SAURIA. 21 



Some of them, more particularly termed Sauvegardes, have a tail 

 that is more or less compressed; the scales on the belly are longer 

 than they are broad. They live on the banks of rivers, 8cc. Such is 

 Lac. teguixin^ Lin. and Shaw; Le Grande Sauvegarde d'Jime- 

 rique; Teyu-guazu; Temapara, &c.; Seb. I, xcvi, 1, 2, 3, xcvii, 

 5, xcix, 1. Yellow dots and spots disposed in transverse bands, 

 on a black ground above, and a yellowish one beneath; yellow 

 and black bands on the tail.(l) Found in Guiana, where it at- 

 tains the length of six feet. It moves rapidly on shore, and 

 when pursued hastens to the Avater for i-efuge, where it dives, but 

 does not swim. It feeds on insects, reptiles, eggs, Sec, and lays 

 in holes which it excavates in the sand. Both flesh and eggs 

 are edible.(2) 

 Others, called Ameivas(3) only differ from the preceding in the 

 tail, which is round, and nowise compressed, furnished, as well as 

 the belly, with transverse rows of square scales; those on the belly 

 are more broad than long. They are American Lizards, tolerably 

 similar, externally, to those of Europe; but besides the want of mo- 

 lars, most of them have no collar, and all the scales of the throat 

 are small; their head also is more pyramidal than that of the Euro- 

 pean Lizards, and they have not, like the latter, a bony plate on the 

 orbit. 



Several species have been confounded under the name of La- 

 ccrta ameiva, some of which it is still very difficult to distin- 

 guish. The most common, Teyus ameiva, Spix, XXIII; Pr. 

 Max. de Wied. liv. V, is a foot long or more; green; the back 

 more or less dotted and spotted with black, and vertical rows 

 of white ocellated spots bordered with black, on the flanks. 



There is another, Teyus cy adieus, Merr.', Lacep., I,xxxi, Seb. 

 II, cv, 2, about the same size, of a bluish colour, with round 

 white spots scattered over the flanks and sometimes on the 

 body. The young of these animals, and of some others of the 



(1) Dried specimens, or those pi-eserved in spirits, assume a greenish or bluish 

 tint in those parts where the colours are light, and it is thus that they are repre- 

 sented by Seba; but while alive, and as we have seen it, the light parts are more or 

 less yellow. Pr. Max. de Wied has given a good picture of it in his eleventh No. 



(2) Add the Tupin. d laches vertes of Daud., if it benota'simple variety of Sauve- 

 garde. Spix calls it Tup. monitor, pi. xix; it is his T. nigropundatus, which is 

 the true Sauvegarde. 



(3) According to Marcgrave, the term Jlmciva designates a Lizard with a forked 

 tail, a circumstance which can only be the result of accident; Edwards having had 

 in his possession an individual of the above division, in which this accident was 

 observed, apphed that term to the whole species. Marcgrave compares his indi- 

 vidual to his Taraguira, which, from his description, is rather a Polychrus. 



