LETTER XV.

The oviparous and amphibious quadrupeds-the tortoise, crocodile, and lizard tribes.-A general view of their nature, qualities, and mental principle.

THE class of animals which is very peculiarly connected with those relics of their primeval races which our rocks and subterraneous strata have disclosed, is that which contains the oviparous quadrupeds-the tortoise, crocodile, and lizard tribes-and those without tails. These spring from eggs, without parental brooding, like fish and insects; and as they have left for our present knowledge of their ancient nature, amid the destructions they underwent, some important fossil remains of their bones and figure, they ought not to be omitted in our general review of the orders and economy of the primitive creation.

The oviparous quadrupeds present to us material investments of the animal mind and living principle, very distinct from the figures, limbs and functions of the other quadrupeds and kingdoms of nature, yet associated with them by several analogies. They have a heart, though it has only one ventricle. They have blood; yet it is not the red warm fluid, but a cold and pale one. They breathe, but with frequent and long suspensions, which no land or air animal could endure.* They have the same senses, but in feebler action and sensitivity, except that of sight. Their brain is proportionally smaller. Their muscular motion, in some, is far less vigorous, though active in others. They require less food, and can remain a long time without any. Their

• "This class of animals is distinguished by a body cold and generally naked; a countenance stern and expressive, and harsh voice. All have cartilaginous bones; slow circulation; they are deficient in diaphragm ; do not transpire; are tenacious of life." T. Linn. v. 1, p. 638.

"The class of oviparous quadrupeds are possessed of an equal number of senses with the more perfect animals; but all their senses, except that of sight, are so weak, in comparison with the viviparous quadrupeds, that they must receive much fewer impressions through them,-must communicate seldomer and less perfectly with external objects, and be less strongly and frequently excited to internal action in consequence of these." Count La Cepede, v. 1, p. 16. Kerr's Transl. . . . "Exquisite sight and hearing." T. Linn. p. 638.

"They are able to remain a very long time without food. Some instances have been known of tortoises and crocodiles living a whole

manners are gentler; they exhibit no ferocity, and appear to enjoy a much longer and more tranquil life.* They usually inhabit the sea or its shores, rivers and their banks, marshes, pools, and other wet and moist places. They live or herd together, are generally inoffensive, and can be tamed, and become tractable and amusing.t The young never know their mothers, nor receive any nourishment from them. Hence they are what they uniformly show them selves to be, from the impulses of their assumed principl of life and provided organization; and independent of al tuition.+ La Cepede divides them into three genera classes, which he arranges separately into such divisions as their distinct kinds seem to make reasonable; and these are subdivided into their respective species. They form the amphibia of Linnæus, who distinguished them into two orders, reptiles with feet, and serpents without; and into twelve genera. T

year though deprived of all sustenance." La Cep. 30... "They can live a long time without food." T. Linn. 638.

"Most of the oviparous quadrupeds are long-lived. We are certain that the large sea tortoises, and the other species, live to a very advanced age." p. 59. "Perhaps even more than a century." p. 115..... "The mud tortoise lives at least 80 years. From this great length of life, the Japanese adopt the tortoise as an emblem or hieroglyphic of happiness." p. 116.

"For the most part the manners of the animals of this class aregentle, and their characters are free from any degree of ferocity." La Cep. 48... "Their tempers are often susceptible of being considerably modified by culture." fb. p. 58.

"They have no enjoyment of parental affection. They abandon their eggs immediately after they are laid." La C. 54. ... "Thus the young of oviparous quadrupeds receive from their parents neither nourishment, care, nor education. They neither see nor hear any action or sound to imitate." Ib. 57.

§ He classes them, in his Supplement to Buffon, into-1. tortoises; I. lizards; ш oviparous quadrupeds without tails: which he divides thus the 1st into sea tortoises, fresh water, and land ones; the 2d int crocodiles and lizards; the 3d into frogs and toads. La Cep. Ov. Quad v. 1 & 2.

