Reptiles 



seeking a meal, its attention is diverted by this quivering, 

 cast-off tail, thereby helping the startled lizard to make 

 good its escape. 



The sight of a fly walking upside down on the ceiling 

 leaves us cold, as the Americans say, because it is a sight 

 to which we are well accustomed ; a lizard, however, per- 

 forming the same feat would occasion some surprise, yet 

 it is often done by the geckos, lizards with sucker-like 

 fingers and toes. Let us quote a naturalist's description 

 of an evening in the tropics : " For the uninitiated tourist 

 in a tropical country there is usually an unpleasant 

 surprise furnished by the venturesome geckos. One 

 generally anticipates an awakening of insect life with the 

 coming of darkness, and he is not disappointed. Swarms 

 of winged forms are attracted to his lamp. Great, hard- 

 shelled beetles enter the window with a sonorous hum 

 like from a distressed buzz-saw, dash against the lamp 

 chimney, then flounder on the floor ; moths of various 

 sizes dart hither and thither or whirl in dizzy gyrations 

 about the light ; a colony of tiny, ghost-like things dance 

 up and down or are instantly consumed in the flame ; 

 there is a continuous buzz varying in its cadence and 

 taxing to the nerves of any but a naturalist, when, with- 

 out warning, a silent grey form darts obliquely across the 

 wall, jumps from the vertical surface to the ceiling over 

 which it flies, and like a streak of light continues down 

 the opposite wall ; perhaps for a moment it may stop, 

 exhibiting a body as long as that of a small rat, glittering, 

 cat-like eyes and a pulsating throat. To the nervous 

 traveller, already annoyed by the varied hordes of insects' 

 forms, the apparition of these heavy but stealthy forms 

 darting across the ceiling over his head is weird and 

 startling. An attempt at capture intensifies the impression, 

 for the strange thing darts over the walls with the ease 

 of a gigantic fly. Suddenly it may scurry for the window 

 and away, but if the light continues to burn, others of its 

 kind soon appear. Thus is life in the tropics associated 



233 



