in zoology, a genus of serpents belonging to the order of amphibia serpentes, so called from the false notion of its having two heads, because it moves with either end foremost.

The head of the amphisbaena is small, smooth, and blunt; the nostrils are very small; the eyes are minute and blackish; and the mouth is furnished with a great number of small teeth. The body is cylindrical, about a foot long, and divided into about 200 annular convex segments like those of a worm; and it has about 40 longitudinal streaks, of which 12 on each side are in the form of small crosses like the Roman X; the anus is a transverse slit; and the last ring or segment of the belly belly has eight small papillae, forming a transverse line before the anus; the tail, i.e., all the space below the anus, is short, consisting of 30 annular segments, without being marked with the cross-lines, and is thick and blunt at the point. The colour of the whole animal is black, variegated with white; but the black prevails most on the back, and the white on the belly. It has a great resemblance to a worm, living in the earth, and moving equally well with either end foremost. There are but two species, viz. 1. The fuliginosa, which answers exactly to the above description, and is found in Libya and in different parts of America. 2. The alba, which is totally white, is a native of both the Indies, and is generally found in ant-hills. The bite of the amphibena is reckoned to be mortal by many authors; but as it is not furnished with dog-teeth, the usual instruments of conveying the poison of serpents, later writers esteem it not to be poisonous. They feed upon ants and earth-worms, but particularly the latter. See Plate XVI.

**Amphibena Aquatica**, a name given by Bertratus, Albertus, and several other authors, to that long and slender insect, called by others the *feta aquatica*, and *vermis setarius*. It has the name *amphibena*, from its going backwards or forwards with equal ease and velocity. The usual size is four or five inches long, and the thickness of a large hair.

Dr Lister accidentally found out the origin of this worm, in his researches into the history of a very different sort of insect. Dissecting one of the common black beetles dug up in a garden, he found in its belly two of these hair worms, or amphibones; and renewing the experiment on other beetles of the same species, he found that they usually contained, one, two, or three of these worms. As soon as the body of the beetle is opened, they always crawl out. When put into water they will live a considerable time, and swim nimbly about; but often put up their heads above water, as if endeavouring to make their escape, and sometimes fastening themselves by the mouth to the sides of the vessel, and drawing their whole bodies after them. These creatures are not only found in the waters, but buried in earth, and sometimes on the leaves of trees, in our gardens and hedges. Phil. Trans. No 83.

**Amphisii**, among geographers, a name applied to the people who inhabit the torrid zone. The Amphisii, as the word imports, have their shadows one part of the year towards the north, and the other towards the south, according to the sun's place in the ecliptic. They are also called *Aeolii*. See *Asci*.

**Amphissa** (anc. geogr.), the capital of the Locri Oxoiae, 120 stadia (or 15 miles) to the west of Delphi, (Pausanias.) So called, because surrounded on all hands by mountains, (Stephanus.) Hence *Amphissae*, the inhabitants; who plundered the temple at Delphi, (Demosthenes.)—Also a town of Magna Graecia, at the mouth of the Sagra, on the coast of the Farther Calabria, situated between Locri and Caulonia; now called *Recellia*. Amphissae the epithet, (Ovid.)

**Amphitane**, among ancient naturalists, a stone said to attract gold as the lodestone does iron. Pliny says it was found in that part of the Indies where the native gold lay so near the surface of the earth as to be turned up in small mounds among the earth of anthills; and describes it to have been of a square figure, and of the colour and brightness of gold. The description plainly points out a well-known fossil, called, by Dr Hill, *pyriteum*: this is common in the mines of most parts of the world; but neither this nor any other stone was ever supposed, in our times, to have the power of attracting gold.