FOOD AND GROWTH 57 



reptile gallery at the British Museum, is known to have lived 

 fifty-four years at the date of its decease in 1794 ; but how much 

 has to be added to this is uncertain, since there is no clue as to 

 its age when it was brought to England. Some idea as regards 

 the age attained by giant land-tortoises is afforded by certain 

 specimens from the Seychelles. In the year 1766 five tortoises 

 belonging to the species Testudo sumeirei were taken from 

 their island by the Chevalier Marion de Fresne and carried to 

 Mauritius, where two were living a few years ago. The most 

 celebrated of the pair is the one at the Artillery Barracks, Port 

 Louis, of which the shell measures about forty inches in length 

 in a straight line. Since the dimensions of the shell are reported 

 to have been practically as large so long ago as the year 18 10, 

 it is certain that this tortoise must have been very old at the 

 time of its arrival in Port Louis ; and something over a. century 

 would probably be a moderate estimate of its age at that date. 

 Accordingly, it would seem that the reptile cannot be much 

 less than 250 years, and may be much more. 



Another aged specimen was the Colombo tortoise. Ac- 

 cording to tradition, this patriarch, which died in 1894, was 

 found in Colombo when Ceylon was taken over by the British 

 in 1796; having been imported from one of the "tortoise- 

 islands ". 1 At that time it was doubtless an unusually large and 

 old specimen, or it would not have been kept, and we may ac- 

 cordingly allow it a minimum age of a couple of centuries. In 

 a third case, that of the Egmont Island tortoise, the evidence 

 as to the duration of its captivity is less satisfactory. It is re- 

 ported to have lived on Egmont Island for a century and a half, 

 but since the Chagos group (to which that island pertains) was 

 not colonised from Mauritius till the early part of the nineteenth 

 century, there is some doubt with regard to the statement. 

 Nevertheless, it is certain that this monster must be of prodigious 

 age. This tortoise was in the habit of burying itself and remain- 

 ing dormant for half the year. Although nothing definite appears 

 to be known with regard to other reptiles, there seems to be 

 little doubt that crocodiles attain a great age ; and many years 

 ago when Professor A. Leith-Adams visited the celebrated 

 " magar-pit," or crocodile-pond, near Karachi, he was told that 

 a large specimen of the Indian magar {Crocodilns palustris) was 



1 See Pearson, Spolia Zeylanica, vol. xxvi., p. 108, 1910. 



