76 COMPARISONS OF STRUCTURE IN ANDIALS. 



and modes of life. They are climbers, but 

 not arboreal climbers only; they run up the 

 sides of walls, up the trunks of trees; they 

 traverse ceilings like a fly, and cling to the 

 imder side of leaves ; they make crevices in 

 walls or buildings, holes in rocks, or fissures 

 and hollows in trees, their resort, lurking 

 there during the day. Night is the season of 

 their activity ; it is then that they come forth 

 from their concealment, and wander in search 

 of prey. Their eyes gleam in the darkness, 

 and are intently fixed on any object that 

 excites alarm or suspicion; and so prompt 

 and rapid are these lizards in their movements, 

 that they escape and vanish as if by magic, 

 when their capture or destruction seems cer- 

 tain. For this mode of searching for prey, 

 and for these quick and instantaneous actions, 

 while running up walls or the trunks of trees, 

 their feet are most admirably constructed. 

 The toes are armed with sharp, retractile 

 claws, like those of a cat in miniature, at 

 least in most of the species, and moreover, 

 on the under side, with suckers of various 

 form and extent — in some oval, in some fun- 

 shaped, and in others circular ; and these 

 suckers, acting like those on the feet of flies, 



