, that some naturalists counsel their union into a single class of
Squamate, or scaled reptiles. By a milder process of arrangement, all
those animals which dwell upon the frontier ground between Lizards or
Saurians, and Ophidians or Snakes, are to be called Saurophidian. The
blindworm then, is Saurophidian; it is quite as much a lizard as a
snake. Snakes have the bones of their head all movable, so that their
jaws can be dilated, until, like carpet-bags, they swallow any thing.
The lizard has its jaws fixed; so has the blindworm. Snakes have a long
tongue, split for some distance, and made double-forked; the blindworm's
tongue has nothing but a little notch upon the tip. It has a smooth
round muzzle, with which it can easily wind its way under dry soil to
hybernate; or else it takes a winter nap in any large heap of dead
leaves. It comes out early in the spring; for it can bear more cold than
reptiles generally like, and it is found all over Europe, from Sweden to
the south of Italy. It feeds upon worms, slugs, and insects. Like the
snakes, it gets a new coat as it grows, and takes the old one off, by
hooking it to some fixed point, and crawling from it, so that the cast
skin is dragged backward, and turned inside out. The slow-worm is of a
dark gray color, silvery, and about a foot long on the average. It is
ovo-viviparous. It is extremely gentle; very rarely thinks of biting
those who handle it, and, when it does bite, inflicts no wound with its
little teeth. Of course it has no fangs and is not poisonous. Shrinking
with fear when taken, it contracts its body and so stiffens it that it
will break if we strike or bend it. Therefore it bears the name Linnaeus
gave it--_Anguis fragilis_.

We have found nothing yet to shudder at among our reptiles. "O! but,"
you say perhaps, "that was not a real snake." Well, here is our real
snake. _Natrix torquata_--our common Ringed Snake; he is very common. He
may be three or four feet long, and brownish-gray above, with a green
tinge, yellow marks upon the neck, and rows of black spots down the back
and sides, alternating, like London lamp-posts, with each other. You
will find him any where in England, almost any where in Europe, below
the latitude of Scotland. You will find him most frequently in a moist
place, or near water, for he is rather proud of himself as a swimmer. He
has a handsome coat, and gets a new one two, three, four, or five times
in a season, if his growth require i