130 SAURIA. SCINCID.E. 



Like most of the tribe, the Viviparous Lizard 

 varies considerably in its colours and markings. 

 The most common variety is of an olive hue, with 

 a line of dark brown down the back, and a 

 band of the same down each side, with rows of 

 black spots between ; the under parts are, in the 

 male, bright orange, spotted with black, — in the 

 female pale greyish-green, without spots. Six 

 inches is the average length of the adult male. 



Family VII. — Scincid.1;. 



(^Snake- Lizards.) 



There is not perhaps in the whole circle of 

 zoology, a more beautiful example of the grada- 

 tion between forms whose extremities are widely 

 distinct from each other, than is presented by the 

 gradual and almost imperceptible transition of the 

 Lizards into the Serpents. If we look at a Cha- 

 meleon, or an Iguana on the one hand, and then 

 at a Rattlesnake or a Cobra di Capello on the other, 

 they seem almost as remotely separated as animals 

 of the same class can be ; and yet so minute are 

 the steps by which we are led from one to the 

 other, that it is impossible with any satisfaction 

 to draw a line that shall divide them, other than 

 such as is merely conventional and arbitrary. 

 Pressed by this difficulty, while some zoologists, 

 as Mr. Gray, separate the Lizards from the 

 Serpents by a third order, called Saurophidia, 

 constituted expressly for the reception of these 

 intermediate and transition forms, others, with 

 Merrem have preferred to consider the whole of 

 the scaled reptiles as forming but a single Order. 



