ORDER, CHELONIA.
Fem. Testudinidx.
Testudo Gmel., Galapagos. T. radiate, Shato, Madagascar.
T. stellate, Shaw, Vizagapatam. T. platynotus, Blyth, Bardwan.
T. elongate, Blyth, Arakan, Tenasserim. Homopus Horsfieldii, Gray, Afghanistan.
rant. Geoemydidoe.
Manouria emys Gray, Tenasserim.
Geoemyda granClis, Gray,- Tenasserim.
G. tricarinata, Blyth, Chaibassa.
Cuora Amhoinensis, Daud, Malacca, Tenasserim. Cyclemis orbiculate, Ben, Burma.
Fam. Ernydidm.
Emys nuchalis, Blyth, Java.
E. Hamiltonii, Gray, Calcutta.
E. trijuga, Schweigg, Arakan, Madras.
E. nigra, Blyth, Tenasserim. E. seize. .
Tetraonyx Lessonii, D. and B., Calcutta, Tcnasserim. Batagur lineatus, Gray, S. E. India.
B. Thurgii, Clray, Calcutta.
R. dhongoka, Gray, Central India. B. Berdmorm, B/yth, Pegu.
B. ocellata, Dam., Calcutta. P.. trivittata, Dum., Nival.
Pangshura tectum, Ben, Calcutta. P. tentoria, Gray, Indus.
P. flaviventer, Gunth., Bengal. P. Smith, China., Bengal.
Platysternum megacephalum, Gray, Martaban.
Fam. Trionycida% Emyda granosa, Gray, Calcutta.
E. Ceylonensis, Gray, Ceylon.
Trionyx Gangeticus, C. and V., Bengal. T. Guntherii, Gray, Arakan.
Chitra Indica, Gray, Hoogly.
Fam. Chelonidae.
Sphargis coriacea, Linn., Tenasserim coast. Caretta imbricate, Schweigg, Bay of Bengal. °vane olivacea, Eschech, Bay of Bengal. Chelonia virgata, Schweigg, Bay of Bengal.
Testudo greca inhabits a part of Syria ; the T. geometrica, an African species, is found also in the island of Ceylon. Of Trionyx, several species inhabit the rivers of Southern Asia. One has been observed in the Euphmtes, which is perhaps 'dent ical with the Trionyx of the Nile, also found in Hindustan. The Ganges maintains the T. Ganget juts, peculiar, so far as is knovvn, to that river ; another, the T. granosus, which forms the passage to the Emydes, is found also on the coast of Coromandel; while two others, T. stellatus and T. subplanus, have been observed from Bengal to the island of Java. The Trionyx of Japan belongs most probably to the first of these, which would thus be nearly as -widely diffused as the Emys vulgaris, of which a local variety is found in the islands of that empire. The othor Emydes of the south-eastern portion of Asia are E. tectum, E. megacephala, so characteristic in its heavy or un wieldy form; E. tetrionyx, intermediate between the Emydes and Trionyx, and a native of the river Irawadi; E. Spengleri varieties are known in the
isle of France, Ceylon, Penang, Malacca, Sumatra, Java, Borneo, and China; E. couro inhabits China, the southern point of Celebes, and the islands of Penang, Java, and Amboyna ; while E. trijuga has been found in Java.
Tortoises are eaten in the Pacific Islands. A small fresh-water tortoise of China, called Luh man-kwei, is provided with a growth of green conferval filaments of an inch or more in length. It is kept in bowls and fed on fish and shrimps.
The tortoise is sacred in the eyes of the Buddhists of China, because it is believed to undergo no transformation.
The kites carry to a height the small fresh-water tortoise Emyda punctata of Central India, and drop it so as to break the shell.
Testudo elephantina, the gigantic land tortoise of Aldabra, found only in Aldabra, a small island in the Indian Ocean, N.W. of Madagascar ; is now nearly extinct. One specimen, a male, weighed 8701bs., and although known to have been more than 80 years old, was still growing at the time of its death. Other tortoises of great size occur iu the Seychelles Islands. The colossal tor toise, Colossochelys atlas, discovered in the Siwalik tmct, is extinct. Ancient mythological conception represents the world as supported on the back of an elephant, itself sustained upon a tortoise. This ancient wide-spread notion (common to the ancient Pythagoreans and the modern Hindus) had in it, before Falconer, an obvious incongruity, in that the greatest land aninaal of the world was figured as supported on the back of an animal of a size com paratively insignificant. His discovery of the Colossochelys, however, removed this incongruity. For in the very same formations in which it was discovered, relics were also found, identical with the existing Emys tecta ; on this grouud, Dr Falconer conjectured that human eyes might have witnessed the Chelonian monster alive, and watched its toilsome march. This association together of fossil animals and man as contemporaries was indeed remarkable, as it took place at a time so long anterior to that in which the antiquity of man began to receive attention from xnen of science generally.—Siebold, Fau. Jap. Chelonii, per C. J. Temminck and H. Schlegel, in Magazine of Zoology and Botany, i. 199; Gunther, Reptiles; Smith, 3L 3f. C.