He made 6 species of sea tortoises, and 26 of the others; 3 distinct species of the real crocodiles, 8 of resembling lizards; 14 other species of lizards with round tails; 23 more species of the kind which he heads with the chameleon; 5 others, the flying lizard; and 6 others, which begin with the salamander. He enumerates 20 species of frogs, and 14 of toads. Ib.

To the reptiles who "have feet and naked ears without auricles, he assigned 5 genera,-the tortoise; the dragon, or flying lizard; the lizard tribe, including the crocodiles; the frog and toad genera; and one which he called siren. These, in Dr. Turton's edition of the System, comprised in the first, 3 species of marine turtles, 18 river turtles, and 12 land tortoises; in the second, 18 toads and 18 frogs; the fourth has 2 crocodiles

The Creator has made nothing that is unuseful-nothing so insulated as to have no relations with any thing elsenothing which is not serviceable or instrumental to other purposes besides its own existence-nothing that is not to be applicable or convertible to the benefit of his sentient creatures, in some respect or other. The mineral has a connexion of this sort with both the vegetable and animal kingdoms, and these with each other.* The same principle has been pursued throughout the animated classes of nature. No one species of living being has been formed only for itself, or can subsist in absolute uselessness to others. This is one grand purpose for causing so many races of animal being to subsist on each other. By this system, each enjoys the gift of life, and each is made to contribute, by the termination of that gift, to the well-being of others. Fishes, are thus useful to each other, to many birds, to some animals, and to man. Birds have their period of happiness for themselves, and are serviceable to others of their kind, and to man, and to some quadrupeds, in their mode of death, instead of mouldering through corruption into their material dissolution. Quadrupeds have the same double use in their existence their own enjoyment; and the benefit at their death, to those of their own order, and to the birds and reptiles, worms and insects, that have been appointed to derive nutrition from their substance. All the kingdoms of nature have been likewise so constructed as to be beneficial to the human race, not as nutriment only, but in the thousand conveniences to which they are convertible. The amphibious order of nature is no exception to these general results. Its various genera contribute their proportion to the common stock of mutual utilities. They have their own

nd an alligator, and 78 lizards. The serpents are arranged into 7 genera, with numerous species.

The matros, or wild cotton tree, affords an instance of the connexion which the various parts of nature are linked together. It grows in Suba to a height of 100 feet, of which, for the first 65 feet of its elevation, the whole trunk, which is 76 feet in circumference at the base, has not a single branch: but above this distance from the ground, the branch emerges and covers a diameter of 165 feet. This immense tree is itself a world. It shelters and feeds myriads of insects. Several parasitical plants attach themselves to it. Wild pine-apples grow at the top. The vine on its boughs, letting down its ramifications to the earth, enables rats, mice, and the opossum to climb to its pine cups, which are full of rain water. The wood-louse forms extensive republics at the juncture of some of its branches, and constructs two covered ways of mortar to the earth, one to descend by, and the other to go up. Lit. Gaz. No 679.

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gratification from their personal existence; they contribute by their substance to the maintenance of others of their fellow creatures; and some of their genera serve to multiply the conveniences and pleasures of man. He derives advantages from all that exists, in as much larger a degree to any other animal, as he is superior to any in his intellectual exertions and universal capacity.

The first order, the tortoise genera, are the most immediately serviceable to mankind. The flesh of the sea turtle i oth a valued delicacy and a useful medicine;* and th shell of one species furnishes society with that rich an beautiful material which forms our tortoise-shell ornaments and conveniences. It is a gentle and harmless animal, without any means of hurting others. Its protecting shell forms both its house and its armour, and enables it to defend itself by a patient and passive resistance, without disturbing its natural mildness of temper. It takes for its occasional subsistence grass, sea-weeds and shell-fish; but, in general, it requires but little food, as it can subsist for many months without any. The green sea turtles like to be together, and therefore assemble in numbers in the same locality, content with their mutual vicinity, and seeking no further association. They can remain long under water,

"The flesh of the green tortoise contains a softening, diaphoretic, and highly nourishing juice, the good effects of which I have often experienced. It makes an excellent soup, which is considered as a Sovereign remedy in scurvy and pulmonary disorders." Note of De la Borde, king's physician at Cayenne.. ... Hence it is "an approved remedy against the diseases which proceed from a long continuance in a crowded ship." La Cep. v. 1, p. 80.

