IV 
INTRODUCTION. 
family, Sphargis mercurialis, is common on the coasts of the Mediterranean, 
and is supposed to have furnished the body of the ancient lyre; and hence the 
tortoise was dedicated to Mercury, the fabled inventor of that instrument. It 
is however scarcely probable that the ancients generally discriminated between 
the different marine species,—those three at least which are covered with horny 
plates,—excepting for the purposes of commerce. 
It was probably to Terrapene europcea , the common lake tortoise of the South 
of Europe, that the death of the celebrated dramatic poet iEschylus was at¬ 
tributed ; as Pliny distinctly states that the eagle, through whose means the 
catastrophe occurred, is a frequenter of lakes. He, to avoid the fulfilment of 
an augury, which threatened him with death by means of a falling house, is 
said to have gone into the fields, where an eagle, carrying aloft a tortoise in his 
talons, and mistaking the bald head of the poet for a round smooth stone, let his 
prey fall upon it in order to break the shell, and broke, instead thereof, the 
skull of the gifted and eloquent victim of this fatal mistake*. 
It is unnecessary however, and would be equally unsatisfactory, to trace the 
vague and uncertain notices given by the writers of the earlier ages, respecting 
these animals. Even when the mutual intercourse of distant countries had be¬ 
come greatly extended, and commerce had gradually enlarged our information 
respecting the natural productions of the remotest parts of the world, the 
animals in question still remained little known and imperfectly distinguished. 
It matters little, indeed, what species were known to such authors as Aldrovan- 
dus, or Bontius and Piso, or what were the originals intended to be represented 
by the barbarous caricatures, which rather obscured than illustrated the works 
of that period. But passing by the older writers, it is matter of no small dis¬ 
appointment to find that even the great Father of method, the illustrious Lin- 
* “ Tertii (generis Aquilarum) Morphnos, quam Homerus et Percnon vocat, aliqui et Plancnum, et anatinam, secunda magnitudine et 
vi: huicque vita circa lacus. Ingenium est ei testudines raptas frangere e sublimi jaciendo : quee sors interemit poetam iEschylum, 
praeditum fatis (ut ferunt) ejus diei ruinam secura coeli fide caventem.” Plin.Nat. Hist. lib. x. cap. 3. 
It is a curious coincidence that the eagles of South Africa are generally believed to have a similar instinct to that attributed to the 
species alluded to by Pliny. The account is given in the Voyage of Kolbe to the Cape of Good Hope 5 but as I have not the work to 
refer to, I give it as quoted by Daudin. “ Suivant ce voyageur les grands aigles de mer, nomm 6 s orfraies , sont tres-avides de la tortue; 
malgre toute la force de leur bee et de leurs serres, ils ne pourroient briser sa dure enveloppe; mais ils l’enlevent aisement, ils l’empor- 
tent au plus haut des airs, d’ou ils la laissent tomber a plusieurs reprises sur des rochers tres durs ; la hauteur de la chute et la tres 
grande vitesse qui en r 6 sulte produisent un choc violent; et la couverture de la tortue, bientotbrisee, livre en proie a 1 ’aigle carnassier, 
l’animal qu’elle auroit mis a couvert, si un poids plus considerable avoit r£sist£ aux efforts de 1 ’aigle pour l’enlever dans les nues.” 
Daud. Hist. Rept. ii. p. 300. 
