REPTILES. 
295 
CHAPTER XXXI. 
Reptilia ( Reptiles ). 
(Continued.) 
There may often be seen on sunny banks in summer, 
basking in the genial beam of noon, a little Reptile, well 
known under the appellations of Blind-worm and Slow- 
worm. As it lies motionless, you might almost fancy it a 
foot’s length of thick iron wire, slightly polished, for it is 
almost equal in thickness in every part, and its surface 
gleams with a metallic lustre in the blight sun. Here is 
the village apothecary coming up the lane, poring over a 
book with spectacles on nose; let us ask him if he can tell 
us anything about it. “ Oh yes ! it is the Anguis fragilis of 
Linnseus ! ” and he passes on. Oh ! the Brittle Snake ! for 
such is the English of those two Latin words. 
But here is Hodge the hedger : perhaps from his occu- 
pation he may have some acquaintance with the bit of 
dingy wire : what say you, Hodge 1 “’Tis a Zneak ! and 
he makes a spiteful blow with his stick across the back of 
the poor animal, with the apologetic asseveration, “ Tis a 
deadly pizon varmin !” But see, the blow has effectually 
demolished it, and that in a strange manner; for, as if it 
had been made of glass, it has snapped across in four or 
