384 PROCEEBiNGS OP THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. [March 22, 



laeontological research, and thus to aid us in arriving at that " speck 

 now barely visible in the distance, which is our goal to-day, and 

 may be our starting-point to-morrow." I shall, therefore, not 

 hesitate to enter upon a complementary portion of the same walk of 

 investigation which is intimately connected with the thread of the 

 preceding speculations. 



2. ColossocJidys Atlas. — In 1835, while the interest of the Jumna 

 exploration was still fresh. Captain (now Colonel Sir Proby) Cautley 

 and myself, then occupied with the investigation of the fossil fauna 

 of the Sewalik Hills, ctiscovered the remains of the extinct gigantic 

 Tortoise of India. This remarkable form was briefly referred to in a 

 memoir communicated to the Geological Society in 1836, but the 

 detailed account of it did not appear until 1844. The huge Che- 

 Ionian was inferred to have had a shell twelve feet long, eight 

 feet in diameter, and six feet high ; and the anterior or episternal 

 portion of the plastron exhibited a thickness of six inches and a half 

 of solid bone — proportions which rendered it a fit object for compa- 

 rison with the Elephant. 



The following remarks, bearing upon its possible relation to the 

 human period, are extracted from the ' Proceedings of the Zoological 

 Society' in 1844. 



" Golossochelys Atlas. — The first fossil remains of this colossal 

 Tortoise were discovered by us, in 1835, in the Tertiary strata of the 

 Sewalik Hills, or Sub-Himalayas skirting the southern foot of the great 

 Himalayan chain. They were found associated with the remains of 

 four extinct species of Mastodon and Elephant, species of llhinoceros. 

 Hippopotamus, Horse- An oplotherium*. Camel, Giraffe, Sivatherium, 

 and a vast number of other Mammalia, including four or five species 

 of Quadrumana. The Sewalik fauna included also a great number 

 of reptilian forms, such as Crocodiles and land and freshwater 

 Tortoises. Some of the Crocodiles belong to extinct species, but 

 others appear to be absolutely identical with species now living in 

 the rivers of India ; we allude in particular to the Crocodilus longi- 

 rostris'f, from the existing forms of which we have been unable to 

 detect any difference in heads dug out of the Sewalik Hills. The 

 same result applies to the existing Emys tectum, now a common 

 species found in all parts of India. ***** 



" This is not the place to enter upon the geological question of 

 the age of the Sewalik strata ; suffice it to say that the general 

 bearing of the evidence is that they belong to the newer Tertiary 

 period. But another question arises : ' Are there any indications 

 as to when this gigantic Tortoise became extinct ? or are there 

 grounds for entertaining the opinion that it may have descended to 

 the human period?' Any a ])riori improbability that an animal so 

 hugely disproportionate to existing species should have lived down 

 to be contemporary with man is destroyed by the fact, that other 

 species of Chelonians which were coeval with the Golossochelys in 

 the same fauna have reached to the present time ; and what is true 



* Now Chalicotherium Sivalense, being Nestoritherium of Eaup. 

 t Gavialis Qangetimis. 



