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NATURAL HISTORY. 



will be seen to be furnished with five clawed scaly endings. They are flat and saw-like at the edges, 

 a large scale being over the base of the nail. 



The Skink inhabits the western and northern parts of Africa, and they are found also in Senegal, 

 in Abyssinia, on the other side of the Continent, and in Egypt, and Bruce met with it in Nubia. It 

 likes a warm place, and frequents the little hillocks of fine and light sand that the wind accumulates 

 at the foot of hedges that border the cultivated lands, and of the tamarisks which try to vegetate 

 on the confines of the desert. There it may be seen comfortably basking in the rays of the burning 

 sun, and chasing, every now and then, the beetles which crawl within its range. It runs very quickly, 

 and, when menaced, buries itself in the sand with great rapidity, hollowing out for itself a burrow 

 many feet deep in a short time. When taken it endeavours to escape, but does not attempt to bite 

 or to defend itself with its claws. Probably they attain five inches in length. 



This little creature was once of use to the physician, although of doubtful value to the patient. 

 It was dried and powdered and given as a remedy, or specific, against almost every malady, by the 

 Greeks and Romans. Pliny wrote that the scales of the nose and the feet, after being powdered and 

 boiled in white wine, were to be used as particular stimulants ; and Apelles used parts of the 

 animal as antidotes against the wounds inflicted by poisoned arrows. Up to the sixteenth century 

 the reptile led an unhappy life, being chased, and taken, and swallowed ; but gradually its medicinal 

 virtues were disproved, and it now lives in peace. 



A Scincoid* which lives in the New World has its head of a bright-red colour, and the body and 

 tail are olive ; the throat and abdomen being yellowish-white. It is about thirteen inches in length, 

 and is found from lat. 39 N. to the Gulf of Mexico, in the Atlantic States, as well as in Mississippi 

 and Louisiana. It frequently takes up its abode in an old nest of the Woodpecker, out of which 

 it thrusts its head in a threatening manner. Seldom coming to the ground, it is shy, but fierce 

 when taken, and bites severely. 



Australia has some remarkable Scincoids, and one, which is called the Stump-tailed Lizard,! 

 is very curious from the extraordinary resemblance which the tail bears to the head when the 

 eyes are closed with their scaly lids. Visitors to the Zoological Gardens frequently say that the 



STUMP-TAILED LIZARD. 



creature has two heads, when it is motionless, in its cage. It has a long stout body and blunt 

 head and tail, four small limbs and short digits. The body in its upper part, and the head and 

 tail, are encased in large, rough, broad scales. The lower eyelid is minutely scaly, and the eye 

 is bright, of a brown colour, with splashings of yellow occasionally. Underneath the body the 

 scales are smaller and lighter-coloured, and the ear is not visible. 



* Plestiodon (rythrocephalus = Scincns amcricanus. t Trachydosaurus rugosus (Gray). 



