1883. | On the Habits of the American Chameleon. 919 
The greatest stimulus to exercise of the brain is human soci- 
ety. Hence the greatest developments of mind have always been 
in the centers of population. Whatever may be the passive vir- 
tues of country life, it is the cities that furnish both the stimulus 
and the field for the triumphs of mind. 
TEE ARTE 
OBSERVATIONS ON THE HABITS OF THE AMERI- 
CAN CHAMELEON (ANOLIS PRINCIPALIS). 
BY R. W. SHUFELDT, 
CAPTAIN MEDICAL CORPS, U. S. ARMY. 
NDER all circumstances lizards are interesting creatures, 
meet them where we may ; as one evidence of this, how often 
do we find them chosen, and that, too, for many ages gone by, as 
objects to adorn pottery, vases and china, or modeled in silver 
and gold to be worn as jewelry, or cast in the baser metals for 
other purposes, such as bronze ornaments. There is something 
very mysterious, at times, in their very look, their dignified mien, 
their almost provoking silence; this is changed in us to a sense 
of curious interest that is quickened as the reptile assumes its 
livelier air, darts along the tree branch that it may be on, or shoots 
with the rapidity of an arrow up the trunk of some old tree. 
This singular interest amounts to positive fascination, as we come 
to know the anolidae, and I assure you our little American 
chameleon is one of the most engaging of the group, at the same 
time, being one of the commonest of all the lizards found through- 
out the lowlands of Louisiana; indeed, I have known instances 
of two or three children capturing as many as twenty-five or 
thirty in some old magnolia grove in the course of an hour or 
two, and we may well imagine the number that would escape 
from our juvenile collectors. It is certainly the exception though, 
that any one ever disturbs or injures, either in city or forest, this 
inoffensive and harmless little creature ; entitled as we are, how- 
ever, to claim this for ourselves, it must be remembered, and it is 
a fact not commonly known, that in the town and its immediate 
neighborhod the chameleon has an uncompromising enemy in 
the domestic cat. This animal, I have been informed upon un- 
doubted authority, will, when the opportunity presents itself, pass 
anything, meat, birds, and even fish, if there is the slightest 
chance of securing one of these lizards, of which they seem to 
