THE BLIND-WORM. 97 
wastes. They are timid, harmless creatures, retiring into holes, and 
concealing themselves in moss at the foot of trees, to hide them- 
selves from observation. ‘They feed upon worms, insects, and the 
smaller molluscs. Although perfectly harmless, the country-people 
are strongly prejudiced against them, believing their bite to be a 
deadly poison. This animal is extremely brittle. Laurenti and 
others assert that whea captured it throws itself into a position of 
such rigidity that it sometimes breaks in two, and that a smart blow 
of a switch will at any time divide it. 
Fig. 25.—Blind-worm. 
|There are little-known species of Amguzs in India and South 
Africa, which are at least provisionally so considered, and certainly 
do not differ essentially ; and next we come to forms in which the 
limbs are successively more developed. Such are the Ophiodes 
striatus of Brazil, which has two short, flattened, undivided, and 
one-pointed limbs, corresponding to the usual hind pair; the 
Brachymeles bonite of the Philippines, in which there are two pairs 
of short and rudimentary limbs, the fore bearing two minute claws, 
while the hind are undivided; Venira bicolor, of the same archipelago, 
has very short limbs, the fore and hind being placed distantly apart, 
but in this genus all have five distinct toes; Chiamelea /ineata, from 
E 
