SAURIAXS. 23 



bricate and not verticillate, distinguish them from tliat genus. Their 

 maxillary teeth are nearly similar, and there are none in the palate. 

 In the 



Common Agam^e, 



The scales are raised in points or tubercles; spines eitber singly or in 

 groups bristle on various parts of the body, the vicinity of the ear espe- 

 cially. A row of them is sometimes seen on the neck, but without form- 

 ing that palisado-like crest which characterizes the Calotes. The skin of 

 the throat is lax, plaited transversely, and capable of being inflated. 

 In some species are found femoral pores. The 



Ag. barbata, N., (The Ocellated Agama), is very remarkable 

 for its size and extraordinary figure; a suite of large spiny scales 

 extends along its back and tail in transverse bands, and approximate 

 it to the Stellios. The throat, which can be greatly inflated, is 

 covered with elongated and pointed scales, which make for it a sort 

 of beard. Similar scales bristle on the flanks, and form two oblique 

 crests behind the ears ; yellowish spots edged with black under the 

 belly. We must not confound with it the 



Lac. murieata, Sh. ; the Muricated Aqama of the same country, 

 Gen. Zool. Vol. Ill, part 1, pi. lxv, f. 11; "White, p. 244, in this 

 the raised scales are disposed in longitudinal bands, between which 

 are two series of spots paler than the ground, which is a blackish 

 brown. It usually attains a large size. 



Other species have no femoral pores. 



Ag. colonorum, Daud. ; Seb. I, cvii, 3*. (The Colonial Agama). 

 Brownish, with a long tail; a small row of short spines on the neck; 

 from Africa, and not, as is asserted, from Guiana. 



There is a smaller Agama at the Cape, with a moderate tail, 

 varied with brown and yellowish, bristled above with raised and 

 pointed scales, the Ag. aculeata, Merr.-f ; Seb. I, viii, 6, lxxxiii, 



one of these Lizards, it is impossible to conjecture; Daudin has extended it to the 

 whole of the subgenus to which this species belongs, and thinks that Agama is the 

 name given to it in the country of which it is a native. 



A new species called torquala has lately been described by Messrs. Peale and 

 Green, Jour. Acad. Nat. Sc. Philad. Vol. VI, p. 231, from Mexico, which they con- 

 sider as approaching the nigricollis, Spix. — Eng. Ed. 



* Nothing can equal the confusion of the synonymes quoted by authors with 

 respect to the different species of Lizards, and chiefly under divers Agama, Calotes 

 and Stellios. The Agama, for instance, Daudin quotes from Gmelin, Seb. I, cvii, 

 1 and 2, which are Stellios; Sloane, Jam. II, eclxxiii, 2, which is an Anolis, Edw. 

 ccxlv, 2, which is also an Anolis; and the same fig. is again quoted by him and 

 Gmel. for the Polychrus. Shaw even copies it to represent that same animal, with 

 which it has nothing in common. Seb. I, cvii, 3, which is the true Ag. colonorum, 

 Daud., is cited by Merrem as Ag. superciliosa ; and Seb. I, cix, 6, which is his 

 aculeata, is quoted as orbicularis, &c. 



f The Agame a pierreries, Daud. IV, 410; Seb. I, viii, 6, is merely the young of 

 this spiny Agama of the Cape, whose colours are more various than those of the 

 adult. Add the Ag- sombre (Ag.atra), Daud. Ill, 340; rough, blackish; a yellowish 

 line along the back; — the Ag. ombre (Lac. umbra) Daud., which is not the Lac umbra. 

 Lin., but distinguished from it by five lines of very small spines, which extend along 

 the back, etc. 



