THE CLASS REPTILIA. 5 
venomous. Even these three are contined to Eneland, 
Scotland, and Wales, there being no representative 
another 
of the serpent tribe indigenous to Ireland 
grievance from the naturalist’s point of view, per- 
haps! ‘St Patrick’s decree of banishment has long been 
popularly associated with this curious local immunity, 
while others have suggested that the fact points to 
Ireland having been cut off from the continent of 
Europe before the serpent species had reached so far 
west. Whatever the real explanation may be, the 
fact remains that (with the exception of some isolated 
occurrences referred to later) Ireland has no serpents. 
Lizards are the only reptiles found there. 
New Zealand, too, has no serpents except venomous 
sea-snakes, though here again the order of lizards is 
represented ; and there are other oceanic islands which 
exhibit a similar peculiarity. 
Climate has, of course, a great deal to do with the 
distribution of reptiles, as they are essentially in- 
habitants of warm and temperate lands, becoming 
rarer the farther north one goes. Thus, “In Europe 
snakes cease at 60° north latitude, and at 6000 feet 
elevation in the Alps”;+ the lizards, however, ex- 
tend both to the more northern latitudes and_ to 
higher elevations, except in North America, where 
the serpents are found more northerly than the 
lizards. 
To the naturalist who studies the development of 
! Packard. 
