3o6 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



The Seychelles and Mauritius were indeed to a great 

 extent " dumping places," to which tortoises were brought in 

 former days from other islands, and maintained either as 

 curiosities or for the sake of their eggs and young, if not for 

 both reasons together; it is this "dumping" process which has 

 rendered the unravelling of the history of the giant tortoises 

 of the islands of the Indian Ocean such a difficult business. 



By far the most famous of these transported specimens is 

 the monster recently and, for all I know, still, living at the 

 Royal Artillery Barracks, Port Louis, Mauritius. It formed 

 one of a consignment of five brought to that island from the 

 Seychelles in the year 1766 by the Chevalier Marion de 

 Fresne, and accordingly known as Marion's tortoises— a name 

 which, in the singular, may serve as the designation of the 

 species they represent. At intervals three of these tortoises 

 were taken to England, where they did not long survive, 

 whilst a fourth, together with the one at the Artillery Barracks, 

 remained in Mauritius. 



In 1894 Mr. Rothschild obtained a photograph of the 

 monster tortoise at Port Louis, which led him to suggest that 

 it belonged to the aforesaid indigenous Testudo indica. This, 

 however, had been previously shown by another naturalist, 

 M. Theodore Sauzier, not to be the case, as this tortoise, 

 although having no nuchal shield to the carapace, possesses 

 divided gulars on the plastron ; and it was accordingly de- 

 scribed as a new species, under the name of Testudo suiucirci. 

 In its divided gulars Marion's tortoise forms in some degree 

 a connecting-link between' the Mascarene and the under- 

 mentioned Aldabra tortoises. This fact, coupled with the 

 circumstance that five specimens were brought simultaneously 

 from these islands, strongly suggests that Marion's tortoise is 

 the species formerly indigenous to the Seychelles, where it 

 was doubtless abundant in Marion's time. The Port Louis 

 specimen has a shell measuring 40 inches in a straight line ; 

 since it is reported to have attained its present dimensions 

 so along ago as 18 10, it may be presumed to have been 

 something like a century in age when brought to Mauritius 

 nearly 150 years ago. When I last heard of it the veteran 

 was reported to be blind but otherwise in good health and 

 spirits. In the lack of a nuchal shield to the carapace, coupled 

 with the presence of double gulars to the plastron, Marion's 



