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CHAPTER IIL 
THE ORDER OF LIZARDS.—SAURIANS. 
TuHIs is the second order of the great section of scaly reptiles 
(Sguamata), as distinguished from the shielded reptiles (Ca/a- 
phracta). ‘The name Saurian, Savpos, given by Aristotle to the genus 
of lizards, has been more comprehensively applied to a group 
of reptiles which have the body elongated, covered with scales, or 
having the skin rough like shagreen. They have, for the most 
part, four feet, the toes of which are furnished with hooked claws; 
the eyelids are movable, and their jaws armed with encased teeth ; 
they have a distinct tympanum, a heart with two auricles and a 
single ventricle, sometimes partially valved, having sides and a 
sternum. They are not subject to metamorphosis, and, finally, 
they are furnished with a tail. 
(“By far the greater number of the Saurians,” writes Dr. 
Giinther, “are easily distinguished from the other orders of 
Reptiles by their elongated form, by theic movable thorax covered 
with skin, by the presence of legs, and by their general integu- 
ments, which are either folded into scales, or granular, or 
tubercular, or shielded ; still, there are many Saurians which, at 
a superficial glance, might easily be taken for members of the 
preceding order, that of the Snakes; and it cannot be denied 
that there is a gradual transition from one of these orders to the 
other. On the part of the Saurians, we allude to those which 
have no externally visible limbs, and which combine with a 
greatly elongated, cylindrical body, the peculiar kind of locomo- 
tion we observe in Snakes. Yet the greater affinity of these 
Reptiles to the ordinary Lizards is indicated by another character, 
which is in intimate connection with their mode of life. The 
Snakes, having movable maxillary bones, and mandibles not joined 
by a symphidis, are enabled to swallow other animals of appa- 
rently greater bulk than their own. In the Saurians the maxillz 
are fixed and immovable, and the mandibles are joined by an 
