688 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HIST. f^OCIETY, Vol. XXI. 



Gul Mohur tree approached to within a foot of the top of the hedge. Then, 

 standing upright on her hind legs, she would catch hold of a thin frond of 

 Gul Mohur and pull herself np on to the twig. Thence upwards to the main 

 part of the tree where her colour, green and black, blended so perfectly 

 with her surroundings as to render her detection and retrieval difficult. 

 Defecated lifting a hind leg and would always clean her anus carefully 

 against a twig or leaf. Excrement very full, like a turkey's. On level 

 exposed ground her walk was slow and stilted, each leg being waved in a 

 curious vacillatory motion before being set to the ground, but once under 

 cover she strode forward freely, though very slowly. 



On 5th October 1911 the male arrived, also from Jubbulpore. He seemed 

 dry and emaciated, colour mustard yellow, with black spots, length about 

 14|- inches. No strength in his tail. However, on being placed on the 

 punkah, he at once climbed to the top, under the ceiling and copulated with 

 the female " a tergo " grasping her with all four legs. She was then a 

 uniform light green. Coition took place three times that day and once 

 the next. As he would not eat, he was put on a bush outside and water 

 poured over him. He drank greedily, licking the drops off the leaves. 

 His tongue then, though very dry and stiff, probably because his former 

 master had never given him a drink, got to work on the grasshoppers. 

 (From this time forward his colour day by day assumed a deeper tinge of 

 green until in a month he was as green as the female.) 



I now enclosed a bush some 4 feet high, set in a large pot with muslin 

 netting on a frame and put both chamjBleons into it. On 7th October 1911, 

 t.e., 2 days after mating, the female assumed a wonderful colour, viz., jet- 

 black, covered with spots of vivid emerald and ochre yellow, though at 

 night she turned the usual light green. She now showed rage if the male 

 came near her, rocking her body to and fro and gaping at him with faint 

 hissings. He on the other hand would fly in ludicrous terror falling head- 

 long from his perch if she came near, as though paralysed. From thence 

 forward his object has been to put as great a distance as possible between 

 them both. On the 28th October his skin began to peel in large patches. 

 The female showed obvious signs of pregnancy by then, and invariably 

 moored herself securely to her roosting perch by 2 or 3 turns of her tail, 

 resting her belly carefully and evenly along the branch. I now scooped out 

 a handful of earth at the bottom of the bush, and covered it with a tile, so 

 as to make a kind of " cabin." On 9th November 1911 the female descend- 

 ed into the hole and began to dig like a terrier, packing the loose earth 

 with her fore legs and kicking it out behind her with her hind legs. At 

 night she roosted in the bush, but low down. All next day, the 10th, she 

 dug furiously in the loose mould and did not emerge at night. Next day, 

 the 11th, a very attenuated chamseleon emerged at 2 p.m. and spent all 

 afternoon in pulling the loose earth back with her fore paws, ramming it 



