ALLIGATORS AND TURTLES. 
25 7 
and which, as soon as it escaped, started off in a direct 
line for a neighbouring stream. Dr. Davy placed his 
stick before it to try to make the little animal deviate 
from its course ; but it stoutly resisted the opposition, 
and raised itself into a posture of offence, just as an older 
animal would have done. 
Humboldt made exactly the same observation with 
regard to young turtles, and he remarks that as the young 
normally quit the egg at night, they cannot see the water 
which they seek, and must therefore be guided to it by 
discerning the direction in which the air is most humid. 
He adds that experiments were made which consisted in 
putting the newly hatched animals into bags, carrying 
them to some distance from the shore, and liberating them 
with their tails turned towards the water. It was in- 
variably found that the young animals immediately faced 
round, and took without hesitation the shortest way to 
the water. 
Scarcely less remarkable than the instincts of the 
young turtles are those of the old ones. Their watchful 
timidity at the time of laying their eggs is thus described 
by Bates : — 
Great precautions are obliged to be taken to avoid disturb- 
ing the sensitive turtles, who, previous to crawling ashore to 
lay, assemble in great shoals off the sand bank. The men during 
this time take care not to show' themselves, and warn off any 
fisherman who wishes to pass near the place. Their fires are 
made in a deep hollow near the borders of the forest, so that the 
smoke may not be visible. The passage of a boat through the 
shallow waters where the animals are congregated, or the sight 
of a man or a fire on the sand-bank, would prevent the turtles 
from leaving the water that night to lay their eggs ; and if the 
causes of alarm were repeated once or twice they would forsake 
the praia for some other quieter place. ... I rose from my 
hammock by daylight, shivering with cold — a praia, on account 
of the great radiation of heat in the night from the sand, being 
towards the dawn the coldest place that can be found in this 
climate. Cardozo and the men were already up watching the 
turtles. The sentinels had erected for this purpose a stage about 
fifty feet high, on a tall tree near their station, the ascent to which 
was by a roughly made ladder of woody lianas. They are ena- 
bled, by observing the turtles from this watch-tower, to ascertain 
