MENTAL ATTRIBUTES OE CHAMELEON 



typical and nimble, scaled, creatures that are called by 

 that name. To watch a chamseleon in the Reptile House 

 side by side with a lacerta for example, will bring out so 

 long a series of differences, that it seems almost necessary 

 to establish another order for these divergent creatures. 

 Their prehensile tail is unique among limbed reptiles, 

 and its very prehensility is remarkable, for it only works 

 downwards : the toes are bound together in threes and 

 twos, three on one side of hand and foot, and two on the 

 other. This is suggestive of a bird, and especially of 

 the woodpeckers, where, however, there are but four 

 toes altogether, grouped in twos. The independently 

 moving eyes above the grinning mouth are weird in the 

 extreme and not reptile-like ; they are indeed like no- 

 thing except a human being with an inordinate squint, 

 and like the eyes of such a being they move independ- 

 ently. Then too the tongue, nearly as long as the body 

 of its possessor when fully extruded, is an extraordin- 

 ary organ, unparalleled in the reptilian series and only 

 partially paralleled by the ant-bear, the woodpecker and 

 the echidna. The chamaeleon when it detects its prey, 

 an insect for choice, literally " gives tongue " to the 

 extent of six inches or so. To watch a chamaeleon 

 shows that profound mental differences accompany these 

 structural differences from the remaining crowd of 

 lizards. Its movements are characterized by an almost 

 judicial deliberation. It is elephantine in its slowness. 

 The reptile is in fact not by any means unlike in these 

 particulars to its fellow-dweller upon tree-tops the 

 American sloth. Finally, the lean and really emaciated 

 form of the chamaeleon mark it out as something greatly 

 different from the ordinary run of lizards, who are plump 

 in comparison. This leanness, however, has its uses. 

 The chamaeleon has, somewhat rashly for so small a 

 creature, an ungovernable temper ; it literally swells 

 with anger, grunts, bites and flashes changes of colour. 



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