Journal 



OF THE 



NEW-YORK MICROSCOPICAL SOCIETY 



Vol, IX. JULY, 1893. No. 3. 



SOME PHENOMENA IN EXUVIATION BY THE 

 REPTILES. 



BY SAMUEL LOCKWOOD, PH.D. 

 (Read May iqth, 1893.) 



In a run through Europe I saw upon a peasant boy clothing 

 that had come down from an ancestor. The garment seemed 

 ■defiant of wear, but it was painfully malodorous. In nature it 

 is a law for every living thing that the old covering shall give 

 place, at some pretty regular period, to a new raiment. It is sim- 

 ilar in principle, whether it be the shedding of the bark of a tree, 

 or the moulting of the feathers of a bird, or the casting of the 

 hard encasement of a crab, or the soft skin of a snake. For this, 

 if the condition is normal, each has its period for laying aside the 

 old and appearing in the new. In the human subject the opera- 

 tion is continuous. I have been surprised, by actual test, at the 

 amount of dermal epithelia floating in the air of a school room, 

 due to the friction from the natural activity of childhood. 



Some animals have periodic castings, when the entire outer 

 skin is shed, and the creature then appears in brighter attire. 

 When this process is entire, science, through Huxley, I believe, 

 has given to it the term exuviation. 



In what will be said on this subject, in the term Reptilia I 



