34 lECtURF/^tll. 
ported by internal ribs, arid by the lielp of whic& 
it flies or flutters. It is a perfectly innocent animal, 
and is found in many pafts of *Xsia and Africa. Its 
natural colour is a And blueish grey, with darker 
variegations, and the mug's are elegantly spotted 
towards their edges with black and white varie- 
gations. The animal is the' Draco volans of Lin- 
naeus. Another species has been described by 
some, diflering from the present in having the 
fore-legs joined to the upper part of the wings. 
I shall proceed to take a very short survey of 
the Serpent tribe, constituting the last order of 
the LimiEean amphibia. The Serpents, in a ge- 
neral view, are readily distinguished from the rest 
by their total want of feet moving by the assist- 
ance of their scales, and their general powers of 
coiitorsion. In the servients the distinction of 
the species is often very difficult, the animals often 
varying greatly in colours according to the dif- 
ferent stages of their growth. Linnjeus imagined 
that he had discovered an infallible method of as- 
certaining the species, viz. from the number of 
scalv plates on the lower parts of the animal in 
the different genera; but experience has suffl- 
cientlv proved this method to be erroneous, and 
