368 
Order Chclonia. 
[No. 4, 
deposited about a hundred eggs, when she was surprised by a number 
of Burmese fishermen, who had been lying in ambush near the spot 
(a favourite resort of the common Turtle, Chelonia virgata), and, after 
a desperate struggle, was secured. 
The strength, aided of course by the enormous weight, of the 
animal, was such, that she dragged six men endeavouring to stop 
her, down the slope of the beach, almost into the sea, when she was 
overpowered by increased numbers, lashed to some strong poles, and 
brought into the village by ten to twelve men at a time. 
Being desirous of taking an accurate drawing of the Turtle, I was 
puzzled for some time how to induce her to sit for her portrait, as 
she was very restless, and, in her endeavours to scramble away, upset 
any moderate number of people that tried to stop her. At last, I 
had her slung with slings, as they hoist a water-butt on board a 
ship, from the branch of a tree, and then, with a guy or tripping line, 
from the tree to the caudal extremity of her shell, to prevent her 
slewing round, she hung quite motionless. 
The description, in Dumeril and Bibron, of Sphargis corictcea is so 
minute and accurate, and applicable to the present specimen, that it 
would be mere repetition, were I to add, here, the notes which I took of 
the animal. I will merely mention the points in which it differs from 
the details given by the above authors. The principal one of which is 
the colour; due allowance being made for the specimens described in the 
Paris Museum d’Histoire Naturelle, having been more or less faded. 
The colour of the animal, now under notice, while still alive, and 
fresh from the sea, was a plain blackish neutral tint, extending all 
over the carapax, crown, nucha, upper half of tail,, and outer face of the 
paddles. The whole being dabbed over with white spots, of irregular 
shape, like little patches of white-wash. The seven tuberculous longi¬ 
tudinal ridges of the carapax were also whitish. All of the under-parts, 
including the sternal and abdominal shields, and the inner sides of 
the paddles, pale flesh-colour, blotched and spotted with pale blackish 
neutral, which, on the sternum, take the form of three longitudinal 
bands on each side of the mesial suture, with irregular edges and spotted 
• 
intervals. The white spots, on the head, have a fleshy tinge. Throat 
reddish flesh-colour, marbled pale blackish; iris burnt umbre-brown. 
Dumeril and Bibron’s adult subject is described, as having the 
carapax “ un brun marron” which, I should translate, as “ castaneous- 
