SELBORNE, _April_ 21_st_, 1780.
Dear Sir,--The old Sussex tortoise, that I have mentioned to you so
often, is become my property. I dug it out of its winter dormitory in
March last, when it was enough awakened to express its resentments by
hissing, and, packing it in a box with earth, carried it eighty miles in
post-chaises. The rattle and hurry of the journey so perfectly roused it
that, when I turned it out on a border, it walked twice down to the
bottom of my garden; however, in the evening, the weather being cold, it
buried itself in the loose mould, and continues still concealed.
As it will be under my eye, I shall now have an opportunity of enlarging
my observations on its mode of life and propensities, and perceive
already that, towards the time of coming forth, it opens a breathing
place in the ground near its head, requiring, I conclude, a freer
respiration as it becomes more alive. This creature not only goes under
the earth from the middle of November to the middle of April, but sleeps
great part of the summer: for it goes to bed in the longest days at four
in the afternoon, and often does not stir in the morning till late.
Besides, it retires to rest for every shower, and does not move at all in
wet days.
When one reflects on the state of this strange being, it is a matter of
wonder to find that Providence should bestow such a profusion of days,
such a seeming waste of longevity, on a reptile that appears to relish it
so little as to squander more than two-thirds of its existence in a
joyless stupor, and be lost to all sensation for months together in the
profoundest of slumbers.
While I was writing this letter, a moist and warm afternoon, with the
thermometer at 50 degrees, brought forth troops of shell-snails, and, at
the same juncture, the tortoise heaved up the mould and put out its head,
and the next morning came forth, as it were, raised from the dead; and
walked about till four in the afternoon. This was a curious coincidence!
a very amusing occurrence! to see such a similarity of feelings between
the two φερέοικοι! for so the Greeks called both the shell-snail and
the tortoise.
Summer birds are, this cold and backward spring, unusually late: I have
seen but one swallow yet. This conformity with the weather convinces me
more and more that they sleep in the winter.