308 Zoological Society . 



found to fail, if tried on this species ; for though it is not difficult to 

 pass the noose over the head (the reptile allowing this so long as its 

 assailant's approaches and motions are deliberate and gentle), it is 

 instantly slipped off again, because there is no sensible contraction 

 behind the occiput, and the scales lie too smoothly to afford the 

 slightest hold. They are too wary and too swift to be caught by 

 the hand. A smart tap with a switch, however, across the shoulders 

 or the back disables them for awhile ; but if the blow descend on the 

 tail, that organ instantly separates, with the like brittleness, as in 

 other lizards. Cats not unfrequently catch them. 



The form of the scales and the manner of their apposition remind 

 us of the fishes : they are convex above, concave beneath, are slightly 

 attached to the skin, and lap over each other at the edges. The 

 colours of the animal are produced by pigment deposited on the under 

 surface of the scales, which in a scale recently removed is soft, and 

 readily rubbed off: the skin beneath is black. The scales, which are 

 subpentagonal, are marked with a series of regular lines, indented 

 on both surfaces, connected by transverse ones, somewhat like the 

 nervures in the wing of an insect ; they lose themselves before they 

 reach the hinder edge. The pigment is deposited in 

 the centres of the areas formed by the lines. The 

 scales from the back and from the belly are alike ; but 

 the postreme two-thirds of the tail are covered, both 

 on the upper and under surfaces, by narrow transverse 

 plates, which do not essentially differ however from 

 the other scales, except in having a greater number of ^ **^'^^^' magnified, 

 parallel depressed lines. 



The beautiful provision for protecting the eye without impeding 

 vision, shown by the lower (and larger) eyelid having a sort of win- 

 dow, a transparent, glassy, circular plate in its centre, immediately 

 opposite the pupil when the eye is closed, is well-worthy of admira- 

 tion as an obvious example of creative wisdom and providential care. 

 Habitually darting to and fro in the narrow crevices of walls and 

 heaps of stones, the eyes of the Woodslave, if unprotected, might be 

 continually liable to injurious contusions, while as it feeds on the 

 insects, at least in part, that resort to such situations, undimmed 

 vision would be essential to it while permeating them. 



The Woodslave is viviparous. I first became aware of this fact 

 by the dissection of a specimen killed on the 11th of February, in 

 the abdomen of which were several oval sacs, about half an inch long, 

 composed of a soft, transparent, very tender membrane, which dis- 

 played a foetus within each, far advanced to maturity. And on the 

 29th of April I killed another female, the abdomen of which was very 

 much dilated : in this specimen I found four young, quite matured, 

 and fully coloured, with a brilliancy indeed superior to that of the 

 adult : they were enveloped in two sacs, but each foetus was inclosed 

 in its own amnios besides, a very delicate membrane in which it lay 

 coiled up ; the vitellus not quite absorbed, but attached by the funis 

 to the belly. There was also a portion of the tail of a fifth foetus, the 

 body of which had probably been forced from the abdomen of the 



