THE SNAPPING TUETLE LAY EGGS IN ONE SEASON ? 145 



As the marks of egg-laying are soon obliterated, Mr. Hattori did not 

 know of the existence of this third deposit, until the embryos hatched 

 out. As the embryos are however exactly like those of the other two 

 deposits, Mr. Hattori himself has no doubt that it was deposited by the 

 same mother. To the inquiry whether there might not have been a 

 fourth deposit similarly unnoted, thus making the number the same as 

 that of last year, Mr. Hattori answers in the most emphatic negative. 

 Considering his large experience, I have no reason to doubt his conclusion 

 that the large female made three deposits of eggs this season. 



From the two tables given above, various interesting facts may be 

 learned. In the first place, the same female made in 1894 /o?i?- deposits, 

 and in 1895 three deposits of eggs. The duration of incubation is on 

 the whole much less in 1894 than in 1895. The shortest — 28 days — in 

 the table of 1894 was in fact so short that I accepted it only after in- 

 quiries. It is the shortest within my experience and is only one-third 

 as long as the longest — 83 days — in the table of 1895. It is also worthy 

 of note that in both tables, the number of eggs diminishes on the whole 

 with each successive deposit. 



In order to account for some of these facts, it is necessary to state 

 that the summer of 1894 was one of the hottest known recently in 

 Japan and the blazing sun kept pouring down its scorching rays day 

 after day almost without a single drop of rain during the whole season. 

 The summer of 1895 will on the contrary be remembered as one of the 

 coolest and wettest summers within recent years. This striking con- 

 trast will certainly account for the differences in the duration of inculca- 

 tion. I think, it will also account to some extent at least for the 

 difference in the number of deposits in the two years. The period 

 during which the temperatures were high enough for the maturation 

 and deposition of eggs must have been longer in 1894 than in 1895 ; 

 hence one more deposit was made in the former than in the latter. 



After knowing the facts brought out in the above tables, many 

 points in the graphic diagrams which had been constructed from more 

 extensive data became intelligible. For instance, the curve showing the 