+ It is the hawksbill tortoise, testudo imbricata, which furnishes "that beautiful substance with which, even from the most remote antiquity, the sumptuous palaces of the great have been adorned, though it has now given place to the brilliancy of gold, and confined to elegant toys." La Cep. 140.

"Defended by armour of very strong bone, which can sustain ex cessive loads without breaking, so as to have nothing to fear; and at the same time having no means of offence, they can do no injury to others. Mildness of temper, and passive force to resist against injuries, seem their distinguishing features; and it was perhaps in allusion to these qualities that the Greeks made it a companion to the goddess of beauty." La Cep. p. 90... At Ælis there was a temple to the celestial Venus: her image was of ivory and gold, made by Phidias: one af her feet he placed upon a tortoise. Paus. Elian. 1. 6, p. 392.

$"Being able to live, even for more than a year, entirely without food, they flock peaceably together. Drawn together to the same spots by the same necessities and similarity of habits, they live amicably in the same place, without forming any kind of society." La Cep. 89. ...“

and sleep upon it. They are periodically travellers, for the sake of depositing their eggs in convenient places; and sometimes, for other reasons, extensive emigrants; for they have been found on the coasts of France, and also of England.t

The land tortoise has the same gentle and peaceable manners. It can live without food, and probably does so, like many if not most of the fish, except at certain periods. It enjoys a great length of life,s and has its living principle so essentially within its body, that it can subsist and move without either brain or head.|| This class of animals were thus made to be in the waters, what the sheep are on the hills and plains, harmless, gentle, patient, and useful;¶ one

"One small kind, the ferax, in the rivers of South America, about 70 pounds weight, is rather fierce. It defends itself by biting." T. Linn. 642.

The midas species is the largest of its tribe. It inhabits the south seas; and is so strong as to be able to run with a load of 600 pounds weight, and to move with as many men as can sit upon its back. When turned up on land, it is unable to move. It lays numerous round, membranaceous eggs; as many as 1000, which it deposits in the sand, and sits upon by night. Its flesh and green fat is delicious to the taste, and greedily sought after by scorbutic sailors. It feeds on sæpia and shellfish." T. Linn. 1, p. 641.

† La Cep. 119. Tortoises have been found at sea, more than 700 leagues from any known land. Cook's 3d Voy. "M. De la Borde

has seen many tortoises floating at sea 300 leagues from land. Some sea tortoises are occasionally caught on the coast of Languedoc and Provence." They "have been caught near the mouth of the Loire." La Cep. 121, 2. In 1752, one weighing 800 lbs. was taken in the harbour of Dieppe, having been driven there by a storm. Ib. 123.... In 1810, Mr. Bingley saw one that had been caught near Christchurch, Hants. An. Biog. v. 3, p. 147.

"Dr. Garden kept one, weighing above 25 lbs. near three months, in his house; during which time he could never perceive that it took any nourishment, though different articles were presented to it for food." La Cep. 174..... G. Blasius kept one for ten months, during which time it neither eat nor drank. Blas. Obs. Anat. p. 64. .... Mr. White's had the greatest appetite in the height of summer, and eat very little in spring and autumn. White's Selborne.

$ M. Cetti saw one in Sardinia, which had lived 60 years in one house. Hist. Anat. Amph..... Archbishop Laud's was alive in 1753, or 125 years after its introduction. Another lived at Lambeth 107 years. The one at Peterborough was 220 years old. It had been contemporary with seven successive bishops. Murray's Exper. Researches.

In experiments which revolt our best feelings, F. Redi removed the whole brain from a common land tortoise. The eyes closed, to open no more; but the animal walked as before, but as groping its way for want of vision. It lived nearly six months after. Another, which he decapitated, continued alive for several days, though it had lost much blood. Redi. Obs. Anim. Viv. p. 126.

¶ "The manners of the tortoise are as peaceable as its motions are