division into an anterior and posterior wall, each of which were covered with fine folds
placed obliquely across each wall, but parallel to each other.
The allantoic bladder is small compared with that of B. lineata, and presents
two halves that are thrown into numerous fine folds, on their red inner
aspects.
The lung is very different from either the lung of B. basket or B. lineata,
and is chiefly distinguished by the large flask-shaped lower lobe which depends over
the oviduct and abuts against the cloacal bladder, distending the inguinal region
at every deep inspiration, pushing before it the cloacal bladders and the enormous
masses of yellow consistent fat that occur in that region. I t nearly equals the
length of the body of the lung, which is narrow and rather elongate, partially
divided at its anterior extremity, with a sinuous external margin, terminated below
by a small flask-like lobe. The anterior portion of the lung is nearly twice as broad
as the lower end, before the flask-like lobes are given off. The lateral length of the
lung is 11*50 inches; its greatest breadth anteriorly 3*75 inches, and posterior 2"*16.
The length of the large flask-like lobe is 4*50 inches.
Hardella thurgi is a thoroughly aquatic species, frequenting deep slow-flowing
nullahs, and the long land-locked reaches of deep water that occur, for example, in
the district of Pumeah, old channels of the Cossy river, which has travelled
about ten miles to the westward, during a comparatively short space of years.
These slow-flowing and stagnant waters are generally well stocked with aquatic
weeds of various kinds but little known, and generally teem with fish, and are
thus the favourite resort of crocodiles. The S . thttrgi lives in these muddy bottoms
where it scrapes up the bulbous roots of the aquatic plants, occasionally rising to the
surface to breathe, but not so frequently as the Bangshures and Trionyces, by
reason of its capacious lung. The stomachs and intestines I have opened have
invariably been filled with dark-green vegetable matter, but with no trace of an
animal diet. This water tortoise is eaten by Crocodilus palustris, and I have been
informed by a reliable authority that he has seen a crocodile trying to swallow a
large E . thurgi, and that he has found the stomach of C. palustris, packed full
of fragments of the shells of tortoises.
I t is not at all of a fierce disposition, and when unmolested seldom attempts
to bite, and even when much irritated it only slowly opens its mouth, and withdrawing
its head, emits a blowing hissing sound.
Although thoroughly aquatic, I have kept it during the hot weather out
of water, and without food, for more than two months, and with no evil effects as far
as I could judge; after it is returned to the water, having been previously for
long deprived of it, the allantoic bladder becomes rapidly distended, as in other and
allied species, with a clear watery fluid, which, when the animal is frightened, is
ejected with considerable force.
This species appears to be widely distributed through the Gangetic system
of rivers, extending up the Brahmaputra, but not occurring in Arracan and
Burma.
During the cold weather months, many hundreds are brought to Calcutta and
purchased by a low caste of Hindus1, who keep them alive in tanks and sell them to
the Mugh population and to the Chamars for food, also eating them themselves.
In the Purneah district, I have had. an opportunity of observing at Kolassy,
a tribe of Sontals who have been settled in the district for some generations,
dive for this species in deep water, and perform the much more astonishing feat of
capturing in the same way the very fierce T. gangeticus and T. hu/rum. Ten of
these men, all but naked, collected together, and I was surprised to see each ma,n
provided with a large bundle of green marsh grass, neatly tied up as a cylinder,
about 2 feet long by 9 inches, in diameter, cut cleanly across at the ends. As they
went into the water each thrust his green bundle before him which I soon perceived
to be a float, on which each rested his chest, as he got beyond his depth. Then, one
after another, pushing away their floats, dived and re-appeared generally with an
example of Ha/rdella thurgi obtained in the mud at the bottom. Having caught a
tortoise the diver rests on his float to recover his breath, and coming slowly to
shore lands his captive which he carries in two hands, propelling himspilf slowly by
his feet. In this way they caught, in a very short time, about fifteen tortoises of the
following species, viz., P . tecta, B. gra/nosa, and H. thurgi.
• Sub-Genus T e t r a o n y x , Lesson.
B a t a g u r ( T e t r a o n y x ) b a s k a , Gray. PI. LXVI, LXYII, juv.
E m y s batagur, Gray, Syn. Rept., p. 24, 1831 ; id. 111. Ind. Zool., vol. ii, 1834, t. 59.
Em y s basica, Gray, 111. Ind. Zool., vol. i, p., 82, tab. 75.
T r io n y x cuvieri, Gray, Syn. Kept., p. 50, 1881.
Tetraonyx batagm, Gray, Cat. Tort. B. M., 1844, p. 29.
Batagwr basica, Gray, Cat. Sh. Kept., B. M., p. 35, pi. xvi, 1855 p a r s ; id. Ann. & Mag. Nat. Hist.,
1857, vol. xix, p. 843 ; id. Suppl. Cat. Sh. Rept. B. M.,p. 52, fig. skull, 1870; Gunther, Rept.,
Brit. Ind., p. 37, jpl. iii,-figs. B B ; Blyth, Joum. As. Soc., Bengal, vol. xxxii, 1863, p. 84.
TetraonyxJiaslca, Gray, Proc. Zool. Soc., 1869, p. 200, fig. ii, skull.
Te traony x longicollis, Lesson, Belanger, Yoy. aux Ind. Rept., p. 297, 1884.
T etraonyx lessoni, D . & B., Erpét. Gén. vol. ii, p. 838, pi. xvi, fig. 1, 1835, M. M. Duméril. Cat.
Méth. Rept., p. 15, 1851 ; Blyth, As. Soc. Joum., vol. xxii, p. 645,1858 ; Theobald, Linn. Soc.
Joum., vol. x, Zool. p. 17, 1868 ; id., Cat. Rept. Joum. As. Soc. vol. xxxvii, ex. No., p. 11, 1868.
T e traony x basica, D. & B., Erpét. Geni. vol. ii, 1885, p. 341.
1 There is a colony o f these Hindu brokers on the eastern outskirts of Calcutta, on the high road to a great fish
mart to whioh many fish that find their way to the city bazaars, and even to those of its suburbs, are first brought alive,
in boats half filled with water, and sold to the highest bidders. These Bengalee Chelonian brokers live in wretched
thatched mud huts around a tank, the banks of which are literally paved with the shells of this species, and with the
granulated shields of Chitra, Trionyx and JEmyda, which are also highly esteemed as food. On visiting this
curious spot, I was first shewn a few huge specimens of T, gangeticus lying in the shallow water at the side of the tank,
moored to its bank by a cord passed through the webs of the fore and hind feet of one side, and secured to a wooden
peg driven into the bank. On the opposite side of the tank, a large enolosure had been staked off in deep water, and I
was informed that it was filled with Bardella thurgi which is always penned up in this way to prevent its escaping,
for it is a good walker on dry land, dose to this tank was another and much , smaller pond, but so shallow that the
backs of the turtles and tortoises appeared as low mounds above its green surface, coated with a thick pellicle of
conferva. Here, again, there was a central circular pen filled with Bardella thurgi, and, round about it, were many
specimens of T. gangeticus disabled and pegged as just described.