54 CHELONIA. 



Caretta squamata. The Hawk-hill Turtle or Indian Caret. 



Caretta imbricata (part.), auct. 



Testudo squamata, Bont. Jav. p. 82. 



Eretmochelys squamata, Ayass. Nat. Hist. U. States, i. p. 382. 



Linnaeus, in his ' Systema Naturae,' enumerates the species of Turtle famous by the tortoise- 

 shell which it supplies to commerce, as Testudo imbricata, referring to it specimens from the 

 Atlantic as well as from the Indian Ocean, and quoting the Javan Testudo squamata of 

 Bontius as a synonym. All subsequent zoologists have adopted Linnaeus's view, until 

 the Indian Caret was separated from the Atlantic form by L. Agassiz (Nat. Hist. United 

 States, i. p. 382), under the name of Eretmochelys squamata. Whether this distinction will 

 hold good I am not prepared to say, as I have not had an opportunity of examining 

 specimens from the Atlantic ; and I must not omit to remark, that of the characters assigned 

 by Agassiz to the Indian Caret, only the presence of very small scales on the neck appears 

 to be constant, whilst the ridges on the epidermal shields are by no means equally developed 

 in all the specimens, but frequently low and incomplete, as is stated to be the case in the 

 Atlantic Caretta imbricata. The following would be the characters of the Indian species : — 



Very small horny scales are imbedded in the skin of the neck ; the median keel extends 

 generally over all the vertebral shields ; other ridges diverge from the point of each vertebral 

 shield. The costal shields also have sometimes prominent ridges, commencing at the angles 

 they form with the marginal plates and running to the point of each costal. 



The Hawk-bill Turtle, so named from its rather elongate and compressed, curved upper 

 jaw, does not attain to the same size as the other Turtles: a shell 2 feet long is considered 

 as extraordinarily large. Although it is found throughout the East Indian Archipelago, it 

 is plentiful only at certain localities — for instance, on parts of the coasts of Ceylon (Ham- 

 bangtotte, Matura), of the Maldives, of Celebes, &c. As, however. Turtles always resort 

 to the locality where they were bom, or where they have been used to propagate their kind, 

 and as their capture is very profitable, they become scarcer and scarcer at places where they 

 are known to have been abundant formerly. Kelaart (Kept. Ceyl. p. 181) says that some 

 specimens sell for as much as £4, the price depending on the quality of the shell. If taken 

 from the animal when decomposition has set in, the colour of the shell becomes clouded 

 and milky, and hence the cruel expedient is resorted to of suspending the turtle over fire 

 till heat makes the shields start from the bony part of the carapace, after which the 

 creature is permitted to escape to the water*. There is no doubt that Turtles thus allowed 

 to escape to the water after such an operation may live ; but there can be no repetition of 

 this torture, as a reproduction of the epidermal shields to such a great extent is improbable. 

 At Celebes, whence the finest tortoiseshell is exported to China, the natives kill the turtle 

 by blows on the head, and immerse the shell in boiling water to detach the plates: dry 

 heat is only resorted to by the unskilfulf. The natives eat the flesh of this turtle, but 

 it is unpalatable to Europeans; the eggs, however, are regarded as equal to those of the 

 other Turtles. The British Museum possesses a fine example, brought by Mr. Swinhoe from 

 Formosa. 



* Sir E. J. Tennent's Nat. Hist. Ceylon, p. 29.3. f .lourn. Ind. Arcliip. iii. 1849, p. 227. 



