26, 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.

_Snakes_.--It is perhaps owing to the aversion excited by the ferocious
expression and unusual action of serpents, combined with an instinctive
dread of attack[1], that exaggerated ideas prevail both as to their
numbers in Ceylon, and the danger to be apprehended from encountering
them. The Singhalese profess to distinguish a great many kinds, of which
they say not more than one half have as yet been scientifically
identified[2]; but so cautiously do serpents make their appearance, that
the surprise of persons long resident is invariably expressed at the
rarity with which they are to be seen; and from my own journeys through
the jungle, often of from two to five hundred miles, I have frequently
returned without observing a single snake. Mr. Bennett, who resided much
in the south-east of the island, ascribes the rarity of serpents in the
jungle to the abundance of the wild peafowl, whose partiality to young
snakes renders them the chief destroyers of these reptiles. It is
likely, too, that they are killed by the jungle-cocks; for they are
frequently eaten by the common barn-door fowl in Ceylon. This is
rendered the