Then the chameleon has most extraordinary eyes. They are about as big as peas; but instead of having lids which move up and down, as ours do, they are entirely covered by the lids with the exception of just a tiny round space in the middle. The lizard sees, in fact, through a hole in the middle of its eyelid. That is strange enough; but what is stranger still is that the animal can move its eyes in different directions at the same time. They are hardly ever still for a single moment. But instead of moving together, like those of all other animals, one may be looking upward toward the sky and the other downward toward the ground; or the right eye may be peering forward in front of the nose while the left one is glancing backward toward the tail! Indeed, it would be very difficult to find an odder sight than that of a chameleon when it is moving its eyes about. They really look just as if they belonged to two different animals. But the most wonderful fact of all about the chameleon is that it can change its color whenever it chooses. How it does so no one quite knows. But the very same animal which is brown all over as it sits upon a branch will become green all over if you put it among leaves. The last thing at night, probably, you will find that it is gray. Next day, perhaps, brown spots will appear upon its body, and pinkish stripes upon its sides. And occasionally it may be violet, and sometimes yellow, and sometimes nearly black. So that if you were to go and look at a chameleon, and then go and look at it again half an hour afterward, you might very likely take it for a wholly different animal! Then the chameleon has very odd habits. If it is annoyed, for example, it puffs out its body in the most extraordinary way till it is nearly double its ordinary size and its skin is stretched almost as tight as the parchment of a drum. When it is caught it hisses like a snake. And really it must be the very laziest creature on earth. If it lifts a foot into the air it will often wait for quite a minute before it puts it down again, and for two or even three minutes more before it takes a second step. Then it always has to rest for some little time after uncoiling its tail from a branch, while when it coils it round another it stops and rests again. It will hardly travel two yards, in fact, in a day. Chameleons are found in many parts of Africa and Asia, and also in Southeastern Europe. CHAPTER XXVIII SNAKES There are a great many different kinds of snakes; but before we read about some of them, we must tell you some thing about the wonderful way in which their bodies are made.