[Footnote 1:  [Greek:  “Tiktontai de ara en taute te thalatte, kai chelonai megistai, onper oun ta elytra orophoi ginontai kai gar esti kai pentekaideka pechon en cheloneion, os hypoikein ouk oligous, kai tous helious pyrodestatous apostegei, kai skian asmenois parechei."]—­Lib. xvi. c. 17.  AElian copied this statement literatim from MEGASTHESES, Indica Frag. lix. 31.  May not Megasthenes have referred to some tradition connected with the gigantic fossilised species discovered on the Sewalik Hills, the remains of which are now in the Museum at the East India House?]

The hawksbill-turtle[1], which supplies the tortoise-shell of commerce, was at former times taken in great numbers in the vicinity of Hambangtotte during the season when they came to deposit their eggs.  This gave rise to the trade in tortoise-shell at Point de Galle, where it is still manufactured into articles of ornament by the Moors; but the shell they employ is almost entirely imported from the Maldives.

[Footnote 1:  Caretta imbricata, Linn.]

If taken from the animal after death and decomposition, the colour of the shell becomes clouded and milky, and hence the cruel expedient is resorted to of seizing the turtles as they repair to the shore to deposit their eggs, and suspending them over fires till heat makes the plates on the dorsal shields start from the bone of the carapace, after which the creature is permitted to escape to the water.[1] In illustration of the resistless influence of instinct at the period of breeding, it may be mentioned that the identical tortoise is believed to return again and again to the same spot, notwithstanding that at each visit she may have to undergo a repetition of this torture.  In the year 1826, a hawksbill turtle was taken near Hambangtotte, which bore a ring attached to one of its fins that had been placed there by a Dutch officer thirty years before, with a view to establish the fact of these recurring visits to the same beach.[2]

[Footnote 1:  At Celebes, whence the finest tortoise-shell is exported to China, the natives kill the turtle by blows on the head, and immerse the shell in boiling water to detach the plates.  Dry heat is only resorted to by the unskilful, who frequently destroy the tortoise-shell in the operation—­Journal Indian Archipel. vol. iii. p. 227, 1849.]

[Footnote 2:  BENNETT’S Ceylon, &c., c. xxxiv.]

An opportunity is afforded on the sea-shore of Ceylon for observing a remarkable illustration of instinct in the turtle, when about to deposit its eggs.  As if conscious that if she went and returned by one and the same line across the sandy beach, her hiding place would be discovered at its farthest extremity, she resorts to the expedient of curving her course, so as to regain the sea by a different track; and after depositing the eggs, burying them about eighteen inches deep, she carefully smoothes over the surface to render the precise spot indiscernible.  The Singhalese, aware of this device, sound her line of, march with a rod till they come upon the concealed nest.