140 SAURIA. — SCINCID^. 



has not been found in Ireland. With the com- 

 mon propensity to attach venomous qualities to 

 all reptiles, the vulgar in our own country sup- 

 pose the inoffensive little Slow-worm to be highly 

 poisonous, and this false notion is shared by many 

 whose j)owers and opportunities of observation 

 should have taught them better. Shakspeare 

 talks of it as "the eyeless venom 'd worm," and 

 speaks of "the blind-worm's sting" among the 

 horrors which are to be boiled '*i' the charmed 

 pot " of the witches. Dr. Borlase, as cited by 

 Pennant, speaks from hearsay of a man in Ox- 

 fordshire who had lost his life by the bite of a 

 Slow-worm, which, however, the reptile could not 

 have been, from the description wdiich he himself 

 gives. 



No animal, in fact, can possibly be more harm- 

 less than the vilified Slow-worm. " Even when 

 handled roughly," observes Professor Bell, " it 

 rarely attempts to bite ; and when it is irritated so 

 as to induce it to seize upon the finger, the teeth 

 are so small as scarcely to make an impression." 



Like all the other reptiles that inhabit these 

 islands, the Slow-worm retires to a place of 

 security on the approach of winter, which it 

 passes in a state of insensibility. Sometimes it 

 contents itself with hiding under a compact mass 

 of decaying leaves in a sheltered situation, but 

 more commonly it penetrates into the soft earth, 

 w^here it is covered wdth heath or brushwood, 

 forming burrows by means of its smooth muzzle 

 and polished body, to the depth of three or four 

 feet, describing in its course " different circuits, 

 and having several issues." It comes forth earlier 

 in the spring than any other of our Snakes or 



