FAMILY CHELONID. 25 
This beautiful species, which is designated in this State under the names of Box Tortoise 
and Land Turtle, and in the west by the name of Lock Tortoise, is a very gentle and timid 
animal. It varies so much in its colors, that it is difficult to find any two alike. Major 
Le Conte has a series of drawings, exhibiting many remarkable varieties in color: One was 
of a uniform black ; and from this to the brilliant colored individual figured in the plate, a 
regular transition could be traced. He has enumerated five varieties, but they are almost 
imnumerable. In common with many observers, I had considered the angular and concentric 
striz on the plates as constant characters. I have lately seen (May 1) a specimen, apparently 
of an adult, measuring six inches, in which the thin corneous lamine covering the plates 
were gradually dropping off, or shed ; leaving the new epidermis completely smooth beneath, 
with colors of renewed brilliancy, while the old lamine were dull and strongly corrugated. 
How often does this desquamation occur? Is it the effect of disease, or is it an annual or 
periodical process? In this case, the desquamation was confined to the two middle dorsal, 
and to two lateral plates on one side, and to three on the other. The sutures between the 
plates, which had not desquamated, were of that deep character usually supposed to designate 
old age ; but at the places where the desquamation had occurred, the sutures were as narrow 
and as little profound as in young individuals. 
The Box Tortoise is common every where on dry land, although it is also occasionally met 
with in swamps and moist places. It never takes to the water from choice, and indeed would 
be drowned if retained there. It is frequently kept in cellars, under the notion that it drives 
away or destroys rats and other domestic vermin. One which I kept in my cellar, was found 
in the spring, eaten up by the rats. It feeds on insects, fruit, and the edible mushrooms. Its 
geographical range appears to be from Canada to Florida. It is rare in Ohio. In this lati- 
tude, it usually goes into winter quarters in the latter part of September. 
~BLANDING’S BOX TORTOISE. 
CIsTUDA BLANDINGII. 
PLATE I. FIG. 2, 
Cistuda blandingii. Hotproox, N. Am. Herpetol. Vol. 3, p. 34, pl. 5; and Vol. 1. pl. 39, pl. 3 of 2d Ed. 
Blanding’s Cistuda. StorER, Massachusetts Report, p. 215. 
Characteristics. Shell less elevated than the preceding, ecarinate ; margin entire. Sternum 
emarginate behind. Lower jaw hooked. Length 7-8 inches. 
Description. Shell smooth, ecarinate. ‘The first vertebral plate pentagonal; the second and 
third, hexagonal; the fourth with seven sides, the last octagonal. Anterior and posterior late- 
ral plates four-sided, rounded beneath; the second and third, pentagonal. Marginal plates 
twenty-five, with an interrupted margin; the intermediate small; the first, third, fourth, sixth, 
eighth, tenth and twelfth plates quadrilateral ; the second, fifth, seventh and ninth, pentago- 
nal: all are smooth in their centres, with indistinct concentric strie near their borders. Ster- 
Fauna — Parr 3. 4 
