AUTUMN, 191 2 283 



pressed and pointed in this or that direction at will. 

 They are like the freely moving ears of a horse, but 

 they do not point one way, since each one, together 

 with the half-brain which governs it, is occupied with 

 looking at a different thing. You see, for instance, 

 that one of the pair is now aimed like a spy-glass at 

 some remote object, also that it is continually moving, 

 and you will presently discover that it is following the 

 erratic movements of a bluebottle, wandering about the 

 room. This is not an idle amusement nor mere mental 

 curiosity on the chameleon's part ; he knows that the 

 fly is an indefatigable traveller and investigator ; that 

 by-and-by, when he has finished quartering the ceiling, 

 running up and down the walls and looking at the 

 pictures, he will turn his attention to the furniture, 

 piece by piece, and eventually arrive at that very spot, 

 that stand or table with its counterfeit presentment 

 of a branch, and upon the branch the strange image 

 of a monster, perhaps a god, of stone or metal, dug up 

 by some Flinders Petrie in some desert city, where it 

 has been lying buried in sand these several thousand 

 years. Truly a curious and interesting object for an 

 inquisitive fly to look at ! And just as a little tourist 

 will place himself in front of the Sphinx to survey its 

 countenance at a proper distance of forty or fifty yards, 

 so does the fly settle himself before the face of the 

 chameleon, at a distance of six or eight or ten inches. 

 That is not too far for the tongue, which is as long as 

 the body : the eye on a swivel has never lost sight 

 of the blue wanderer ; it is fixed on him even now ; 



