otnote 174: The honey-bee of Europe was introduced into South America
in 1845.]

Of land vertebrates, lizards are the first to attract the attention of
the traveler on the equator. Great in number and variety, they are met
every where--crawling up the walls of buildings, scampering over the
hot, dusty roads, gliding through the forest. They stand up on their
legs, carry their tails cocked up in the air, and run with the activity
of a warm-blooded animal. It is almost impossible to catch them. Some of
them are far from being the unpleasant-looking animals many people
imagine; but in their coats of many colors, green, gray, brown, and
yellow, they may be pronounced beautiful. Others, however, have a
repulsive aspect, and are a yard in length. The iguana, peculiar to the
New World tropics, is covered with minute green scales handed with brown
(though it changes its color like the chameleon), and has a serrated
back and gular pouch. It grows to the length of five feet, and is
arboreal. Its white flesh, and its oblong, oily eggs, arc considered
great delicacies. We heard of a lady who kept one as a pet. Frogs and
toads, the chief musicians in the Amazonian forest, are of all sizes,
from an inch to a foot in diameter. The _Bufo gigas_ is of a dull gray
color, and is covered with warts. Tree-frogs (_Hyla_) are very
abundant; they do not occur on the Andes or on the Pacific coast. Their
quack-quack, drum-drum, hoo-hoo, is one of our pleasant memories of
South America. Of snakes there is no lack; and yet they are not so
numerous as imagination would make them. There are one hundred and fifty
species in South America, or one half as many, on the same area, as in
the East Indies. The diabolical family is led by the boa, while the rear
is brought up by the Amphisbaenas, or "double-headed snakes," which
progress equally well with either end forward, so that it is difficult
to make head or tail of them. The majority are harmless. The deadly
coral is found on both sides of the Andes, and wherever there is a cacao
plantation. One of the most beautiful specimens of the venomous kind is
a new species (_Elaps imperator_, Cope), which we discovered on the
Maranon. It has a slender body more than two feet in length, with black
and red bands margined with yellow, and a black and yellow head, with
permanently erect fangs.

[Illustration: Iguana.]

We have already mentioned the most common birds. Probably, says Wallace,
no country in the wo