134 THE STORY OF KEPTILE LIFE. 



With the Chamaeleons ornament in this direc- 

 tion can no further go ; at least it would almost 

 seem so. Only in a few species, however, do we 

 meet with these marked sexual differences. The 

 most conspicuous instance is that furnished by 

 Chameleon bifurcus of Madagascar. Herein the 

 snout of the male is armed with two enormous 

 bony projections resembling horns. Only a 

 rudiment of these is present in the female. In 

 Owen's Chamseleon (Chameleon oweni), from the 

 west coast of Africa, the male bears three such 

 "horns," two of which project from the forehead 

 and the third from the snout ; but the female is 

 weaponless. These curious projections appear to 

 be comprised of fibrous tissue in the young 

 animal, and to become bony later in life. Pro- 

 bably during a still earlier phase in the history 

 of their development, they were quite flexible 

 in character, as in the case of a similar appendage 

 in one of the lizards (Ceratopliora stoddartii). This 

 suggests that originally the "horn" may have 

 been of still softer tissue, erectile during excite- 

 ment. From this it passed to a permanently 

 rigid structure which now, late in life, becomes 

 bony. At the present day, at least with the 

 Chamseleons, these appendages appear to be used 

 as weapons of offence by the males when fighting 

 for the possession of mates. As in the case of 

 horns in the mammalia, there seems to be a 

 tendency for these structures to be transmitted 

 to the females, and probably, in the course of 

 ages, they will, in this sex, come to assume very 

 nearly the proportions of those of the males, 

 though it is improbable they will ever be quite 



