LAND- TORTOISES. 5 9 



tortoises, when purposely moving towards any point, travel by night and day, 

 and arrive at their journey's end much sooner than would be expected. The 

 inhabitants, from observing marked individuals, consider that they travel a 

 distance of about eight miles in two or three days. One large tortoise, which I 

 watched, walked at the rate of sixty yards in ten minutes, that is three hundred 

 and sixty yards in the hour, or four miles a day, — allowing a little time for it to 

 eat on the road. During the breeding-season, when the male and female are 

 together, the male utters a hoarse roar or bellowing, which, it is said, can be heard 

 at a distance of more than a hundred yards. The female never uses her voice, and 

 the male only at these times ; so that when the people hear this noise, they know 

 that the two are together. They were at this time (October) laying their eggs. 

 The female, where the soil is sandy, deposits them together, and covers them up 

 with sand ; but where the ground is rocky, she drops them indiscriminately in any 

 hole ; Mr. Bynoe found seven placed in a fissure. The egg is white and spherical ; 

 one which I measured was 7| inches in circumference, and therefore larger than a 

 hen's egg. The young tortoises, as soon as they are hatched, fall a prey in great 

 numbers to the carrion-feeding buzzard (Polyboras). The old ones seem generally 

 to die from accidents, as from falling down precipices ; at least, several of the 

 inhabitants told me that they never found one dead without some evident cause. 

 The inhabitants believe that these animals are absolutely deaf ; certainly they do 

 not hear a person walking close behind them. I was always amused when over- 

 taking one of these great monsters, as it was quietly pacing along, to see how 

 suddenly, the instant I passed, it would draw in its head and legs, and uttering a 

 deep hiss fall to the ground with a heavy sound, as if struck dead. I frequently 

 got on their backs, and then giving a few raps on the hinder part of their shells, 

 they would rise and walk away ; — but I found it difficult to keep my balance." 



Like their Mascarene allies, the Galapagos tortoises are much esteemed as 

 food ; and in order to see whether they were sufficiently fat to be killed, the 

 inhabitants were accustomed to make a slit beneath the tail, through which the 

 interior of the body could be seen. With the usual hardihood of reptiles, the 

 rejected individuals appear to have recovered completely from this severe 

 operation. From several of the islands the giant tortoises have already dis- 

 appeared, and it is much to be feared that they will soon cease to exist throughout 

 the Galapagos Group. Dr. G. Baur, who visited Albemarle in 1891, reports, 

 however, that he made a large collection of these reptiles, one specimen weighing 

 more than 400 lbs., and its carapace measuring 4 feet in a straight line. 



The familiar Grecian tortoise (T. qrceca) brings us to the sixth 

 Grecian Tortoise. . . . 



main group of the genus, which comprises seven Old World species of 



small or medium size, characterised by the carapace being brown or olive, which 



may be either uniform, or spotted with black, or black and yellow; by the gular 



shields on the plastron being distinct ; and by the slight prominence and shortness 



of the ridge on the palate. The Grecian tortoise belongs to a section of the group 



in which the anal or hindermost shields of the plastron meet in the middle line by 



a suture of considerable length; and it is further characterised by tin- presence of 



five claws on the fore-foot. From its nearest allies it may be distinguished by the 



fifth vertebral shield of the carapace being much broader than the third; the 



