Caouana olivacea, Indian loggerhead. This species is distinguished from its Atlantic congener by the presence of only a single small claw to each of its feet. It is abundant at the mouth of the Hoogly, found in the Bay of Bengal, on the coasts of Malabar and Penang, and in the seas ef the Philippine Islands and of China. Its flesh, though relished by the Chinese, is unpalatable to Europeans.
Chelonia, Flem., Gray, Shield, Rept. p. 74. Herbivorous, feeding on algre. Species of Chelonia extend over nearly all the seas between the tropics. Ch. maculosa occurs on the 3faLsbar coast.
Chelonia virgata, the Indian turtle or green turtle, is found on all the coasts of the East Indies. It is at all seasons plentifully taken m fishing-stakes in the Straits of Malacca ; in size it equals the Atlantic turtle, which it rivals in flavour. About December and January the female lands to deposit her eggs in the sandy beach of some sequestered island, and then the fishermen watch during the moonlight nighte t,o Hum turtles.' The eggs are of a spherical shape, about 1 inch in diameter, covered by a soft semi-trans parent membrane of a pale-yellow colour. The expert eye of the fisherman baffles the pains with which the turtle conceals her eggs, and pro digious numbers are disinterred. They are very rich-flavoured, like marrow, and will keep for weeks although exposed to the air. The flesh of this species is sometimes found to be poisonous.
Caretta squamata, hawk-bill turtle, or caret. The hawk-bill turtle, so named from its rather elon gated and coinpressed, curved upper jaw, does not attain to the same size as the other turtles ; a shell 2 feet long is considered as extraordinarily large. It is found throughout the Eastern Archipelago, is plentiful only on parts of the coasts of Ceylon (Hambangtotte, Matura), of tbe Maldives, of Celebes, etc. As, however, turtles always resort to the locality where they were born, or where they have resorted to propagate their kind, and as their capture is very profitable, they become scarcer and scarcer at places where they are known to have been abundant formerly. Some specimens sell in Ceylon for as much as £4, the price depending on the quality of the shell. If taken from the animal when decomposition has set in, the colour of the shell becomes clouded and milky, and hence the cruel expedient is re sorted to of supending the turtle over fire till heat makes the shields start from the bony part of the carapace, after which the creature is permitted to escape to the water, where they live ; but re production of the epidermal shields to a great extent is improbable. At Celebes whence the finest tortoise-shell is exported tc; China, the natives. kill the turtle by blows on the bead, and immerse the shell in boiling water to detach the plates ; dry heat is only resorted to by the un skilful.
Dermatochelys coriacea. This turtle, although scarce, appears to be spread throughout almost all the seas of the tropical and temperate regions, having been found in the Mediterranean, on the south coast of England, in the West Indies, at the Cape of Good Hope, on the coasts of the United States, in Chili, in Japan, and in India. A female was caught on the coast of Tenasserim, of entire length 6 feet 21 inches.
In the Sauria, or order of lizards, the in teguments are with scale-like folds, or osseous scutes, or granular. The greater portion of the saurians are easily distinguished from the other orders of reptiles by their elongate form, by their moveable thorax covered with skin, by the presence of legs, and by their general integuments, which are either folded into scales, or granular, or tuber cular, or shielded. Still there are many saurians whick at a superficial glance might easily be taken for members of the order of snakes, and there is a gradual transition between both these orders. Many lizards have several layers of cells loaded with several pigments ; the a spreads or compresses these layers by more or less ating its lungs, whereby the changes in the colo ion are effected. Saurians are oviparous ; tow
ovo-viviparous. Theyhave been divided bynatural isteinto many families.
The first family comprise the Crocodiles, or Cro codilidw. Fresh-water saurians are found between the tropics wherever the country is watered by sufficiently large rivers or lakes. The most con spicuous characters of the crocodiles refer to their thoroughly aquatic life ; but these characters are combined with an extremely powerful develop ment of those organs which render the crocodiles the most formidable of all the carnivorous fresh water animals. The back, the tail, and the belly are protected by a dermal armour composed of quadrangular shields, which are arranged in regular longitudinal and transverse series. A considerable proportion of the food of the croco dile is fish, the proverbial swiftness of which is of little avail when pursued by these reptiles. They fall an easy prey, especially to the young animals ; the active old animals, requiring a greater quantity of food, attack every large animal which accident ally approaches them, and, in overpowering it, the whole of their powerful organization is called into requisition. Seizing the victim between their capacious jaws, and fastening their long, pointed, conical teeth into its flesh, they draw it, in one moment, by their weight and with a stroke of the tail, below the water, and drown it. Their gullet, however, is much too narrow to allow of the passage of the entire body of the victim ; and their teeth being adapted for seizing and holding fast only, and not for biting, they are obliged to mangle the carcase, tearing off single pieces by sudden strong jerks. This is performed chiefly by lateral motions of the head and front part of the body ; and the bones of the head of the crocodile are much more firmly united with one another, and the processes of the cervical vertebm much more developed, than in any other saurian. Indian crocodiles inhabit rivers and estuaries, also the sea-coasts, and in calm weather may be seen floating at a distance of two or three miles from shore. Those inhabiting small inland waters which are dried up during a drought, are compelled to wander about in search of water, in which alone they can procure their food ; they do this during . the night. Some of them, however, especially large individuals, bury themselves in the mud, as many fresh-water tortoises and fish do, and remain in a state of torpor below the hard crust during the time of the drought. It is during that period shortly after they have been released from the state of an enforced fasting, that they are most formidable. A man seized by a crocodile has only one way of saving his life, if not his limb, namely, to force his fingers into the eyes of the beast, which immediately lets go its victim,—a practice equally known to the Indian of South America, to the Negro of Africa, and to the Hindu. It is not difficult to catch a single depredator by a hook baited with flesh or entrails, and made fast by a bunch of strong, thin cords, which it cannot gnaw asunder, as they sink into the spaces between the teeth. It is not easy to kill them on the spot, except by a ball sent through the eye into the brain, or through the neck to the spinal cord. Of course a severe injury to any of the vital parts will prove fatal to them, but not before days or weeks have elapsed. All the crocodiles are oviparous ; the eggs have a hard shell, and resemble in size and shape those of a goose ; from 20 to 60 are deposited in a hollow near the banks, and slightly covered over with mould or sand. The young crocodiles are of a rather rapid growth. One hatched at Madras in '‘ 8 years increased to the length of 8 or 9 feet, and was so powerful as to destroy a full-grown buck antelope, which bad come to drink water at the . tank to which it usually resorted. Alligators are found only in the New World, but the British in India almost universally apply this name to the Indian crocodiles. Crocodiles aro found in America, Africa, .Asia, and Australia.