632 



THE TROPICAL WORLD. 



The large Water-lizards {Hydrosauri) frequent the low river banks or the margins 

 of springs, and although they may be seen basking on rocks or on the dead trunk of 

 some pi-ostrate tree in the heat of the sun, yet they appear more partial to the damp 

 weeds and undergrowth in the neighborhood of water. Their gait has somewhat more 

 of the awkward lateral motion of the crocodile, than of the lively action of the smaller 

 saurians. When attacked, they lash violently with their tail, swaying it sideways with 

 great force like the cayman. These modern types of the Mososaurus and Iguanodon 

 have a graceful habit of extending the neck, and raising the head to look about them, 

 and as you follow them leisurely over the rocks, or through the jungle, they frequently 

 stop, turn their heads round, and take a deliberate survey of the intruder. They are 

 by no means vicious, though they bite severely when provoked, acting, however, al- 

 ways on the defensive. On examining their stomachs, crabs, locusts, beetles, the 

 remains of jumping fish, the scales of snakes, and bones of frogs and other small 

 animals are discovered. Like that of the Iguanas, their flesh is delicate eating, re- 

 sembling that of a very young sucking-pig. 



The formidable name of Flying Dragons has been given to a genus of small lizards, 

 remarkable for the expansible cutaneous processes with which the sides are furnished, 

 and by whose means they are enabled to spring with more facility from branch to 

 branch, and even to support themselves for some time in the air, like the bat or flying- 

 squirrel. The tiny painted Dragon of the East, the Flyhig Lizard of the woods, is 

 fond of clinging with its wings to the smooth trunks of trees, and there remaining 

 immovable, basking in the sun. When disturbed, it leaps and shuffles away in an 

 awkward manner. One Mr. Adams had in his possession, reminded him of a bat when 

 placed on the ground. Sometimes the strange creature would feign death, and re- 

 main perfectly motionless, drooping its head, and doubling its limbs, until it fancied 

 the danger over, then cautiously raising its crouching form, it would look stealthily 

 around, and be ofi* in a moment. The dragon consumes flies in a slow and deliberate 

 manner, swallowing them gradually ; its various species belong exclusively to India 

 and the islands of the Eastern Archipelago. 



Who has not heard of the fatal glance of the Basilisk, which, according to poetical 

 fancy obliged all other poisonous animals to keep at a respectful distance. The truth 

 is, that the lizards that bear this dreaded name, which has been given them from the 

 fanciful resemblance of their pointed occipital crest to a regal crown, are quite as 

 harmless and inoffensive as the flying dragon. They are chiefly inhabitants of South 

 America, where they generally lead a sylvan life, feeding on insects. 



A few words on Frogs and Toads shall close this rather miscellaneous chapter. Of 

 the former there is none more famous than the hideous Pipa Sunnamensis, which 

 considerably exceeds in size the common toad, and whose deformity is often aggra- 

 vated by a phenomenon unexampled in the rest of the animal world, namely, the 

 young in various stages of exclusion, proceeding from cells dispersed over the back 

 of the parent. It was for a long time supposed that the ova of this extraordinary 

 reptile were produced in the dorsal cells without having been first excluded in the 

 form of spawn ; but it is now thoroughly ascertained that the female Pipa deposits 

 her eggs or spawn at the brink of some stagnant water, and that the male collects or 

 amasses the heap of ova, and deposits them with great care on the back of the female, 



