246 LEAVES FROM THE 



liberation worthy of a creature whose motions in excava- 

 ting the earth for hybernation are so ridiculously slow, 

 that White describes the movement of the legs when so 

 employed, as little exceeding that of the hour-hand of a 

 clock. Mr. Darwin relates, that when the galapagos tor- 

 toise is solus cum sold, he utters a hoarse roar or bellow- 

 ing, which can be heard at the distance of a hundred 

 yards, and then is vocally silent for the rest of the year. 

 The female, it is said, never makes her voice heard ; if, 

 indeed, she have one. The white spherical eggs are laid 

 in October, the female depositing them together where 

 the soil is sandy, and covering them up with sand. 

 Where the ground is rocky, she drops them indiscrimi- 

 nately in any hollow. Seven were found placed in a line 

 in a fissure. One measured by Mr. Darwin was seven 

 inches and three-eighths in circumference. As soon as 

 the young tortoises are hatched they are exposed to the 

 attacks of the buzzard, which has the habits of the cara- 

 cara, and fall a prey in great numbers to that bird. Acci- 

 dents, such as falls from precij^ices, seem to be the prin- 

 cij^al events against Avhich these tortoises have to guard. 

 Several of the inhabitants told Mr. Darwin that they had 

 never found one dead without some such apparent cause. 

 They believe that these animals are, like the majority of 

 Persian cats, absolutely deaf; and Mr. Darwin declares 

 with certainty that they do not overhear a person walking- 

 close behind them. He was amused, when overtaking one 

 of these great monsters as it was quietly pacing along, to 

 see how suddenly, the instant he passed, it would draw 

 in its head and legs, and uttering a deejD hiss, fall to the 

 ground with a heavy sound, as if struck dead. He fre- 

 quently got on their backs, and then, upon giving a few 

 raps on the hinder part of the shell, they would rise up 

 and walk away; but he found it very difficult to keep 

 his seat. 



The flesh of these tortoises is largely consumed, botli 



