142 OPHISAURUS VENTRALIS. 



alarmed, it moves with considerable swiftness, and is not easily taken without 

 injury, for the vertebra? of its long tail are articulated like those of a Skink, 

 and are easily separated by a slight blow; indeed it is from this extreme fragility 

 of the tail that the animal has received the common name of Glass Snake. 



Geographical Distribution. The Glass Snake is found on the Atlantic border, 

 from southern Virginia to Cape Florida. It inhabits Alabama, Mississippi, 

 and Louisiana, and is found in many of the States bordering on the Mississippi, 

 Missouri and Ohio rivers. Its extreme northern range, west of the Alleghanies, 

 seems at this time to be Michigan. 



General Remarks. Catesby was the first naturalist who described the Glass 

 Snake, and gave a tolerable figure of it, though defective in colour. Linnanis 

 received it in the twelfth edition of the Systema Naturae as the Anguis ventralis, 

 which specific name has been generally adopted by succeeding naturalists. 

 Schneider separated it from the genus Anguis, and placed it in his Chamoesaurus. 

 Daudin made for it a new genus, which he named Ophisaurus, and very properly, 

 for the Glass Snake has really the external form of a serpent, with the internal 

 orsanization of a saurian animal. 



