FLOOR.] 
NORTHERN ZOOLOGICAL GALLERY. 
J 63 
THE NORTHERN ZOOLOGICAL GALLERY. 
FIRST EOOM. 
At the entrance into this gallery is placed a specimen of a Gigantic 
Land Tortoise (Testudo elephantina). This kind is found in Aldabra 
only, a small uninhabited island in the Indian Ocean, north-west of 
Madagascar. Formerly found in great abundance, it is now nearly 
extinct, the majority of the specimens having been captured by the 
crews of passing vessels, so that a few only remain. The specimen 
exhibited is a male, which weighed 870 pounds, and although known 
to have been more than 80 years old, was still growing at the time of 
its death. 
The skeleton, with carapace, of the Leathery Turtle (Sphargis), the 
largest of all living Chelonians. Its shell is devoid of bone, and 
flexible like leather. It seems to inhabit all seas of the temperate 
and tropical zones, and has rarely occurred on the British coast. Its 
flesh is not eaten. 
The Wall Oases 1-8 contain a collection of Nests of Wasps and 
Bees ; some are constructed of clay, or of sand, while others are of 
a paper-like substance, made of an admixture of the scrapings of 
wood and vegetable fibre with the saliva of the insects. Speci- 
mens of the various insect fabricators of these structures- are in 
many instances attached to the nests. Case 6 contains the remains 
of the square lintel of a door of one of the government offices in St. 
Helena, showing the destruction caused by a species of White Ant. 
In Case 8, a series of the different stages of development, and of the 
products of the Japanese Silk-moths, prepared and set up in Japan, is 
exhibited. Cases 9-16 contain a collection of the Nests of Birds; 
among the more noticeable are the playing avenues of the Australian 
Bower Birds, the pendulous nests of the American Orioles, and the 
nests of the Esculent Swallow : that of the San Geronimo Swallow is 
a long pendulous tube formed entirely of the seed of a plant, secured 
together by the saliva of the bird ; the hollow for the eggs is at the 
top, inside the tube ; the bird has placed a false entrance on the side 
to deceive its enemies. Various nests of Humming Birds, Honey- 
eaters, Tailor Bird and Lyre-tailed Menura, are also shown. The 
Table Cases 1-8 contain specimens illustrative of the various 
changes of Insects, their nests and structures; the cocoon of the 
gigantic Goliath Beetle of Western Africa, the clay nests of various 
species of White Ants, the various Vegetable Galls, and a series of the 
nests of Spiders ; among these the nests of the Trap-door Spider, and a 
remarkable flat web, constructed by an Australian species, are shown here. 
On the walls are suspended some specimens of the large gigantic 
Land-Tortoises which once inhabited in large numbers the G alapagoes 
and the islands of Mauritius, Rodriguez, and Aldabra. They formed 
a very important article of food to navigators in the seventeenth and 
eighteenth centuries during the protracted and tedious voyages across 
the Indian and Pacific Oceans, but are now almost extinct. 
M 2 
