110 



THE AQUAEIUM, APRIL, 1894. 



levees built to keep water on the rice 

 fields during the growing season, and 

 do immense damage. Constant watch- 

 fulness and much hard work is required 

 to keep up the levees, which oftentimes 

 are so honeycombed as to need entire 

 reconstruction. The rabbits and rac- 

 coons make great havoc on the truck 

 farms, destroying lettuce, cauliflower, 

 and cabbages wholesale. Some farmers 

 have had to build wire fences about 

 their fields while others have abandoned 

 the raising of these vegetables. Several 

 years ago a law was made in Plaque- 

 mines parish forbidding the killing 

 of alligators, and with their increase 

 the destructive vermin decreased. But 

 that law has since been repealed." 



DESIGN FOR A TREE-FROG 

 HOUSE. 



An ordinary Candy Jar set in a rustic frame- 

 work. The cover is formed by a thatch roof 

 made of blades of the common Bullrushes. This 

 house will also answer as a terrarium for Liz- 

 ards, Salamanders, etc. 



THAT "LIZARD FAD." 



We did not endorse the wearing of 

 live lizards, chained to breast pins, re- 

 gardless of the temperature, and we 

 never sold one for that purpose, because 

 it is cruelty to animals. All species of 

 lizards are very sensitive to cold and 

 especially the so-called American cham- 



eleon, which species, because so gentle, 

 was so lucky (?) as to find favor with 

 the ladies. 



The American chameleon is properly 

 called the Red-throated anolis (Anolis 

 principalis), owing to the red throat 

 the male can display at will. It is a 

 native of the Southern states bordering 

 the ocean, from South Carolina to 

 Louisiana. It is a very useful creature, 

 destroying many injurious insects. 



The anolis are entirely harmless and 

 make very nice pets, becoming quite 

 tame and live for years in captivity. 

 They should be fed oh live insects, and 

 during the cold season Avhen such can 

 not be jirocured a live meal-worm twice 

 a week will keep them all right. They 

 should be bathed now and then in luke- 

 warm water and should be supplied 

 with drinking water. As we have seen 

 above, they come from a warm climate, 

 and to expose them willfully to a cold 

 temperature is cruelty. 



But to those who now feel sorry for 

 the poor innocent creatures which were 

 sacrified this winter, not through will- 

 ful cruelty, but simply by excu^ble 

 ignorance, we say, that these hundreds 

 of thousands of anolis that were sold on 

 the streets and in fancy stores last 

 winter, have died the death of martyrs. 

 The very same ladies who would have 

 been scared at the sight of one before 

 they became ''fashionable," and would 

 not have bought one at the customary 

 store-price of 10 cents each, bought 

 them from the street-peddlers or else- 

 where at one dollar apiece, became, un- 

 knowingly, benefactors ; they supported 

 a new industry (which, in spite of the 

 hard times of last winter, grew to fabu- 

 lous dimensions), and which enabled 

 many a poor fellow who was out of em- 

 ployment to earn a dollar and keep his 

 family from starvation. 



