EAST AFRICAN LIZARDS. 



U5 



It is a most awkward creature to handle ; not only can it give 

 a severe bite, but a lash from the tail of even a small specimen is 

 severe, owing to it turning the dorsal keel over sideways as it 

 strikes. It makes good use of its clavrs to scratch when seized, 

 and on this account alone I have dropped Monitors which I had 

 securely b}*- the neck. 



Hearing that a couple of very large Monitors paid a daily visit 

 to the cook-house, which was situated at the edge of a bank or 

 slide which sloped steeply down to the river nearly 200 ft. below, 

 I walked aloug the opposite bank of the river one day, A bell 

 was rung at 12 p.m. each day, and from 12. .30 to 1.30 p.m. all is 

 quiet. It is then that the reptiles came up for scraps. Whether 

 the ringing of the bell had any significance for them it would 

 be difiicult to say. Whilst walking along the opposite bank I 

 descried one of the lizards lying just below the top near the cook- 

 house, but hidden from view from anyone on that bank. After 

 crossing the river I scrambled up thirty foot or so of the slide, 

 and found that the Monitor had disappeared. Even as I looked, 

 however, its head appeared over the top of the bank, and I fired 

 at it with a '22 Winchester. The bullet caused it to bound over 

 the bank where it lay quiet, for as it heard the bullet whistle 

 past, it imagined the danger came from above. 



In its new position it exposed its whole length to me, and I put 

 three bullets into it as fast as I could load ; after each it gave a 

 jump, but kept under the bank. Someone, hearing the firing, 

 came to the edo-e of the bank and looked over, thus disturbing: 

 the Monitor, which fied down the bank like a great dog, disappear- 

 ing into some bushes on the brink of a cliff that rose sheer from 

 the river forty feet below. I feared that it had gone over this, 

 but my boy i-etrieved it from the very edge. It was not in the 

 least spoilt by the three bullet-holes, and I had to give it a 

 tremendous dose of chloroform to kill it. The creature was a 

 male and measured 55 inches over all. Its stomach contained 

 m.eat from the cook-house and crabs. Crabs' claws on the pai-tly 

 submerged rocks in the river are generally a sign that Monitors 

 are in the neighbourhood. In the stomach of another specimen I 

 have found the remains of a toad. As is well known, they often 

 come to fowl-houses for the eggs, which seems to be one of their 

 favom^ite articles of diet. 



Ticks are connnonly found about the anal region of Monitors. 



A worm, Tanqua tiara (v. Linst), was found in one specimen 

 at Morogoro (6. iv. 18). 



A M P H I S B N I D .E. 

 MONOPELTIS COLOBURA (BlgT.). 



Blgr. Ann. S. Afr. Mus. v. 1910, p. 495. 

 Of the ten species of Amphisb^enidse found in East Africa this 

 was the only one met with by the writer. This is its first record 

 Pkoc. Zool. Soc— 1920, ^s"o. X. 10 



