lO TUJi COMMON TORTOISE. 



waited on it for more than thirty years, it always 

 hobbled, with awkward alacrity, towards its benefac- 

 tress, whilst to strangers it was entirely inattentive. 

 Thus did the most abject of torpid creatures distin- 

 guish the hand that fed it, and exhibit marks of gra- 

 titude not always to be found in superior orders of 

 animal being. It was a diurnal animal, never stir- 

 ring out after dark, and very frequently appearing 

 abroad even a few hours only in the middle of the 

 day. It always retired to rest for every shower, and 

 in wet days never came at all from its retreat. Al- 

 though he loved warm weather, yet he carefully 

 avoided the hot sun, since his thick shell, when once 

 heated, must have become extremely painful and 

 probably dangerous to him. He therefore spent 

 the more sultry hours under the umbrella of a large 

 cabbage leaf, or amidst the waving forests of an as- 

 paragus bed. But, as he endeavoured to avoid the 

 heat in the summer, he improved the faint autumnal 

 beams by getting within the reflection of a fruit-tree 

 wall ; and though he had certainly never read that 

 planes inclining to the horizon receive a greater 

 share of warmth, he frequently inclined his shell, 

 bv tiltinsr it against the wall, to collect and admit 

 every feeble ray*. 



Very ample evidence has been produced of this 

 animal's living to a most extraordinary age, fre- 

 quently exceeding even the period of a century. 

 One that was introduced into the garden at Lam- 

 beth, in the time of archbishop Laud, was living in 



* White's Selborne. 



