644 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol, X1I1 
damage asa prospective specimen, owing to the ‘shell’ that encloses 
the body, and consisting of a dorsal part or carapace and a ventral 
part or plastron. The best way is, no doubt, to settle him with poison, 
for which purpose a cloth soaked in chloroform and tied over the 
head is reeommended. Unfortunately—or rather I suppose I should 
say fortunately—such drugs are not often handy, especially away in 
the jungles when most wanted. My advice is to hand him over to 
the cook for execution, with instructions not to effect this by chopping 
off his head, and to damage him as little as possible. Of course if it 
is only proposed to retain the ‘shell’ such precautions are not neces- - 
sary ; but, although useful for purposes of identification, and even then 
not always sufficient, it cannot strictly be considered as a ‘ specimen. ’ 
To prepare one properly as such it is first necessary to cut with a 
saw the shell between the fore and hind-limb openings on each side, 
and cut the skin right round by the tail, so that the plastron may be 
folded back. All the flesh and bones of the body can then be removed, 
the legs and tail being skinned as those of a mammal, but by turning 
them inside out if possible, without cutting the skin down to the 
toes. For purposes of preservation apply arsenical soap and alum, 
and dry as in other cases before putting away. 
Snakes and Lizards (Squamata). In the third order of the 
reptiles we again find a far greater number of species than in the | 
Chelonia, those in our country exceeding 200 in the case of lizards, 
and 250 snakes, with one solitary representative of the sub-order 
containing the peculiarly specialized chameleons. _ 
These have always been carefully studied .by naturalists all the 
world over ; but even if it can be said that the Society’s collection of 
snakes is more complete than any of the other collections, there are still 
many species that we have not got and that members could supply speci- 
mens of. In the case of lizards we have never found an enthusiast ‘ to 
put our house in order,’ nor do they take the popular fancy as snakes . 
do, with the result that the collection is by no means representative. 
For the hunting and collecting of both snakes and lizards there is no 
royal road to success, and good steady work in the field will alone 
provide specimens. One comes across snakes at all sorts of odd and 
unexpected moments, and those that live on the ground, at any rate, 
seldom repay special and systematic search, With  tree-snakes a 
