LIZARDS. 



Ill 



Some live on ants upon the ground, others peck minute 

 insects from the bark of trees ; one group will devour 

 bees and wasps, others prefer caterpillars ; while a host 

 of small birds seek for insects in the corollas of flowers. 

 The air, the earth, the undergrowth, the tree-trunks, the 

 flowers, and the fruits, all support their specially adapted 

 tribes of birds. Each species fills a place in nature, 

 and can only continue to exist so long as that place 

 is open to it ; and each has become what it is in every 

 detail of form, size, structure, and even of colour, 

 because it has inherited through countless ancestral 

 forms all those variations which have best adapted it 

 among its fellows to fill that place, and to leave behind 

 it equally well adapted successors. 



Reptiles and Amphibia. — Next to the birds, or 

 perhaps to the less observant eye even before them, the 

 abundance and variety of reptiles form the chief charac- 

 teristic of tropical nature ; and the three groups — 

 Lizards, Snakes, and Frogs, comprise all that, from our 

 present point of view, need be noticed. 



Lizards. — Lizards are by far the most abundant in 

 individuals and the most conspicuous ; and they con- 

 stitute one of the first attractions to the visitor from 

 colder lands. They literally swarm everywhere. In 

 cities they may be seen running along walls and up 

 palings ; sunning themselves on logs of wood, or creeping 

 up to the eaves of cottages. In every garden, road, or 

 dry sandy path, they scamper aside as you walk along. 

 They crawl up trees, keeping at the further side of the 

 trunk and watching the passer-by with the caution of 

 a squirrel. Some will walk up smooth walls with the 

 greatest ease ; while in houses the various kinds of Geckos 



