610 



ANGUINE S2REN. 



wliere smooth and even ; the liead of a somewhat 

 . depressed form, with a lengthened, obtuse, and 

 widish snout, and has no external eyes : the month 

 is moderately wide, and furnished with a row of 

 rery minute teeth : the legs are about three quar- 

 ters of an inch in length ; the fore legs being situ- 

 ' ated almost immediately behind the branchial fins, 

 and the feet furnished with three toes, without 

 any appearance of claws : the hind legs are situ« 

 ated at a great distance backwards, towards the 

 commencement of the tail, and are of the same 

 appearance with the fore legs, but the feet have 

 ;- only two toes, which, like those of the fore feet, 

 are destitute of claws. The motions of the animal, 

 when taken out of the water, are, in general, ex- 

 tremely slow and languid ; as is also the case when 

 kept in a vessel of v/ater ; but when in its native 

 lake, it is sometimes observed to swim 'pretty 

 - briskly, waving its body in a serpentine direction^ 

 in the manner of a leech. 



The Anguine Siren is v/ell figured by Laurenti, 

 who seems to have been its first describer, in his 

 work entitled Specimen Jlledicu?n^ e.vhibens Synopsin 

 lleptilmm, under the title of Proteus iVnguinus. 



With respect to its real nature^ Zoologists arc 

 not yet agreed : some imagining it to be the Larva 

 of some species of Lizard, whose gradations have 

 not been fully ascertained, while others, with per- 

 haps equal probability, suppose it a complete or 

 perfect animal. 



Its anatomy is amply detailed by Dr. Schreibers^ 



