tints of green. If he is dying, particularly of hunger, the yellow is at first predominant; but in the first stage of putrefaction this changes to the colour of dead leaves.

It seems that the causes of these different varieties are several and first, the blood of the Chamaleon is of a violet blue, which colour it will preserve for some minutes on linen or paper, especially on such as have been steeped in alum-water. In the second place, the different tunicles of the vessels are yellow, as well in their trunks as in their ramifications. The epidermis, or exterior skin, when separated from the other, is transparent, without any colour; and the second skin is yellow, as well as all the little vessels that touch it. Hence it is probable that the change of colour depends upon the mixtures of blue and yellow, from which result different shades of green. Thus, when the animal, healthy, and well fed, is provoked, its blood is carried in greater abundance from the heart towards the extremities; and, swelling the vessels that are spread over the skin, its blue colour subsides the yellow of the vessels, and produces a blue green that is seen through the epidermis. When, on the contrary, the animal is impoverished and deprived of free air, the exterior vessels being more empty, their colour prevails, and the animal becomes a yellow-green till it recovers its liberty, is well nourished, and without pain, when it regains the co

lour; this being the consequence of an equilibrium in the liquids, and of a due proportion of them in the vessels*.

Hasselquist says, that he never observed the Chamæleon assume the colour of an external object presented to its view, although he made several experiments for the purpose. He says its natural colour is an iron gray, or black mixed with a little gray. This it sometimes changes, and becomes entirely of a brimstone yellow, which, except the former, is the colour it most frequently assumes. It sometimes takes a darker or greenish yellow, and sometimes a lighter. He did not observe it assume any other colours; such as blue, red, purple, &c. When changing from black to yellow, the soles of its feet, its head, and the bag under its throat, were the first tinged; and then, by degrees, that colour spread over the rest of the body. He several times saw it marked with large spots of both colours all over its body, which gave it an elegant appearance. When it became of an iron gray it dilated its skin, and became plump and handsome; but as soon as it turned yellow, it contracted itself, and appeared empty, lean, and ugly and the ncarer it approached in colour to white, the more empty and ugly it appeared; but its shape was always the most unpleasant when it was speckled.-Mr. Hasselquist kept a Chameleon for near a month; it was, during the whole time, very nimble and lively, climbing up and

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*D'Obsonville, 35