(OeUe, AU NIUS ICAL 1a 718 
iguana deposits its eggs in the sand of the seashore in 
such localities as enable it to reach the sea. Oddly 
enough it is said that though the iguana can swim with 
ease, it objects to sea water, which, in view of the locality 
chosen by it for egg laying, is curious. An ally of the 
iguana, the marine lizard, Oreocephalus of the Galapagos, 
does not share this distaste for sea water ; it is an inter- 
esting fact that even iguanas can be submerged for a 
long time in water without being drowned ; and it will be 
remembered that Darwin tried, and in vain, to drown 
an Oreocephalus. The dewlap under its chin is not an 
inflatable structure, as some have thought or at least 
asserted ; but a very near ally of Igwana, known as 
Metopoceros cornutus, has a really dilatable throat pouch 
with which to express anger and perhaps also convey 
terror. This last iguana is black where our iguana is 
green ; and yet it is also arboreal. 
AN ANCIENT LIZARD 
For hours together this reptile will sit like Saturn, 
“quiet as a stone,” with hardly a blink of eyelid to indi- 
cate that it is not intended, like the chamois of Mark 
Twain, to fulfil obligations towards the visitor. The 
quiet atttude is not, however, an attribute of Sphenodon 
(or Hatteria) punctata only. It is common to the reptile 
tribe who live often two lives in sharp contrast. At 
times the eye can hardly follow the brisk movements of 
a small lizard ; at other times it is as if carved or stuffed. 
The tuatera presents no features which mark it out to 
the uninstructed eye as anything unlike the average of 
lizards. And, indeed, if all we had to judge by were 
external form and habits, Hatteria would be most un- 
questionably relegated without doubt to the Lacertilia. 
It has blackish olive hues, which are not unknown in the 
lizard tribe. The close-set crest along the back is to be 
seen in the iguana ; even the “ parietal eye,” so con- 
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