130 THE VIVARIUM. 
said to be a connecting link between their order and that of the 
serpents. 
The Agamide family is a very large one, containing some thirty 
genera and 202 species, and numbers among its members several 
very interesting and extraordinary Lizards. Some of them are 
arboreal in their habits; and others terrestrial. Most of them 
are carnivorous, and a few are herbivorous, but all, with the 
exception of the members of one genus, are oviparous. 
The Aganide are closely related to the Iguande, another 
large and important family. The former are confined to the Old 
World and Australia, while the latter, with an exception or two, 
are natives of the New. Unfortunately, only a comparative few 
of these Lizards are suitable, as a rule, for confinement in this 
country, as the greater portion of them come from the tropics 
and their neighbourhood. 
The famous flying Lizards, called the Dragons, belong to the 
Agamide. Of these extraordinary Reptiles, Cantor says, who is 
quoted by Dr. Giinther in the “ Reptiles of British India,” that 
“the transcendent beauty of their colours baffles description. As 
the Lizard lies in the shade along the trunk of a tree, its colours, 
at a distance, appear like a mixture of brown and grey, and 
render it scarcely distinguishable from the bark. Thus it remains, 
with no signs of life except its restless eyes, watching passing 
insects, which, suddenly expanding its wings, it seizes with a 
sometimes considerable unerring leap.”? The wings are more 
correctly described as parachutes, and are formed, according to 
Dr. Giinther, “by the much-prolonged five or six hind ribs; 
these are connected by a broad, expansible fold of the skin, the 
whole forming a sub-semicircular wing on each side of the body. 
The Dragons are Tree Lizards, and jumping from branch to 
branch, they are supported in the air by their expanded 
parachutes, which are laid backwards at the sides of the animal 
while it is sitting or merely running.” The tail is very long and 
slender, and does not easily break. I have never owned a live 
Dragon, nor have I ever seen one in confinement; but I do not 
know any reason why they should not do well in captivity if kept 
in a large, heated Vivarium, in which were placed some suitable 
branches or small trees. 
