THE ROYAL NATURAL HISTORY. 



GAMB I ER : BOLTON. '& 



BJEPTILES. 



CHAPTEK I. 

 GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS, Class Reptilia. 



IN ordinary language the term Reptile is applied indifferently to such creatures 

 as crocodiles, tortoises, lizards, snakes, frogs, and salamanders, but by the 

 naturalist it is used in a more restricted sense, and includes only the first 

 four of these, together with a host of extinct types; while the frogs and 

 salamanders, with certain other forms, both living and extinct, on account of 

 important structural differences, constitute a class by themselves,' known as the 

 Amphibians, and bearing the same rank as the class of Reptiles. To an ordinary 

 observer there would seem but little in common between a scaled lizard or snake, 

 a cuirassed crocodile, and a carapaced tortoise, on the one hand, and a feathered 

 bird on the other. Nevertheless, as we have had occasion to mention at the close 

 of the preceding volume, the connection between Reptiles and Birds is exceedingly 

 intimate, so close, indeed, that Professor Huxley has termed the latter greatly 

 VOL. v. i 



