LIZARDS. 



85 



Kingi, previously described, the natural pabulum of Moloch consists exclusively of 

 insects, but in this particular type is restricted to ants of the minutest size. The 

 small black evil-odoured 

 species, common in both 

 South and Western Aus- 

 tralia, was always a prime 

 favourite with the speci- 

 mens kept by the author, 

 and wherever these ants 

 abounded, in conjunction 

 with a sufficiently warm 

 temperature, no difficulty 

 was experienced in main- 

 taining these lizards in per- 

 fect health. Moloch horridus 







is by no means a rapid 



Photo. 



MOLOCH OR SPINOUS LIZARDS FEEDING AT AN ANT TRACK, p. 86. 



traveller, its utmost speed 

 being one which is easily overtaken by a man's moderate walking pace. Consequently, 

 no risk of losing them was hazarded by turning them loose by the roadside, or in a 

 garden walk where a banquet of ants was readily accessible. A favourite pasture ground 

 of some half-a-dozen specimens brought by the author from the Gascoigne district to 



Perth, in Western Aus- 

 tralia, was the Govern- 

 ment Gardens in the last- 

 named City, many of the 

 paths of which picturesque 

 grounds abounded with 

 ant-tracks. Liberated 

 there, they would soon 

 settle down to feeding 

 in a row, and the number 

 of ants an individual lizard 

 would assimilate was some- 



On 



what astonishing. 



"A POST PRANDIAL PROMENADE," ,.86. ""'* '' several occasions experi- 



