Ichneumon, p. 324 VI

Male and Female Skinkore, p. 100, V. 2.

Booka shash, p.326, VI

The large bulleted Sea Urchin, with rough knobby Prickles, found in the Red Sea.

ter that is excreted from the tip of it. The Moors and Arabs, after they have dried the skin, suspend it upon their bosoms to prevent the influence of an evil eye. in name from the n

The taitah differs little letaa, which in Lev. xi. 3.

is rendered the lizard; and therefore the chamaleon, a species indeed of lizard, might, with more propriety, be substituted for it.

The warral, or guaral, according to Leo*, is sometimes thirty inches in length; being usually of a bright reddish colour, with darkish spots. Vansleb† is so weak a philosopher, as very seriously to affirm, that the warral is ingendered from the rotten eggs of the crocodile.

The dhab or dab, another lizard, taken notice of likewise by Leo ‡, agrees nearly in shape, and in the hard pointed annuli or scales of the tail, with the caudiverbera, as it is represented in Gesner || and Johnston. Tsab [3] therefore, a word of the same sound in the Hebrew, Lev. xi. 29. is translated erroneously, as we may suppose, the tortoise, instead of the sharp scaled tail'd lizard.

The zermoumeah is as frequent in the highways and hedges, as the common green lizard. It is a mighty slender elegant animal, with a long

*J. Leo. Descript. Africæ, 1. ix. p. 297.

+ Vid. Vansleb's present State of Egypt, p. 47.

Vid. J. Leo, ut supra.

taper

|| Gesn. de Quadruped. ovip. p. 23. Jonst. Hist. Quadruped. Tab. LXXIX.

§ Boch. Hieroz. l. iv. c. 1.

taper tail, of a light brown colour, all over beautifully striated with yellow streaks.

The skink or scincus frequently hides itself under flat stones, or else in the holes of old walls and ruins. In the like situation, (though they often come into our houses, and crawl over our beds), we find the nije-daimah, or booka-shash, which is of a dark gloomy colour, seven or eight inches long, with a flat head and body, and with the tail like the dab's. I have often observed, that the booka-shash would beat with its tail the walls, floors, or cieling which it rested upon; a circumstance that may induce us to take this for the smaller, and the dab for the greater caudiverbera or uromastix. The warral also, in running upon the ground, uses the like action; whilst the Arabs gravely affirm, that the person who is touched by one of these strokes will become barren and unfruitful.

SECTION III.

Of the Serpentine kind.

Not to mention the slow-worm and the snake, which are common, the most remarkable species of the serpentine kind is the thaibanne, which might well be taken for Lucan's Thebanus ophites, provided Thebanus was an appellative, and not the proper name of the serpent. I have been informed that some of them are three or four yards long; and as it is by far the largest serpent in Barbary,

Barbary, it will so far answer to the hæmorrhous, to which Lucan has given the epithet of ingens; the many others which he describes being probably much smaller, and of the viper size. I have seen purses made of the skin of the thaibanne, which were more than four inches wide.

The zurreike, another serpent of the Sahara, is usually about fifteen inches long. It is of a slender body, and being remarkable, as the name (from surak, jaculari) insinuates, for darting itself along with great swiftness, may perhaps be one of Lucan's jaculi volucres.

But the most common as well as malignant of this tribe, is the leffah, which, like our viper or adder, is of a less uniform turn of body than the zurreike, and rarely exceeds a foot in length, It is not always of the same colour, but varies a little according to the quality of the earth, sand, or rocks, where it is found †. The torrida dipsas answers very well both to the name and to the quality of the leffah, which is so called from lef fah, urere, to burn.

The Arabs report that there is the same antipathy betwixt the leffah and the taitah, which was long ago assigned to the chamæleon and

* Vid. note, p. 339.

the

This circumstance and quality in the serpent kind has been taken notice of by Pliny. Vulgatum est,' says he, lib. viii. cap. 28. serpentes plerosque colorem terræ habere, qua occul'tantur. Vid. etiam Nicand. in Sepe et Sepedone.

‡ Vid. Ælian. Hist. Animal. 1. iv. c. 33. Philen. de Propr. Anim. in Chamaleonte. Scalig. ad Cardanum de Subtilit. apud Gesn. ut supra.