252 NATURAL HISTORY. 



The peculiarities of the Tortoise were well known to the ancients, and a military machine used 

 in besieging towns was called after it, and the curious story about the death of the tragic poet 

 ^Eschylus, already noticed in mentioning the habits of the great Lammergeier, testifies to the 

 acquaintance of the ancients with the solidity of this bucklered reptile. 



The Ethiopian region of natural history has the greatest number of species of Tortoises, and 

 the Leopard Tortoise,* the Grooved Tortoise,t and the little Geometric Tortoise^ are familial- 

 examples. The last Moseley noticed as loving the sandy and arid districts of the Cape of Good 

 Hope, and he states that they may be tracked by the marks they leave on the soil. They are caught, 

 and their little shells are made into paper weights, being first of all filled with lead. The Radiated 

 Tortoise is from Madagascar. There are no true Tortoises in Australia. The American species, 

 including the Great Tortoises found on the Galapagos Islands, are the Gopher Tortoise from North 

 America and Mexico, and the Brazilian, Black, and Argentine Tortoises from South America. || There is 

 a Tortoise in Chili, Northern Patagonia, Mendoza, the Pampas, Monte Video, and Buenos Ayres, which 

 resembles in its colour and general appearance one from the very distant regions of Abyssinia. But this 

 American Chilian Tortoise (Testudo ckilensis) has a more depressed shell, and the marginal and chest 

 plates differ from those of the African kind. 



The Gopher has its most northern limit on the western border of South Carolina, and they 

 are found in Georgia, Alabama, and the Floridas. The adults are strong, and can move a weight of 

 some hundred pounds or more, and in the wild state they seek their food by night. They like dry 

 and sandy places, and are abundant in poor and barren countries. They are fond of the sweet potato, 

 and go into their holes in the heat of the day. They dislike rain, and retreat on a shower com. 

 mencing. As the cold comes on they hibernate, but a few warm days will restore their activity. 



The remaining groups of the Tortoises have already been noticed in explaining the mobility of the 

 plastron and carapace in certain Chelonians. They constitute the genera Pyxis and Kinixys, and 

 may be called the Land Box Tortoises, in contradistinction to some others which lead a more or less 

 aquatic life, and which belong to other divisions of the order. 



FAMILY II. THE EMYDES. THE RIVER AND MARSH TORTOISES. 



These Chelonians lead, with one or two exceptions, a land and water life. Their limbs are 

 slenderer than in the Tortoises, and their digits are united by a web for swimming purposes. As a 

 rule, the carapace is flatter than in the land group, but it is bony, and there is a well-developed horny 

 covering. 



The family may be subdivided into two groups. In one the head and fore limbs can be withdrawn 

 under the shell, and in the other the neck is so long and the buckler is so small that the usual shelter 

 is incomplete. Nevertheless, the members of this last group do manage to get their heads under cover 

 of, but not within, the carapace and plastron. 



An example of the first group the Terrapins which are very common in the United States, 

 is the American Box Tortoise. It is familiarly known as the Carolina Box Tortoise (Cistudo 

 Carolina), and in other and different localities as the Virginian or Mexican, and from its orna- 

 mentation the Ornate, or Chequered Tortoise. This animal has a very wide distribution in the 

 United States and in North America, from Maine to Florida, westward in Texas, Iowa, and Missouri, 

 and in Mexico, and can be recognised among its fellow Emydes by its singularly terrestrial habits. It 

 rarely frequents marshes, and probably never the water, but it is found in dry, hot, pine forests and 

 on mountain ground, looking after beetles, grubs, and, it is said, snakes. The slightly-arched and keeled 

 carapace is about five inches long and four broad, and is broadest behind. It is of a rich brown 

 or brown-black tint, and has yellow spots or stripes. The plastron, movable before and behind, is 

 yellow or brown, and there is the usual hood to the neck, out of which the head peeps and returns, 

 more or less, as within a glove-finger. Many years since Mr. Orel described the habits of one from 

 Pennsylvania, which managed to get its living in rather a parasitical manner. It was found feeding 



* Testudo pardalis. t Testudo sulcata. t Testudo geometria. 



Testudo radiata. \\ Testudo polyphemus, and Testudo tabulata. 





