Mock Turtle

“ Two or three men go out in a canoe in smooth water, when the Turtles delight to sleep on the surface, basking in the sun. No sooner is one discovered, than the ready diver plunges into the sea, and coming up silently behind the animal, suddenly seizes the hinder edge of the carapace before it awakes, and pressing down the posterior part of the body in the water, obliges the fore parts to remain upright. Thus the terrified Turtle, now thoroughly awakened, is prevented from diving until the canoe coming up, the bold fisherman and his prey are both taken on board. ”

“ Most of the young Mud Turtles crawled quickly out of the sand and broken shells, and began drying themselves in the sunshine. One slow little fellow stopped to look at the broken [Pg 84] shells, stubbed one of his front toes on a large piece and then sat down until it should stop aching. "Wait for me!" he called out to his brothers and sisters. "I'm coming in a minute."
The other little Turtles waited, but when his toe was comfortable again and he started toward them, he met a very interesting Snail and talked a while with him. "Come on," said the Biggest Little Turtle. ”

“ Defenseless in his undignified position, Emilius suffered our well-meant attentions in bitter silence. The hole was drilled, the turtle tipped over, grasped again by his peculiarly unattractive tail and borne triumphantly to the grassy bank behind the house, where, like any domestic animal, he was tethered to a tree.
"What next?" asked Joy-of-Life, who was already losing her heart to the unresponsive monster.
"Water," pronounced Sir Oracle. "Turtles won't feed except under water. They can't swallow if their heads aren't completely immersed. ”

“ When grazing the turtles eat only the roots, the tops thus rising to the surface, where they indicate to the turtler the animal's whereabouts. The turtler, armed with a strong steel barb attached to a rope and loosely fitted to the end of a pole, carefully rows up to the unsuspecting animal, and with a strong thrust plunges the barb through its shell, withdraws the pole, and, grasping the rope, now firmly attached to the turtle's back, lifts the animal to the surface. ”

“ The children cried aloud to their father, "Come, for the Turtle is running away!"
When Binama heard this cry, he and the birds with him, threw the sheaves of taro aside and gave chase to the runaway. But the Turtle had already reached the sea, and he hasted to dive. The birds called, "Show thyself now. Lift up thine head." This did the Turtle, and the angry birds cast great stones into the sea, and the left armlet which the Turtle wore was shattered. So he dived, but they called again, "Show thyself. Lift up thine head," and a stone fell upon the right armlet and brake it into small pieces. ”

“ The box tortoise can retire into its shell and close the under part into a groove of the upper edge, and thus form for itself an impregnable retreat; but there are varieties only partly encased by the shell, which cannot bring their heads and feet under cover.
The turtle wanders about with its house on its back as the snail does, and against its enemies it can close its doors and be emphatically “not at home.” Turtles have keen sight and hearing; they have no teeth, the jaws being simply cased in horn, like those of birds. Many of them are capable of making loud sounds. ”

“ Everybody was naturally very angry at this behaviour, and the girl most of all, and in her secret heart she determined to have her revenge. But, just at present, the turtles were too strong, so the prisoners had to put on their smartest slippers and their brightest clothes, and dance a war dance while the turtles sang. They danced so long that it seemed as if they would never stop, till the turtle who was leading the singing suddenly broke into a loud chant:
Whoever comes here, will die, will die! ”

“ There is a long shaft, into the end of which is loosely slipped a movable head. A rope is attached to the head, and a buoy to the other end of the rope. As soon as the reptile is struck, the shaft is disengaged, and is picked up by the thrower; while the float serves as an indication of the turtle’s whereabouts, and enables the hunters to tow it toward the shore.
One of the natives, named Gi’ôm, told Mr. M’Gillivray that they sometimes caught the turtle by means of the remora, or sucking-fish. ”

“ But, goodness me! He soon found out what a heavy thing a turtle is. Pretty soon the old hawk’s wings grew tired. Oh, very weary, indeed.
“I must rest,” he said to himself, turning toward an old dead tree near the edge of the Shady Forest.
“Let me go! Let me go!” again and again begged Teddy Turtle.
“Be still, will you?” answered the old robber bird, doing his best to keep his balance on the limb of the dead tree and at the same time hold on to the wiggly jiggly little turtle.
“No, I won’t,” answered Teddy Turtle, with another wiggle and a jiggle, and maybe a wiggle-jiggle-jiggle after that. ”

“ The Mother Turtle raised one of her forefeet until all five of its toes with their strong claws were pointing at him. She also raised her head as far as her upper shell would let her. "So you are the one," she said. "I thought you were when I heard you trying to make the others wait. It is too bad." ”

“ And Long Bill always took pains to tell his children of his own adventure with Timothy Turtle and warn them not to make such a mistake.
"Luckily I sat exactly in the center of Mr. Turtle's shell, so he couldn't reach me," Long Bill was explaining to his family one day. "But if I had happened to perch on his head I certainly wouldn't be here now."
"Oh, Mr. Turtle is too slow to catch me," one of the youngsters boasted. "I saw him on the bank to-day; and he only crawled."
"Ah! You don't know him," Long Bill Wren replied. "When he wants to, he can stand up on his hind legs as quick as a wink. ”

“ When the fishermen discover the Turtles basking on the surface of the water, not daring to disturb their intended prey, by making the least noise, they slip overboard one of their Remoras, secured by the long cord, and pay out the line according to their distance. The fish soon perceives the Turtle, and hastening to it, fixes itself so firmly on the floating reptile, that the fishermen can draw both together into their boat, where there is no difficulty in detaching the fish by pushing forwards its head from behind. ”

