SAURIA. 19 



under the belly and round the tail; on the top of the latter is a carina 

 formed by a double row of projecting scales. The range of pores 

 observed on the thighs of several other Saurians is not found in 

 these. They are all from the eastern continent.(l) Two species are 

 found in Egypt which may be considered as the types of two subdi- 

 visions. 



Lac. nilotica, L.; Monitor du Nil.; Ouaran of the Arabsj Mus. 

 Worm. 313; Geoflf. St. Hil., great work on Egypt; Rep. pi. 1, 

 f. 1. Strong conical teeth, the posterior of which become round- 

 ed by age; brown, with pale and deeper coloured dots, forming 

 various compartments, among which we observe transverse rows 

 of large ocellated spots that become rings on the tail. The lat- 

 ter round at base is traversed above by a carina which extends 

 almost from root to tip. It attains a length of five and six feet. 

 The Egyptians pretend it is a young Crocodile hatched in a 

 dry place. It was engraved upon the monuments of that coun- 

 try by its ancient inhabitants, and possibly, because it devours 

 the eggs of the Crocodile.(2) The other species, 



Lac. scincus^ Merr.: Monitor terrestre cl'Egypte; Ouaran el 

 hard of the Arabs, Geoffr. Egypt. Rept. Ill, f. 2, has compress- 

 ed, trenchant, and pointed teeth; the tail almost without a keel 

 and round much farther from the root; its habits are more ter- 

 restrial, and it is common in the deserts in the vicinity of Egypt. 

 The jugglers of Cairo, after extracting its teeth, employ it in 

 their art. It is the Land Crocodile of Herodotus, and as Pros- 

 per Albin remarks, the true Scincus of the ancients. (3) 



India and Africa produce a great number of Monitors Avith 

 trenchant teeth like those of the preceding species, but whose 

 tail is more compressed than even that of the Lac. nilotica. The 

 one most common in the Indian archipelago is the 



Zac. bivittata, Kuhl, which is white above, black beneath, 

 with five transverse rows of white spots or rings. A white band 

 extends along the neck, and there is an angle formed by the 



(1) Seba, and from him Daudin, describe some true Monitors as American; it is 

 a mistake. 



(2) To this species, both by the form of the teetliand the arrangement of the 

 spots, which, by-the-bye, are similar in almost all the Monitors, must be referred 

 the 71/. orn^ {M. ornatu's, Daud. )> Ann. Mus. II, xlviii, Lac. capensis, Sparm. and 

 the M. albogularis, Daud. l{ept. Ill, pi. xxxii. 



It is from this subdivision that M. Fitzlnger has made his genus "VAnANus, 

 under whicli name Merrem comprized all tlie Monitors. 



(3) This species constitutes the genus Psammosatikus of M. Fitzinger. 



