640 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HIST. SOCIETY, Vol. XXII. 



No. XXXVI.— NOTES ON THE FLYING LIZARD {DRACO 



MACULATU8). 



Whilst hunting for specimens amongst the trees in the P. & O. Company's 

 compound at Singapore on the 26th of June at 11 a.m. I saw two small brown 

 lizards basking in the sun on the trunk of a large tree. I give the time, 

 because they are mostly seen between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m., when the sun is. 

 strong, for the rest of the day keeping to the upper parts of the trees out 

 of sight. 



On closer inspection I found they had " wings," which were spread out ; 

 but they were absolutely motionless. I also found that they were a pair. 

 Not having anything to catch them with I hurried back to my ship and got 

 my butterfly net and ran back again to the same place expecting they 

 would have vanished, but they had not ; they were still in the same place, 

 I made a dash at the lower of the two lizards, knocked it off the tree, 

 caught it in the net and transferred it to a tin box without hurting it in 

 any way. I then looked for its mate, but he had disappeared high up into 

 the uppermost branches and I did not see him again. I made my way 

 back highly delighted with having caught even one and got the carpenter 

 to knock me up a box with a glass cover, into which I placed my lizard with 

 some earth and dried twigs, also some small grasshoppers as food. I am 

 not certain if she ate these, but anyway they were gone the next morning, 

 perhaps through the holes which were bored in the box for air. However 

 day after day I tried her with flies and small cockroaches, and once with a 

 butterfly which had lost its way and flown on board in mid-ocean ; but even 

 this did not tempt her, and she did not eat anything all the time I had her 

 and did not seem much the worse for it. 



The colour of this lizard was brown and grey, with black spots, one black 

 spot between the eyes and one on the back of the neck. Then 7 double 

 black and yellow spots along the back which merged into rings along the 

 tail. On the wings were lines of brown black spots with yellowish wavy 

 lines in between. The throat underneath was grey with a tinge of blue 

 green, and mottled with black. "The male has yellow under the throat 

 and a small crest on the back of its neck." The "■ wings " extended from 

 behind the forelegs to the forepart of the hind legs and were in the form 

 of a parachute, just skin with 6 or 7 long ribs passing through to strengthen 

 them and for expanding and closing them. After being confined in 

 the box it seldom opened its " wings " but kept them folded at its sides. 

 These wings are used as a parachute when jumping from branch to branch 

 which they do so quickly they are hardly to be seen. This lizard is 

 quite harmless, but it certainly looked very fierce when I attempted 

 to handle it, opening its mouth very wide and making faces at me. 

 A Malay who saw me catch it told me that it was poisonous and he evidently 

 believed it was. The whole body is covered with scales but they are very 

 small. This lizard is only found in the Malay Peninsular, Sumatra, Java 

 and Borneo and is different to the flying lizard of India. The day after 

 the capture of the lizard it scraped a little hole in the earth at the bottom 

 of the box and laid three little oval white eggs with a soft skin, then left 

 them exposed and has never been near them since except to jump on them 

 in her excitement or anger when being looked at. Jumping on the eggs 

 dented them in, but after a few hours they always resumed their proper 

 shape again. The eggs when laid were just under half an inch long, but 

 on the ninth day I discovered that they were growing longer and more 

 rounded in the middle. I have kept the earth fairly damp the whole time 

 BO that the eggs should have a little moisture. 



The first morning after the lizard was on board I found thfe box full of 



