122 



ANOMI^E ANONACE.E. 



catch all their prey with the mouth, and arrive at it 

 by speed of foot. Such are the grounds of analogy 

 upon which it has been so often said and repeated 

 that the two genera occupy the places of each other 

 in the two great continents. Perhaps the best ex- 

 pression of their characters, in few words, is to say 

 that the chameleons are singular ; the anoles ad- 

 mirable. 



They are indeed the beauties of the saurian race : 

 their forms are light and delicate ; their colours 

 often rich ; their expression mild and gentle, yet 

 (as one would say) full of speculation ; and their 

 motions more resemble those of birds than of merely 

 footed creatures. They start, they leap, they climb, 

 bounding now here now there, as if life were to 

 them one continued holiday ; and as they are found 

 chiefly in the dry and healthy spots, they seem to 

 point out to man where he should take up his 

 dwelling. They are mild and inoffensive, but they 

 are not timid : they do not skulk away from our 

 sight, as is the case with those reptiles which have 

 the power of mischief in them. They move, " come 

 when they are called," for if the chirp of at least 

 some of the species is imitated, they come out of 

 their holes, and approach man, as if to know what 

 he wants, eyeing him mildly but steadily all the 

 time. This curiosity, or whatever it may be called, 

 often costs them their lives, as the boys call them, 

 and then capture them with snares. They are, 

 however, animals which it is desirable to protect, 

 as well on account of their beauty, their lively mo- 

 tions, and their frank and confiding manners, as 

 of their usefulness in keeping down those broods 

 of insects which are both annoying and destructive. 

 In short they are animals, in whatever point of view 

 we survey them, which man should always think twice 

 before he destroys. 



The species are not very well made out, but the 

 most beautiful, though rather the smallest in size, 

 appear to be those which have not the serrated keel 

 on the basal part of the tail. Among them the red- 

 throated anolis (anolis bullaris) is the finest in its 

 colours. Its prevailing tint is green with golden 

 reflections in some lights, and a black spot upon 

 each cheek. The dilatable skin on the throat, when 

 not inflated, is of a dark russet colour ; but in the 

 course of the inflation it passes through many tints, 

 with more rapidity than even the skin of the cha- 

 meleon ; and when fully distended, it is of a bright 

 cherry red, glossy and shining. This species is 

 found to a considerable distance northward in the 

 United States, and also in the West India islands. 

 With the exception of the keel on the tail, and dif- 

 ferences of size and colour, the species are so much 

 alike that the detail of them is unnecessary for 

 popular purposes ; and enough has already been 

 mentioned to point out their general characters, and 

 the place they hold in the scale of animated being. 



A NO MI A (Linnaeus, Lamarck, Cuvier). A genus 

 of shells, belonging to the class Acephalopkora, order 

 Lamcl/ibranckiata, and to the family Ostracea;, of De 

 Blainville's system of Malacology. 



The animal inhabiting this shell is very much 

 compressed, the edges of the mantle very thin, not 

 adhering, and furnished on the outside with a row of 

 tentacular filaments ; the abductor muscle is thick, 

 divided into three portions, of which the largest 

 passes partially through a notch on the lower valve, 

 adhering to marine bodies by a small calcareous piece 



at its extremit}', which in some species is wanting. 

 The shell is adherent, irregular, inequivalve, inequi- 

 lateral, and much resembling an oyster ; the inferior 

 valve flatter than the upper one, divided at the sum- 

 mit into two branches, forming a notch or an aper- 

 ture of an oval form ; one of them, large and thick, 

 forms the part to which the ligament is attached ; 

 the superior valve is much larger and more convex, 

 with an oval excavation beneath the summit, for the 

 other attachment of the short and thick ligament ; a 

 subcentral muscular impression, divided into three 

 parts. 



Like the oyster, the anomise possess no locomotive 

 power, they live and die on the spot which gave them 

 birth ; the small osseous portion by which they are 

 affixed to marine bodies has been mistaken by some 

 persons for a third valve, but it is, in fact, no more 

 than the thickened extremity of the tendon, or inte- 

 rior muscle of the animal, by means of which it be- 

 comes attached to the object on which the egg was 

 hatched. It is so constructed as to close the hole or 

 notch, at the summit of the upper valve, when the 

 muscle of the animal is contracted. In this genus 

 the smaller perforated valve is the lower one, being 

 always placed in contact with and conforming to the 

 shape of the substance upon which it lies ; in the 

 oyster, on the contrary, the larger and the most 

 concave valve is the lower one. 



Poli describes the animal of this shell as being very 

 similarly organised with that of the oyster, and its 

 habits appear perfectly congenial. 



It is not easy to characterise the shells of this 

 genus ; Lamarck enumerates nine species, other 

 writers have mentioned a greater number ; but from 

 their assuming in most cases the form of the substance 

 to which their thin valve is affixed, that circumstance 

 may be presumed to have led to an erroneous con- 

 clusion of their being distinct species. 



Anomia ephippium. 



The two divisions De Blainville has made are 

 such as have the small osseous appendage to the 

 muscle, and such as have it not ; the first is exempli- 

 fied in any Anomia ephippium, the other is the A. 

 squamata, which is affixed by the valve 

 itself, a figure of which is here given, to 

 the object on which it was hatched. Le- 

 franc admits ten fossil species. 



The difficulty of defining properly the classification 

 of these shells, probably occasioned their having been 

 named anomia, , not, and v^a?, law, {without law), 

 implying that they did not fall within any law or 

 system of arrangement established with respect to 

 other species of mollusks. 



ANONACE.E. The fourth order of the Jus- 

 sieuan system. It contains nine genera, viz. Anona, 

 Monodora, Eupornatia, Asarnma, Uvaria, Unona, 



