TRUE LIZARDS. 
161 
Portugal and Spain, where it is represented by a variety, it extends in France as 
far north as Paris, but it is unknown in Sardinia. In place of resorting, like the 
pearly lizard, to trees, this species is usually found on the ground, more especially 
in districts where the subsoil is rocky, ranging from the sea-level to a height of 
some three thousand feet, and being equally at home on the plains or among the 
mountains, in stony or sandy districts, on bare rocks, or among thick bush. As 
rapid as lightning in its movements, it feeds chiefly upon large insects and their 
larvae, together with slugs and worms; living in grassy districts almost entirely upon 
grasshoppers, and at times attacking smaller species of its own tribe. In Switzer¬ 
land and Germany the female usually deposits her eight to eleven white eggs 
green lizards (§ nat. size). 
during June, these being hatched in the course of a month or so; and it is 
generally during the breeding-season that the blue on the throat is assumed by 
this sex. 
The third European representative of the genus is the much 
smaller sand-, or hedge-lizard ( L. agilis), which is a more northern 
form, ranging into the British Islands and Scandinavia. Usually not more than 
8 inches in length, although occasionally measuring nearly 10, this lizard may be 
recognised by its short, thick, and blunt-snouted head, and by the tail being 
considerably less than twice the length of the head and body. Never having more 
than fifty-eight scales round the middle of the body, it is further distinguished by 
the rostral shield of the head being separated by a small interval from the nostrils, 
VOL. v. — II 
