Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 5.djvu/394

382 at will. In moving, the eyes act independently of each other, so that while the one stares upwards the other may be eagerly following the motions of an insect beneath, or the one may even be directed backwards while the other watches in front. This extraordinary range of vision amply compensates for the small degree of mobility in the neck and the general slowness of motion characteristic of the chameleon. The tongue is equally remarkable, being sub-cylindrical, worm-like, and extremely extensile, with the end somewhat enlarged and hollow, and supplied with a glutinous secretion. It is by means of this organ, which is capable of being protruded to a length of six or seven inches, that chameleons obtain their food. They are arbo real in their habits, supporting themselves on the branches of trees by their grasping hand-like feet and prehensile tails. In their movements they are slow and deliberate, and when watching for the insects which form their sole food, they remain motionless for hours, partly concealed by the foliage, and still more by the exercise of the faculty which they possess above all other creatures of changing their colour so as to resemble surrounding objects. Their power in this direction has, however, been greatly ex aggerated. They cannot, as was at one time supposed, assume in succession all the colours of the rainbow ; but under certain conditions, by no means well ascertained, their normal bluish ash colour may give place to a green or yellowish hue, with irregular spots of a dull red, or it may become considerably paler so as to approach to white ness. Thus an observer reports recently that he saw a chameleon making its way along the top of an old wall near Ephesus, the stones of which were of a dark colour, occasionally varied by a block of white marble, and he noticed that no sooner did the creature rest on one of the latter than it gradually became less visible, owing evidently to its assumption of a colour somewhat harmonizing with the marble on which it rested. This curious phenomenon was observed by the earliest writers on natural history, and gave rise to much speculation. Aristotle held that the change of colour only took place when the chameleon was inflated with air, to which therefore it was owing ; Pliny that its varying colours were borrowed from sur rounding objects ; while Wormius was the first to attribute those variations to the play of the emotions and passions ; but Milne Edwards, in a paper published in the Annales d&amp;gt; s Sciences, showed that, whatever the exciting cause of these changes in colour, whether due to the emotions, the inflation of the lungs, or exposure to the sun s rays, they were rendered possible only by the presence in the skin of the chameleon of two layers of differently-coloured pig ment, placed one over the other, and so arranged that both may appear simultaneously on the surface, or the one may be displaced to a greater or less extent by the other, the colour varying with the amount of such displacement. Thus protected by its colouring, the chameleon awaits the coming of its prey, and no sooner does an insect place itself within reach of its worm-like tongue than that organ, leaping forth from its sheath with lightning speed, fixes ita victim on the glutinous tip, which is forthwith engulphed with equally astonishing rapidity. The eggs of the chame leon are deposited under leaves on the ground. They are numerous, round, and covered with an exceedingly porous shell formed of calcareous matter. The species composing the family are inhabitants chiefly of Africa and the islands adjacent, notably of Madagascar, to which about a third of all the known species are confined. The latter include such curious forms as the Rhinoceros Chameleon, the male of which has a horn-like tubercle at the end of the muzzle ; also a form recently described by Giinther, in which the tail is so short as to be almost useless for prehension, a defect which seems compensated for by the presence of an additional denticle at the inner base of each claw, and of a spine projecting from the side of each finger and toe, which must add greatly t:&amp;gt; the creature s prehensile power. Owing to this peculiarity Giinther proposes to make it the type of a new genus (Proceedings of the Zoological Society, 1874). Fernando Po is the home of the Three-Horned Chameleon (Chamceleo Oweiii), which has a long conical horn over each eye, and another at the extremity of the muzzle ; but the best known and most widely distributed species is the Common Chameleon (C. vulgaris), found in Southern Asia and the north of Africa, and naturalized in the southern countries of Europe. It is often brought to England, but owing to the coldness of the climate it exists there in a more or less torpid condition, and soon dies.  CHAMFORT, (1741-1794), one of the most famous talkers of a century rich in conversational excellence, was born at a little village near Clermont in Auvergne. The illegitimate child of a dame de compagnie, he never knew his father, and started in life as plain Nicolas, that being the name bestowed on him by his mother. A journey to Paris resulted, through some now unknown influence, in the boy s obtaining a bursary at the College des Grassins. He worked hard, and won nine prizes out of ten in two years. It is significant of his cynical and original turn of mind that he should have been the only critic disposed to be severe on the Latin hexameters that crowned his college reputation, and that in after years he should have regarded as wasted the time bestowed on the acquisition of academical knowledge, his opinion of which is expressed in one of his most contemptuous epigrams &quot;Ce que j ai appris j e ne le sais plus ; le pen quejesaisje lai divine.&quot; After this success the future king of the salons ran away from college, in company with two class-mates, on a voyage round the world. The three rovers reached Cherbourg, and there reflected. They returned, and Chamfort became an abbe&quot;. &quot; C est un costume, ct non point un etat,&quot; he said ; and to the principal of his college who promised him a benefice, he replied that he would never be a priest, inasmuch as he preferred honour to honours &quot; j aime Vhonneur et non les honneurs.&quot; About this time he assumed that name of Chamfort he was afterwards to render famous, and plunged hap-hazard into the press for literary work and renown. He met with scant suc cess. Repulsed by editors and booksellers alike, he took to making sermons at a louis each for an incompetent brother ; and in this way, scribbling now and then for the journals, he contrived to exist for a whole year. A successful com petition for one of the Academy s prizes opened to him the drawing-rooms of the upper world, and he became fashionable. His health and constitution were exceedingly vigorous ; but his passions were violent, he lived hard, and he presently had to seek rest and recovery at Spa and elsewhere. In a second competition he was unsuccessful ; but a comedy of little merit, La Jeune Indienne, made some noise, and con soled him for his failure. He was always poor. Though his was already a well known name, he lived on elee mosynary dinners and suppers, repaying countenance and sustenance with his Ions mots. Madame Helve tius entertained him at Sevres for some years. Chabanon, however, gave up to the destitute wit his pension of 1200 livres on the Mercure de France, and about the same time Chamfort took two more Academy prizes for his eulogies on Moliere and on La Fontaine, by which he also won a hundred louis from Necker, and obtained an enormous reputation. And as he wrote little and talked a great deal, his reputation increased, till, underprotection of the Duchesse de Grammont, he went to court. His poor tragedy, Mustapha et Zeangir, was played at Fontainebleau before Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette; the king added 1200 livres to the gift of Chabanon, and the Prince de Cond6 made Chamfort his 