210 DAYS OUT OF DOORS. 



youngsters seemed at times dangerously near the eyes and 

 ears of the patient old one, but it offered no resistance, 

 and, when I forced such burdened lizards to move, it was 

 always with a deliberateness that suggested that they were 

 really averse to disturbing those resting upon them. 

 Again, adults would often rest upon each other, in what 

 appeared to be a most uncomfortable manner for the one 

 beneath, often pressing the head of the latter into the 

 sand and completely blinding it for the time ; yet I never 

 saw the slightest evidence of ill-humor, not even when 

 they were being fed. Often it happened that some sleepy 

 fellow would quietly snap up the fly toward which another 

 lizard was cautiously crawling, yet no fight ensued. Any- 

 thing more trying than this to humanity can not be ima- 

 gined, yet the lizards took every such occurrence as a mat- 

 ter of course. 



In running, as well as when walking about deliberately, 

 which they less often do, the lizard brings all four limbs 

 equally into play, and their gait is much like that of a cat. 

 When progress is suddenly -arrested, they usually squat 

 upon their hind limbs only, holding their head well up 

 and elevating the body, as does a cat or dog, by keeping 

 the fore limbs straight. Every attitude is suggestive of 

 intelligence, and I refer particularly to the matter, because 

 the differences in these respects between this lizard and 

 the blue-tailed skink, the only other saurian found in New 

 Jersey, is very marked ; the latter, as we shall see, al- 

 though having less suggestive manners, has, I believe, a 

 greater degree of intelligence. 



I have spoken of the rapid and complete submission of 

 the pine-tree lizard when captured. This did not prove 

 true of the great brown skink that I captured among the 

 rocks at Lake Hopatcong. This specimen I placed in a 

 Wardian case, May 20th, and immediately it burrowed in 

 the thick mat of sphagnum at the bottom, and for a week 



