17 



EMYS INSCULPTA.— Leco?i^e. 



Plate II. 



Characters. Shell oval, carinate, emarginate posteriorly; reddish-brown, with 

 radiating yellow lines; sternum full in front, emarginate behind; all the plates 

 deeply marked with radiating and concentric striee. 



SvNONTMES. Emys scabra, Say, Jour. Acad. Nat. Scien. Philad., vol. iv. p. 211. 

 Testudo insculpta, Leconte, Ann. Lye. Nat. Hist. N. Y., vol. iii. p. 112. 

 Emys scabra, Harl., Jour. Acad. Nat. Scien. Philad., vol. vi. p. 26. 

 Emys speciosa, Gray, Synop. Rept, p. 2&. 

 Emys insculpta, Harl., Med. and Phys. Res., p. 152. 

 Emys pulchella, Dum. et Bibr., Hist Nat. des Rept, tom. ii. p. 251. 



Description. The shell is oval, carinate and emarginate posteriorly. There 

 are five vertebral plates; the anterior is pentagonal, broad, with an acute angle 

 and two borders in front, narrow behind, with its posterior margin slightly 

 concave to fit the adjoining plate; the second and third vertebral plates are 

 hexagonal; the fourth is heptagonal, and very narroAv posteriorly; the fifth is again 

 hexagonal, with four of its articulating facets directed backwards. Of the lateral 

 plates, the anterior is triangularly hexagonal and united to four marginal plates; 

 the second and thii-d are hexagonal, the latter very irregularly so; the fourth is 

 quadrilateral; the fifth is hexagonal, smaller above, larger below. All of these 

 plates, as well as those of the vertebral range, have a well developed prominence 

 in the centre, from whence pass radiating strife, which are again crossed by 

 concentric striae, giving a beautiful sculptured appearance to the shell. The 

 marginal plates are twenty-five; the nuchal or intermediate is small and narrow, 

 Vol. III.— 3 



