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In other places the woods appeared to be low and shrubby, and we saw no signs of inhabitants. Two water-snakes swam by the ship: They were beautifully spotted, and in every respect like land-snakes, except that their tails were broad and flat, probably to serve them instead of fins in swimming. In the morning of this day, the variation was 8° 20' E., and in the evening, 8° 36.
The land-snakes are venomous, but their poison is not of a very deadly character; and persons who have been bitten by them, if properly treated, generally recover. The lizards are of various sizes, some quite small, others more than three feet long, and covered with a coarse rough skin like that of a toad.
Modern travellers fail to distinguish the different kinds; but we may presume that they are not very unlike those of the adjoining Media, which appear to be trout, carp, barbel, dace, bleak, and gudgeon. The reptiles of Persia Proper are not numerous. They are chiefly tortoises, lizards, frogs, land-snakes, and water-snakes.
Their scales, instead of being imbricated like those of land-snakes, form hexagons; and those on the belly, instead of being scutate and enlarged, are nearly of the same size and form as on other parts of the body. Ælian speaks elsewhere of fresh-water snakes. I have sailed through large shoals of them in the Gulf of Manaar, close to the pearl-banks of Aripo.
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