50 Years Ago

The Borneo earless monitor lizard (which forms, with two American lizards, the family Helodermatidae) is known from less than ten specimens ... A live specimen measuring 13 in. (about average size to date) was obtained only a mile from our own archaeological base camp ... In most of its behaviour it resembled a nocturnal snake. Though taken from a hole in the ground, the front legs are so weak that it is difficult to conceive of its burrowing with these. The strong snout and head were used to enlarge any ground weakness, however ... It showed no inclination to bite either the handler or anything else (including food). It seems unlikely, therefore, that it is poisonous as has often been suggested.

From Nature 24 June 1961

100 Years Ago

Britain's Birds and their Nests — Another gorgeous volume on Britain's birds and their nests! ...Happy the publishers, and authors we presume, supported by a public with so insatiable an appetite for British ornithology ... We must, however, confess to considerable disappointment in the volume before us. The text is excellent. Indeed, the various biographies are pleasantly written ... But it is with the plates that fault is chiefly to be found. They are all “very pretty,” but we have more of art than of nature in them. Without exception the species ... depicted are the most “proper” series of British birds we have ever made the acquaintance of. They never foul the ground, when 'tis their nature to; they never disturb a blade of grass or a single petal of the beautiful flowers that emborder their nests in nearly every case. They are indeed the most aesthetic company we have yet met with, in the choice of nesting sites.

From Nature 22 June 1911