LIZARDS. 425 
lightning upon it, seizing it with its sharp little teeth, 
and soon swallowing it. The young are produced in eggs, 
which are generally hatched the moment they are laid, 
but sometimes they remain a short time before the young 
come forth ; the skin of the egg being so thin that the 
young Lizard can be seen. The green Lizard is a beau- 
tiful creature. Its colours are more brilliant and beautiful 
.than those of any other European species: they exhibit 
a rich and varied mixture of darker and lighter green, 
interspersed with specks and marks of yellow, brown, 
blackish, and sometimes even red. The head is covered 
with large angular scales ; arid the rest of the upper parts 
with very small ones. The tail is generally much longer 
than the body. Beneath the throat there is a kind of 
collar, formed by scales of much darker colour than the 
rest of the animal. 
The Lizard seems occasionally to lay aside its natural 
gentleness of disposition, but no further than for the pur- 
pose of obtaining food. Mr. Edwards once surprised a 
Lizard in the act of righting with a small bird, as she sat 
on her nest in a vine against a wall, with newly-hatched 
young. He supposed that the Lizard would have made 
a prey of the latter, could it have driven the old bird from 
her nest. He watched the contest for some time ; but, on 
his near approach, the Lizard dropped to the ground, and 
the bird flew off, 
