136 



THE NATURAL HISTORY 



[LETT. 



LETTER LT. 



TO THE HO^ r OURAI:LE DAINES BARRIXOTON. 



WHILE I was in Sussex last autumn my residence was at the 

 village near Lewes, from whence I had formerly the pleasure of 

 writing to you. On the 1st of November I remarked that the 

 old tortoise, formerly mentioned, began first to dig the ground, 

 in order to the forming its hybernaculum, which it had fixed on 

 just beside a great tuft of hepaticas. It scrapes out the ground 

 with its fore-feet, and throws it up over its back with its hind ; 

 but the motion of its legs is ridiculously slow, little -exceeding 

 the hour-hand of a clock ; and suitable to the composure of an 

 animal said to be a whole month in performing one feat of copu- 

 lation. Nothing can be more assiduous than this creature night 

 and day in scooping the earth, and forcing its great body into 

 the cavity ; but as the noons of that season proved unusually 

 warm and sunny, it was continually interrupted, and called forth 

 by the heat in the middle of the day : and though I continued 

 there till the 13th of November, yet the work remained 

 unfinished. Harsher weather, and frosty mornings, would have 

 quickened its operations. No part of its behaviour ever struck 

 me more than the extreme timidity it always expresses with 

 regard to rain ; for though it has a shell that would secure 

 it against the wheel of a loaded cart, yet does it discover as 

 much solicitude about rain as a lady dressed in all her best 

 attire, shuffling away on the first sprinklings, and running its 

 head up in a corner. If attended to it becomes an excellent 

 weather-glass; for as sure as it walks elate, and as it were on 

 tiptoe, feeding with great earnestness in a morning, so sure will 

 it rain before night. It is totally a diurnal animal, and never 

 pretends to stir after it becomes dark. The tortoise, like other 

 reptiles, has an arbitrary stomach as well as lungs ; and can re- 

 frain from eating as well as breathing for a great part of the 

 year. When first awakened it eats nothing ; nor again in the 



