1009 



CHELONIA. 



CHELONIA. 



Owen to be referriblc to the Land-Tortoises ; and he quotes the foot- 

 prints from the quarries at Corncockle Muir, and those subsequently 

 discovered at the quarries of Craigs, two miles east of Dumfries, as 

 examples. (AMPHIBIA.] 



2. Oolite Tortoises. Examples. Impressions of horny scutes about 

 the size of those covering the carapace of a tortoise, ten inches in 

 length, in the Oolite Slate of Stonesfield. 



II. Family Emydida;, Fresh-Water Tortoises. 



1. An undetermined species in the museum of Professor Bell, from 

 the Eocene Clay near Harwich. 



2. Kmy testudiniformii, Owen (Emys deSheppey, Cuv. ?). Sheppey. 



3. Platemys Bowerbankii, Owen. Sheppey. 



4. Platemys BMockii, Owen. Sheppey: 



5. Tetroiternonpunctatum, Owen. Purbeck Limestone. N.B. Closely 

 allied to Trionyx. 



6. With regard to Platemys Mantelli (Emys de Sussex, Cuv., Emys 

 Mantelli, Gray), Professor Owen remarks that the fossils discovered 

 by Dr. Mantell in the Wealden strata of Tilgate Forest, and the 

 resemblance of which to the flat species of Emydian discovered by 

 M. Hugi in the Jura Limestone at Soleure has been pointed out by 

 Cuvier, are referrible to the pluroderal section of the Emydian family 

 as arranged by Messrs. Dumeril and Bibron, and in that section to 

 the genus Ptatemyt (Hydratfis, Bell) ; but that not enough of the 

 skeleton of any individual has yet been obtained to afford a foundation 

 for specific character. 



7. Large Emydian from the Kimmeridge Clay. A bone in the 

 museum of Sir P. Grey Egerton, Bart., from Heddington Pits, 

 probably belonging to a species of Platemys. 



8. Footsteps of Emydiaua in New Bed-Sandstone. Stourton 

 Quarries, Cheshire. 



With regard to the genus Trionyx, Profegsor Owen remarks that 

 certain British fossils from the Secondary Formation referred to 

 Trionyx have been proved to belong to another family of Chelonians : 

 the supposed Trionyx from the New Red-Sandstones (Caithness) has 

 been pronounced to be a ganoid fish (genus Coccoteiu) by Agaasiz. 

 Nor had Professor Owen when he wrote (1841) seen any Chelonite 

 from the Wealden Formation that could be confidently affirmed to 

 belong to Trionyx. 



A femur from the Lias at Linksfield in the possession of Mr. Robertson 

 of Elgin, 44 inches in length, and found with remains of Pletiosaurut 

 and Hybodia, though not identical in form with any Trionyx with 

 which Professor Owen could compare it, he found to resemble the 

 modifications of the bone in that genus more closely than in Tortoises, 

 Emydians, or Turtles. He remarks that although some of the Turtles 

 of the Eocene period, as the Chelone lonyicepi, present such modifica- 

 tions of the jaws as seem to have adapted them to habits and food 

 analogous to those of the Trionyx, yet evidences of this genus, to 

 which the destruction of the eggs and young of crocodiles is more 

 particularly assigned in the Nile and Ganges, are not wanting in 

 certain localities where the London Clay appears to have been depo- 

 sited under circumstances analogous to those at the termination of 

 equally gigantic rivers ; and he adds that unequivocal portions of a 

 true Trionyx have been obtained from the Eocene Clay at Sheppey 

 and at Bracklesham, and that they are also associated, as in the Paris 

 basin, with remains of A noplotherium and Palieotherium in the Eocene 

 Limestone deposits in the Isle of Wight. 



III. Family Chelonida, Thalaasian Family, or Turtles. 



1. Clidant planicept, Owen. Portland Sandstone. 



2. C. obovata, Owen. Purbeck Limestone. 



3. An undetermined species of Chelone from the Wealden. Portions 

 of the carapace, plastron, and bones of the extremities of a large 

 species of Marine Turtle, some of them indicating individuals nearly 

 three feet in length, discovered by Dr. Mantell in the Wealden strata 

 of Tilgate Forest, are figured in the Doctor's ' Illustrations of the 

 Geology of Sussex.' This species, in Professor Owen's opinion, comes 

 nearest to C. planimentum of the Harwich Eocene Clay. 



4. C. pulchricepi, Owen. Superincumbent beds of the Lower 

 Greensand; Greensand near Barnwell, Cambridge. 



5. C. Saatedt, Owen (Emyi Bemtedi, Mantell). Chalk ; Burham, 

 Kent. 



In a monograph on the ' Fossil Reptilia of the London Clay,' by 

 Professors Owen and Bell, published by the Palaeontographical 

 Society, the following species are described, and figures of the remains 

 found, given. 



Order Chelonia. 

 Family Marina. 

 Genus Chelone. 



