ROUGH-SCALED COBDYLE. Zonurus Cordylus. 



FALSE COKDYLE. I'seudocurdylus micrutepidotVi. 



effectual resistance to the force applied from behind, that the tail breaks off from the 

 body before the reptile is secured." 



As, in Dr. Smith's work, the description of the different varieties occupy nearly five 

 quarto pages of letterpress, it is evidently impossible to give more than a general 

 description in this volume. Suffice it to say, that in one variety, found on the Table 

 Mountain and about Cape Town, the colour is ochry yellow above banded with dark 

 brown ; in another, which inhabits the rocks about Algoa Bay, it is yellow, with bold 

 black bars along the back ; another, which lives on the banks of the Orange Kiver, is 

 brown above, warming into bright chestnut in the male and olive-green mottled with 

 dusky black in the female ; and a fourth variety, which is found in the high mountainous 

 regions about Natal, is bright green, with ah olive-green stripe and short bars of the same 

 tint across the back. The tail is also banded with two shades of green, one a deep olive, 

 and the other having a much yellower hue. The female of this variety is without the 

 bands, and is only mottled with dark olive and spotted with the same hue along the sides. 

 The length of the False Cordyle is about eighteen inches. 



A SMALL group of reptiles is collected under the generic title of Gerrhosauri, or 

 Basket-Lizards, because the arrangement of their scales and colouring has an effect as 

 if the body had been covered with delicate wicker-work, such as is employed to protect 

 glass flasks from injury. 



These Lizards are natives of Southern Africa, where they are far from uncommon. 

 They are all rather pretty in form and colouring, but the most pleasing in general 

 appearance is BIBKON'S GEEKHOSAUKUS (GerrhosaurusBibroni}. This animal is found near 

 the Orange Kiver, and may be seen slipping about among the rocky sides of the dark 

 ravines that are so plentiful in that neighbourhood. It is a very shy and timid creature, and 

 if it fancies itself watched by an unfriendly eye, or suspects the least shadow of danger, 

 it quietly glides under the heap of dead wood and dried leaves which collect in abundance 

 in such localities, and will not venture out again until it is tolerably sure that the dangei 

 has passed away. 



