TESTUDINATA. Tortoise.—­Land tortoises are numerous, but present no remarkable features beyond the beautiful marking of the starred variety[1], which is common in the north-western province around Putlam and Chilaw, and is distinguished by the bright yellow rays which diversify the deep black of its dorsal shield.  From one of these which was kept in my garden I took a number of flat ticks (Ixodes), which adhere to its fleshy neck in such a position as to baffle any attempt of the animal itself to remove them; but as they are exposed to constant danger of being crushed against the plastron during the protrusion and retraction of the head, each is covered with a horny case almost as resistant as the carapace of the tortoise itself.  Such an adaptation of structure is scarcely less striking than that of the parasites found on the spotted lizard of Berar by Dr. Hooker, each of which presents the distinct colour of the scale to which it adheres.[2]

[Footnote 1:  Testudo stellata.]

[Illustration:  THE THREE-RIDGED TORTOISE (EMYS TRIJUGA)]

[Footnote 2:  HOOKER’S Himalayan Journals, vol. i. p. 37.]

The marshes and pools of the interior are frequented by terrapins[1], which the natives are in the habit of keeping alive in wells under the conviction that they clear them of impurities.  These fresh-water tortoises, the greater number of which are included in the genus Emys of naturalists, are distinguished by having their toes webbed.  Their shell is less convex than that of their congeners on land (but more elevated than that of the sea-turtle); and it has been observed that the more rounded the shell, the nearer does the terrapin approach to the land-tortoise both in its habits and in the choice of its food.  Some of them live upon animal as well as vegetable food, and those which subsist exclusively on the former, are noted as having the flattest shells.

[Footnote 1:  Cryptopus granum, SCHOePF; DR. KELAART, in his Prodromus (p. 179), refers this to the common Indian species, C. punctata; but it is distinct.  It is generally distributed in the lower parts of Ceylon, in lakes and tanks.  It is the one usually put into wells to act the part of a scavenger.  By the Singhalese it is named Kiri-ibba.]

The terrapins lay about thirty eggs in the course of several weeks, and these are round, with a calcareous shell.  They thrive in captivity, provided that they have a regular supply of water and of meat, cut into small pieces and thrown to them.  The tropical species, if transferred to a colder climate, should have arrangements made for enabling them to hybernate during the winter:  they will die in a very short time if exposed to a temperature below the freezing point.[1]

[Footnote 1:  Of the Emys trijuga, the fresh water tortoise figured on preceding page, the technical characteristics are;—­vertical plates lozenge-shaped; shell convex and oval; with three more or less distinct longitudinal keels; shields corrugated; with areola situated in the upper posterior corner.  Shell brown, with the areolae and the keels yellowish; head brown, with a yellow streak over each eye.]