1. C. bremcept (Emyt Parkintonii, J. E. Gray ; Emys de Sheppey, 

 H. V. Meyer ; Chelone antifua, Kbnig). Eocene Clay of Sheppey. 



2. C. lonfficept. Eocene Clay of Sheppey. 



3. C. rratinmitata. Harwich Clay. 



4. C. declivi*. Eocene Deposits of Bognor, Sussex. 



5. C. trigmiceja. Eocene Clay at Bracklesham. 



6. C. cunicept. London Clay of Sheppey. 

 l.i'. tubcarinata. Sheppey. 



MAT. HIST. DIV. TOL. I. 



Remarking on the descriptions of these species, Professor Owen 

 says, " A retrospect of the facts above detailed relative to the Fossil 

 Chelonians of the genus Chelone, or marine family of the order, leads 

 xj conclusions of much greater interest than the previous opinions 

 respecting the Chelonites of the London Clay could have suggested. 

 Whilst these fossils were supposed to have belonged to a fresh- 

 water genus, the difference between the present fauna and that of 

 the Eocene period, in reference to the Chelonian order, was not very 

 great ; since the Emys, or Cistuda Eurojxea, still abounds on the 

 Continent, after which it was named, and lives long in our own 

 island in suitable localities. 



"But the case assumes a very different aspect when we come to 

 the conviction that the majority of the Eocene Chelonites belong to 

 the true marine genus Chelone ; and that the number of species of 

 these extinct Turtles already obtained from so limited a space as the 

 Isle of Sheppey, exceeds that of the species of Chelone now knowu 

 to exist throughout the globe. Notwithstanding the assiduous 

 search of naturalists, and the attraction to the commercial voyager 

 which the shell and the flesh of the Turtles offer, all the tropical seas 

 of the world have hitherto yielded no more than five well-defined 

 species of Chelone; and of these only two, as the C. Mydas and 

 C. Caonana, are known to frequent the same locality. It is 

 obvious, therefore, that the ancient ocean of the Eocene epoch was 

 much less sparingly inhabited by Turtles ; and that these presented 

 a greater variety of specific modifications than are known in the 

 seas of the warmer latitudes of the present day. 



" The indications which the English Eocene Turtles, in conjunction 

 with other organic remains from the same formation, afford of the 

 warmer climate of the latitude in which they lived, as compared 

 with that which prevails there in the present day, accord with those 

 which all the organic remains of the oldest Tertiary deposits have 

 hitherto yielded in reference to this interesting point. 



" That abundance of food must have been produced under such 

 influences cannot of course be doubted ; and we may infer that to 

 some of the extinct species, which like the Chelone lonfficeps and C. 

 planimentum exhibit either a form of head well adapted for pene- 

 trating the soil, or with modifications that indicate an affinity to the 

 Trionyccs, was assigned the task of checking the undue increase of 

 the now extinct crocodiles and gavials of the same epoch and locality, 

 by devouring their eggs, or their young becoming probably in return 

 themselves an occasional prey to the older individuals of the same 

 carnivorous Saurians." 



Family Fluvialia. 

 Genus Trionyx. 



1. T. Henrici. Eocene at Hordwell. 



2. T. Barbara. Eocene at Hordwell. 



3. T. incraiiatia. Eocene Formations of the Isle of Wight. 



4. T. marginalut. Eocene Deposit at Hordwell Cliff. 



5. T. rivosiu. Eocene Beds at Hordwell Cliff. 



6. T. planut. Eocene at Hordwell and Bracklesham. 



7. T. circumtulcatus. Eocene at Hordwell. 



8. T. jiuilulutui. Clay at Sheppey. 



Family Paludinosa. 

 Genus -Platemyi. 



1. P. BMoclni. London Clay. 



2. P. Bowerbankii. Clay at Sheppey. 



Genus Emyt. 



1. E. tcitudiniformii (Emys de Sheppey, Cuvier?). Eocene Clay 

 of Sheppey. 



2. E. Itn-it. Clay of Sheppey. 



3. E. Comptoni. 



4. E. oicarinata. 



5. E. Delabechii. London Clay, Isle of Sheppey. 



Amongst the Fossil remains brought from the Tertiary Formations 

 of India by Dr. Falconer and Major Cautley, are those of a gigantic 

 species of Land-Tortoise. The species referred to has been named 

 Colottochelyt Atlai. Portions of its skeleton and a model of the 

 entire animal are now in the collection of the British Museum. The 

 carapace of this gigantic animal measures in some specimens above 

 12 feet in length. These remains were found associated with the 

 bones of gigantic extinct Mammalia allied to Palteothcriiwn, and the 

 other Pachydermata of the Paris basin. In the same deposits were 

 also found the remains of several smaller species of Chelonia, and of 

 the one which now inhabits India. There have been also found in 

 the same locality the remains of gigantic crocodiles, differing from 

 those now inhabiting India, and several species of elephant. 



In the 'Reports' of the United States Surveying Expedition in 

 Wisconsin, Iowa, and Minesota, in 1850, an account is given of the 

 discovery of the remains of a large number of species of Chelonia, 

 both Tortoises and Turtles, with the remains of extinct forms of 

 Mammalia in the district of the Mauvaises Terres on the Missouri. 



CHELO'NIA (Godart), a genus of Lepidopterous Insects, of the 

 section Nocturna (Latreille), and family Arctiida; (Leach). Before wo 

 proceed with an account of this genus, which contains two of tho 



3 T 



