CHAPTER X 



THE SPECIFIC CHARACTERS OF BRITISH LIZARDS 



TEEMINOLOGY OF HEAD SCALES — SPECIFIC SCALING OF 



THE THEEE SPECIES CLASSIFICATION OF BRITISH 



SPECIES. 



The average field naturalist is not as a rule very- 

 interested in questions of minute structure and details 

 of classification, unless he be a botanist or an entomo- 

 logist. He is generally satisfied with being able 

 to distinguish an adder from a ring-snake without 

 troubling to learn the particular scaling arrangements 

 which are characteristic of the species. And this 

 state of knowledge or ignorance will be found to be 

 specially applicable to the group of reptiles, the lizards 

 as well as the snakes. If one inquires from the field 

 worker — as the present writer has frequently done — 

 why it is that the specific characters of our reptiles 

 are so neglected, the reply given is that none of the 

 semi-popular books which deal with the fauna of this 

 country explain how those characters are arrived at, or 



the meanings of the descriptive terms used for each 

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