ORDER CHELONIA. 27 



tiplied in the ardent climates of the tropics, where the heat of 

 the earth supplies the deficiencies of their respiration. This 

 feebleness of respiration presents to our notice another result 

 equally remarkable in the reptiles. As it causes a sort of 

 stagnation, a slowness, an almost continual insensibility in the 

 life of these animals, it follows that this life is less rapidly 

 worn out and exhausted. We see, in general, that life is 

 longer in proportion as it is less active, unless its course be 

 abridged, or its thread be cut, by maladies or vmforeseen 

 accidents. We have, all of us, a determinable sum of exist- 

 ence, as it were, which we may expend more or less quickly. 

 The reptile, which lives, if we may so express ourselves, but 

 little at a time, and remains torpid for a part of the year, 

 should naturally exist a good while. This we find to be the 

 fact. It has even been asserted that the crocodile continues 

 to grow during almost its entire life, which is a certain mark 

 of longevity ; for as long as the growth is going on, the 

 animal is young, and its cessation is the mark of approaching 

 age. The serpent, among the Egyptians, the Greeks, and 

 the Mexicans, was the emblem of eternity, or of time, in con- 

 sequence of its long life. It even seems every year to assume 

 a rejuvenescence in casting its former skin, like the earth, 

 which in winter throws aside its faded livery only to invest 

 itself with richer verdure on the retiu'n of spring. Were not 

 the reptiles exposed to be destroyed by their adversaries, in 

 consequence of their tardy movements, and general want of 

 the means of defence, they would become too numerous, as to 

 a long life they unite an exceeding fecundity. 



There is one very singular property in the reptile races, 

 which has been noticed in the text. This is the power of 

 reproducing certain parts, sucli as the tail, feet, &c., when 

 they have been lost. This fact is particularly demonstrated 

 in salamanders and lizards, and was known as long ago as the 

 time of Aristotle. They arc also, as has before been hinted. 



