Q36 CLASS REPTILIA. 



fears and agitations more or less considerable. Its epidermis 

 is transparent ; its skin is yellow, and its blood of a very 

 lively violet blue. From this it results, that when any pas- 

 sion or impression causes a greater quantity of blood to pass 

 from the heart to the surface of the skin, and to the extre- 

 mities, the mixture of blue, violet, and yellow, produces, 

 more or less, a number of different shades. Accordingly, in 

 its natural state, when it is free and experiences no inqui- 

 etude, its colour is a fine green, with the exception of some 

 parts, which present a shade of reddish brown or greyish white. 

 When in anger its colour passes to a deep blue green, to a yellow 

 green, and to a grey more or less blackish. If it is unwell, 

 its colour becomes yellowish grey, or that sort of yellow 

 which we see in deadleaves. Such is the colour of almost all 

 the cameleons which are brought into cold countries, and all 

 of which very speedily die. In general, the colours of the 

 cameleons are so much the more lively and variable as the 

 weather is warmer, and as the sun shines with greater bril- 

 liancy. All these colours grow weaker during the night. 

 Such are the observations made by Opsonville and Golberry, 

 and which have been repeatedly verified on an animal of the 

 same family, but of a different genus, by M. Bosc. This 

 was the Lacerta Bullaris, which is equally of a clear green 

 in its natural state in warm weather, and which changes at 

 will, and very rapidly, to a black green, to a yellow green, to 

 grey, and to brown, according as it is affected by strange objects 

 which have the power of agitating it. In cold weather it is of 

 a grey colour, shaded with brown in some parts, and it has no 

 longer the faculty of varying its tints, because its blood can 

 no longer come to the surface of its skin to modify the yellow 

 by which it is coloured. During the winter, in this country 

 and in France, the same is positively the case with the 

 cameleons. 



The cameleon possesses another property which merits a 



