CHAP. ILL] 



REPTILES. 



203 



lakes around Colombo and the still water near Trin- 

 comalie, there are huge creatures of this family, from 

 six to eight inches in length \ of an olive hue, deep- 

 ening into brown on the back and yellow on the under 

 side. The Kandyan species, recently described, is much 

 less in dimensions, but distinguished by its brilliant 

 colouring, a beautiful grass green above and deep orange 

 underneath. 2 



In the shrubberies around my house at Colombo the 

 graceful little hylas 3 were to be found in great numbers, 

 crouching under broad leaves to protect them from 

 the scorching sun ; some of them utter a sharp metallic 

 sound at night, similar to that produced by smacking the 

 lips. They possess in a high degree the power of changing 

 their colour ; and one which had seated itself on the gilt 

 pillar of a dinner lamp was scarcely to be distinguished 

 from the or-molu to which it clung. They are enabled 

 to ascend glass by means of the suckers at the extremity 

 of their toes. Their food consists of flies and minute 

 coleoptera. 



List of Ceylon Reptiles. 



I am indebted to Dr. Gray of the British Museum for a 

 more complete enumeration of the reptiles of Ceylon than is 

 to be found in Dr. Kelaart's published lists ; but many of those 

 new to Europeans have been carefully described by the latter 

 gentleman in his Prodromua Faunae, Zeylanicce and its appen- 

 dices, as well as in the 13th vol. Magaz. Nat. Hist. (1854). 



