TORTOISE. 171 



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 copulation. 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 conti- 

 nually 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 refrain from 

 eating as well a^ breathing for a great part of the 

 year. When first awakened it eats nothing ; nor 

 again in the autumn before it retires : through 

 the height of the summer it feeds voraciously, 

 devouring all the food that comes in its way. 

 I was much taken with its sagacity in discern- 

 ing those that do it kind offices ; for as soon as the 

 good old lady comes in sight who has waited on it 



