654 REPTILES—CISTUDINID&. 
The Brown Swift, known alsoas Pine tree Lizard, and Brown Scorpion, is 
a very active little animal; it prefers sandy and rocky soils, especially 
regions of pine forests; and, though harmless when disturbed, elevates 
its scales so as to give to its body a more formidable appearance. It may 
be seen onsunny days on fences and the sides of houses, and apparently 
does not occur in wet places. It probably hybernates beneath old bark ; 
does not become adult until two years of age; and in Georgia breeds in 
April. 
ORDER TESTUDINATA. TURTLES.* 
Chelonia, GRAY, Mivart, HUXLry, and MILNE Epwarbs. 
Body-covering in the form of a dorsal and ventral shield; carapax and plastron formed 
by a ucion of the epidermis and skeleton; head, neck, feet, and tail free; jaws in the 
form of a horny beak, edentulous; tongue thick and fleshy; rami of lower mandible 
anchylosed; bones of the cranium immovably united; alisphenoid unossified ; naso- 
ethmoid cartilage present ; premaxille@ small and united ; quadrate bone large, immov- — 
able; caudal vertebre procelous; sacral vertebre two; thoracic walls immovable; 
legs four, with the pectoral and pelvic arches inside the skeleton; lungs voluminous, 
with exceedingly large cells; heart with two auricles and a ventricle, the latter with 
an imperfect septum ; urinary bladder large. ; 
KEY TO THE FAMILIES OF TESTUDINATA. 
* Limbs in the form of paddles. - ; c . . : : CHELONIDA, 
* Feet palmate; usually fluviatile. a. 
* Feet clavate; terrestrial; carapax very convex. : ; d TESTUDINIDZ. 
a. Carapax composed of hard osseous plates. 0. 
a. Carapax leathery, without osseous plates. . : ; TRIONYCHIDZB, 
b. Sternal shields 12 or more. ce. 
b. Sternal shields less than 12. : : : : . . CINOSTERNIDA. 
c, Jawa usually not strongly hooked; plastron oval or oblong. d. 
¢. Jaws strongly booked; plastron cruciform. . . . CHELYDRIDZ. 
d. Plastron with a movable transverse suture ; carapax short and high. 
j CISTUDINID2&. 
d, Plastron nsnally without such suture ; carapax depressed or elongated. 
EMYDIDZ. 
*For classification and reproduction, see Agassiz’s Gont. Nat. Hist. U.S., and alse 
Proe. Zool. Soc, London, 1869, p. 165, 
