PART III 



ORDER LACERTILIA—THR LIZARDS 



Looking down upon the vast Order now engaging 

 the student's attention, even the most passive of ob- 

 servers cannot refrain from expressing amazement at 

 the array of varied forms. Under the head of the 

 Lacertilia we shall consider creatures seven feet long, 

 with claws as long as those of the leopard — animals 

 strong and active enough to leap at the throat of a 

 young gazelle, tear, dismember and devour the prey; 

 and passing such we stop to realize that tiny, limbless 

 and worm-like, slow -moving things, burrowing their life 

 away deep in the ground where they need no eyes — in 

 fact, have none— are also true lizards. Among these 

 hordes of scaly life we shall find lizards that rush over 

 the ground with such speed they appear as but a streak 

 to the human eye ; others having adhesive digits and with 

 equal speed can traverse the smooth face of a precipice 

 or run head downward over a horizontal surface; and 

 yet others that swim with the strength of crocodilians, 

 while a few have parachute-like wings with which they 

 sail from tree to tree. From one family we may ab- 

 ruptly arrive at another where the species are so slow 

 in movements they rely upon a remarkable resemblance 

 to the hues of their arboreal homes for protection, for 

 with these the motions might appeal to us like the slow 

 relaxation of the muscles of some dying creature. 

 Again we come upon lizards without vestiges of limbs, 

 gliding away like serpents, or species with limbs so 



91 



