LACERTA. 
getable food and certain species of insects. 
The guanas de.posit titeiv eggs (wliich liave 
no testaceous covering, and are much va- 
lued for food) in the eartii where they may 
be warmed by the beams of the sun, and 
leave them to be matured solely by its in- 
fluence. The natives of the Baliamas train 
clogs to the pursuit of these animals, and a 
well disciplined dog will take them alive, in 
which case they are carried for sale to the 
markets of Carolina in the holds of vessels ; 
those which are destroyed or lacerated by 
the dogs, are salted and barrelled, and kept 
for the home consumption. Their flesh is 
reported to be easily digestible, delicate, 
and well flavoured. They will keep under 
water for nearly an hour ; when they swim, 
their feet are kept close to their bodies, 
and tiiey appear to produce and regulate 
their motions mefely by their tails. What- 
ever they eat they swallow whole. They 
have been kept without food a very consi- 
derable time. Their colour is much af- 
fected by the state of the weather, or the 
dampness or dryness of their habitation. 
They may be easily tamed if taken young. 
L. basiliseus, or the basilisk, is particu- 
larly distinguished by a broad wing-like 
process, elevated along the whole length of 
its back, somewhat similar to the fins of 
fishes, and which is capable, at the pleasure 
of the animal, of being extended or con- 
tracted. It lives almost solely in trees, 
feeding upon insects, and though somew hat 
terrific in appearance, is as harmless as any 
of the lizard tribe. It is found most fre- 
quently in South America, generally about 
a foot and a half long, swims with great 
ease, and moving among the branches of the 
trees with extreme agility, sometimes ap- 
parently with a short flight, which is aided 
by the remarkable process above menti- 
oned, on its back. The basilisk of anti- 
quity, whose bite was supposed to be more 
speedily mortal than that of any pther 
creature, and whose look even carried de- 
struction with it, is to be ranked with the 
fabulous monsters, which in the prevailing 
ignorance of nature that attended those 
times, were amply supplied by a poetic 
imagination. See Amphibia, Plate I. fig. 3. 
L. monitor, or the black lizard, measures 
frequently four and sometimes five feet, 
being one of the largest as w'ell as the roost 
elegant of the tribe. It is found principally 
in woody and moist situations in South Ame- 
rica, and is reported to give indications of 
attachment and gratitude to those by whom 
it has been fed, and familiarised to be as 
VOL. IV. 
mild in its maniiers and temper as it is ele- 
gant in its form. 
L. agilis, or the green lizard, is abundant 
in all the warmer latitudes of Europe, some- 
times attaining the length of more than two 
feet, but in general not exceeding one. Its 
colouring is more beautiful thaii that of any 
of its tribe in this quarter of the world. 
About the soutliern walls of gardens, it is 
particularly seen pursuing insects with 
great alertness and dexterity, and both in 
attack and escape its agility is truly ad- 
mirable. It may to a certain degree be 
tamed and familiarised, and in this state is 
by many considered not only as a per- 
, fectly harmless, but as a favourite animal. 
L. chamaeleon, the cliameleon, is gene- 
rally of the length of ten inches without tlie 
tail, which is equally long. Its food con- 
sists of insects, which it procures by pro- 
truding the tip of its tubuiar and lengthened 
tongue with inconceivable celeiity, and 
never failing to retract with it the prey at 
which it was darted. In India and Africa, 
and various other parts of the world, these 
animals are found in great abundance. They 
are perfectly inoffensive, and can endure a 
long abstinence, from which latter circum- 
stance the idea of their living upon air 
alone, may not unnaturally have been de- 
rived. They occasionally retain the air in 
their lungs for a very considerable time, and 
thus assume an appearance of fullness and 
fleshiness which is in perfect contrast to 
that which they will suddenly exhibit, in 
consequence of the total expulsion of the 
air from the lungs, during which they are 
collapsed and seemingly emaciated. A 
change of colour is sometimes observed in 
many of the lizard tribe, but particularly so 
in the chameleon ; but the long prevailing 
idpa of the adaptation of its colour to that of 
any substance with which it is surrounded 
is totally groundless. Its varieties in this 
respect appears to extend (in consequence 
principally, of varied health or tempera- 
ture) from its natural green-grey into very 
pale yellow, with irregular patches of red. 
When exposed to the sun, considerable 
changes in the shading and patching of its 
colours are observable ; and when, after 
being wrapped in white linen by sonte 
members of the French Academy it re- 
appeared within two or three minutes, it 
partook somewhat, but very far from com- 
pletely of the colour of it. On being folded 
up in substances of various other different 
colours, it borrowed neither of them, and 
exhibited no interesting change. Th« 
E 
