The Antwerp lynx, meanwhile, had attained considerable credit, from the fact of two ladies visiting him in person, upon which he burst into immoderate laughter. On the cause of his mirth being inquired into, he stated that one of them had on no under garment, the truth of which statement caused the ladies to take a hasty departure, in the dread of revelations still more indiscreet.
In the beginning of the present century there lived a physician at Lyons, who seriously asserted that one of his patients had the power of reading letters, though sealed. This was evidently a device to obtain notoriety, and fill his purse at the expense of a credulous public. For what, in fact, can be more grossly absurd than the assertion that either human eyes, or those of the lynx possess the faculty of reading through opaque bodies? Many attempts have been recently made by the upholders of Magnetism to exhibit similar impositions.
From the lynx we proceed to the cameleon; hoping to exonerate this much defamed animal from the imputations of mutability so long lavished upon its nature. Instead of being adopted as the symbol of fickleness, the cameleon ought, in fact, to become the emblem of frankness and truth, betraying in its changes of hue every impression of which it is susceptible.
The ancients denied the existence of the cameleon, treating it as an ideal animal devoid of natural colour. They conceded to it, on the other hand, a radiant body, and the faculty of existing without food. Such were the opinions of Pliny, Aristotle, and Œlian. But Daubenton and Lacépède devoted serious attention to the nature of the cameleon; and the scrutiny of science has served to rectify a popular error.
Cameleons have been brought alive to France, and a pair is now living in the Zoological Gardens of England. But till lately, they were known in Europe only through the preparations of our Museums of Natural History. This singular animal belongs to the lizard tribe, and is found in hot climates. Its length is from thirteen to fourteen inches; of which the tail counts for half. The head is surmounted by a kind of cartilaginous pyramid inclining backwards. The mouth is so formed as scarcely to afford a view of its disproportionably large swallow. For some time too, the cameleon passed for being devoid of hearing; but Camper has established that it possesses that faculty, though in a limited degree. The organs of sight on the other hand, are so acute as to exceed by far those of the lynx. It can turn its eyes in every direction; moves with deliberate dignity, and feeds on insects. But is not entitled to the encomiums of the ancients with respect to sobriety; though it can fast for a period exceeding a year. Of a pacific nature, it has numerous enemies; and being timid to excess, its endless variations of hue are perceptible through a very transparent skin. Heat and light influence the changes of its colours; which vary between yellow, red, black, green, and white.
Mademoiselle de Scudery possessed a pair of cameleons, from observations upon which, it was seen that adjacent colours produced no effect upon them; other colours than those near them often manifesting themselves on the body. Bichat supposed that the mutations of the cameleon proceeded from the quantity of air contained in the arterial blood; an opinion the better founded, that this animal is able to fill itself with air and discharge it at will. When asleep, or cold, or dead, the hue of the cameleon is white. Such is the exact truth concerning two animals which poets and historians have invested with fabulous properties; and to which mankind have often been assimilated—by analogies now admitted to be groundless.
CHAPTER XVI.
WILD WOMEN.