l893-] NEW-YORK MICROSCOPICAL SOCIETY. 61 



broom the little swift darts off, occasionally leaving its tail. I 

 have been assured by an old woman " that it does this so it can 

 run faster, but that if the tail is let alone it will come back 

 at night and put it on again/' I once had an Anolis get out of a 

 box containing several when I was travelling in a rail car. As it 

 was on the floor of the car, my movements in its capture had to 

 be quick and almost violent. This entailed disaster, for the run- 

 away was returned to his companions minus his tail. In about 

 three months the lost member was replaced by a new one. This 

 curious condition ensued. While all the rest of the body was 

 polychromatic, the tail was a simple monochrome. It could not 

 take on any hue other than its one normal brown. Nature 

 had restored the tail, but she could not duplicate "the true in- 

 wardness " of the lost member. The palette of living colors and 

 the muscular system for the collapsible tubes were wanting. The 

 little fellow would go to sleep in his night robe of green, but that 

 tail was always the one sober brown. 



The cast-off skin of the Ajiolis is a pure, gauzy white, and to 

 the unaided eye not unlike lace in structure, but in fineness far 

 beyond the possibility of any human fabric. But under the micro- 

 scope this delicate tissue displays a beautiful complexity of struc- 

 ture. The lattice-work is not so coarse as in Phrynosoma^ and 

 each window pane seems to be made up of irregular lesser panes, 

 and these with extremely delicate lattices. The panes, too, are 

 very thin and clear, with no pigment granules. 



Exuviation is started at the head generally, although T have 

 seen instances where the skin began cracking first in other parts. 

 Having got broken at the head, which presents the appearance of 

 a very ragged and highly starched night cap, the rent proceeds 

 along the neck and back. As the Anolis is a lithe and extremely 

 agile creature, it can undress with facility, for its mouth can reach 

 any part of the body and detach the loose skin. It doffs the old 

 suit in a very leisurely way, stopping to swallow each piece as 

 soon as it is detached. Nor does it gulp down the cuticular 

 morsel, but eats it slowly, not unlike the refined epicure who gives 

 his food the sauce of gustatory contemplation. Strange, too — 

 exuviation of the new tail is less facile than was that of the 

 old one. 



We have left the Ophidia, or serpents, for the last. From the 



