RIVER TORTOISES. 151 



banks and islets, or on floating timber, from which they plunge 

 into the water on the slightest noise. These Tortoises, which accom- 

 modate themselves so perfectly to the element they inhabit, being 

 voracious and active, are continually at war with the fishes, reptiles, 

 molluscs, alligators, and other denizens of the rivers they inhabit. 



The carapace of the River Tortoise is soft, covered with a flexible 

 cartilaginous skin resting on a greatly-depressed osseous disc; its 

 upper surface is covered with shrivelled sinuosities. As they are 

 destitute of scales these Tortoises are called " soft shelled ;" their 

 flesh is much esteemed, and they are angled for with hook and 

 line the bait being small fish, worms, or molluscs. When they 

 seize their victim, or defend themselves, they dart out their head 

 and long neck with great rapidity, biting sharply with their trenchant 

 beak, and holding on till they have bitten out the piece. Persons 

 wading have been known to lose toes from their bite. 



M. Lesueur states " that towards the beginning of May the 

 females belonging to this division seek out sunny sandy spots on 

 the river's bank for the deposit of their eggs/' " Their eggs are 

 spherical, and more fragile than those of the Marsh Tortoise. They 

 deposit from fifty to sixty at a time." None of this group are found 

 in Europe. The fresh-water lakes and rivers of the warmer regions — 

 such as the Nile and the Niger, in Africa ; the Mississippi, the Ohio, 

 and the Amazon Rivers, in America ; the Euphrates and the Ganges, 

 in Asia — are its habitats. Among other remarkable species in the 

 group we here represent Trio?iyx cegyptiacus (Fig. 37), supposed 

 to be the 'Efxbs of Aristotle. 



No modern naturalist has done more to illustrate the habits 

 of the fresh-water turtle than Mr. Bates, in his highly interest- 

 ing work, "The Naturalist on the Amazon." "The great fresh- 

 water turtle of the Amazon or Orinoco grows," he says, "to an 

 immense size — a fully developed one measuring nearly three feet 

 in length, by two in breadth, and in weight a load for the strongest 

 Indian. Every house (in Ega) has a little pond called a corral 

 or pen in the back-yard, to hold a stock of these animals through 

 the season of dearth — the wet months. Those who have a number 

 of Indians in their employ send them out for weeks, when the waters 

 are low, to collect a stock, and those who have not purchase 

 their supply — this is attended with some difficulty, however, as 

 they are rarely offered for sale. The price of turtles, like that 

 of other articles of food, has risen greatly since the introduction 

 of steam-vessels. Thus, when I arrived, in 1850, a middle-sized 

 tortoise could be bought for ninepence, but when I left, in 1859, 