“ Turtle advised that the animals should all go to the sky to live until they could be sure that the new race of creatures would bring them no harm. And he showed them the [Pg 131] pathway that Rainbow had made, stretching from the earth in wonderful colours. The animals all agreed at the Great Council to take Turtle's advice. But they were all very angry at Deer for leaving them without warning, for they thought that all the animals should either stay together faithfully on the earth or go all together to the sky. Bear showed the greatest anger and annoyance. ”

“ Hazar finished up the business he had on hand and then joined the King in his summer palace up in the hills and as soon as they found a stick which would bear the weight of the turtle, the ducks flew up into the air with the turtle between them.
How the fishes did laugh as they looked at the turtle hanging from the stick by his mouth. "Don't come back again, Talking Turtle," they called after him. "We can get along very well without you." ”

“ This was a terrapin-like bug that was more than a mouthful. His body, indeed, was already out of sight, but claw-like legs protruded from both sides of that isosceles triangle [Pg 84] which a turtle’s mouth makes when it is closed, and waved a frantic farewell to the passing under-water world. The turtle was a long time in masticating his terrapin, but it was a happy time. His whole body blinked contentedly, and he waved his forelegs with a caressing out-push, a motion exactly like that of a child at the breast. ”

“ Let me tell you, my brothers, that the world is full of dangers, and unless we are banded together and stand by each other, we will be scattered and lose our standing as a nation."
To this wise counsel the turtles apparently agreed, but each one wanted the honor of presenting the plan that was to be followed, and each also wanted the distinction of being chosen to lead his fellows. The wise old turtle made every effort at conciliation and proposed several plans, any one of which if accepted would have made the turtles a great and powerful nation, but they could come to no agreement. ”

“ Arrived here the chief’s paddlers drew in and he and de Bonelli landed, the tribe following in due order of importance.
As an amateur naturalist the chargé d’affaires knew something of the habits of the turtle, but he was not prepared for many things which he saw that day. Turtles seldom lay their eggs immediately by the water; as often as not they choose a place half a mile or more away from it. ”

“ The man who sells the gold-fish, with fan-like tails as long as their bodies, has also turtles. These boys at last settle that of all the pretty things they have seen they would best like to spend their money on a young turtle. For their pet rabbits and mice died, but turtles, they say, are painted on fans and screens and boxes because turtles live for ten thousand years. Even the noble white crane is said to live no more than a thousand years In this picture they have carried home the turtle and are much amused at the funny way it walks and peeps its head in and out from under its shell. ”

“ It was a good thing for him that he had a hard back. Nevertheless it always made him angry to be disturbed when he was taking a nap. And some people said that if Timothy Turtle ever grabbed a boy by his great-toe, when he was in swimming, that youngster would limp for many a day thereafter.
But the boys went in swimming just the same. Black Creek would have had to be alive with turtles to keep them out of it on a hot summer's day. Indeed Farmer Green often said that he wished his son Johnnie would spend half the time in the hayfield that he wasted around the creek.p. ”

“ To an Englishman a turtle is a sea-monster, that for a brief space lies on his back and fights the air with his useless paddles in the bow-window of a provision-shop, bound eventually to Guildhall, there to feed Gog and Magog, or his worshippers, known as aldermen. For him a land-testudinate is a tortoise. When his poets and romancers speak of turtles, again, they commonly mean turtle-doves. ”

“ The creature was cunning enough to kill by easy means prey that would otherwise be difficult to overcome, for while crosswise in the snake’s mouth it could not be swallowed, and if put down for an instant the chances of its recapture would be slight.
To suppose that a turtle, as you watch it crawling over the mud, has any sense of humor in its horny head seems absurd; yet naturalists have recorded their being seen at play, and certainly they can readily be tamed to a remarkable degree. ”

“ When questioned by his father, Johnnie said that there was an old turtle in Black Creek that he wanted to catch.
"What are you going to do with him—make soup of him?" Farmer Green inquired solemnly.
Johnnie shook his head.
"I want to cut my initials on his shell and let him go," he explained. "Then if I catch him again when I'm grown up I'll know him when I find him.... I'll put the date under my initials, too," Johnnie added.
Farmer Green laughed.
"When you're grown up," he said, "you'll have something else to do besides catching snapping turtles. ”

“ Turtle didn't live in some other place. "He makes my wife so nervous!" he used to exclaim. "With a new brood of at least a half-dozen youngsters to take care of every summer one has to watch sharp for Mr. Turtle whenever thep. 9 children play near the water." ”

“ Perhaps the poor Spaniards of those days happened in the first instance upon an ancient bull, or a hawks-bill, and tapped the poison gland, or a loggerhead or a luth, and came ever after to entertain, with right good cause, a holy terror of turtle, irrespective of species.
An interesting phase in the life-history of the green turtle is the deception the female employs when about to lay eggs. Her "nests" are shallow pits in the sand. She may make several during a hasty visit to a favourite beach, while postponing the laying until the following day. ”

“ Crow said it [Pg 28] must be a place where there would be a lot of fine things to see, and Mr. Turtle said that he was a good deal over three hundred years old and had often heard of a menagerie, but that he had never seen one. He said he had always supposed that it was a nice pond of clear water, with a lot of happy turtles and fish and wild geese and duck and such things in it, and maybe some animals around it, all living happily together, and taken care of by Mr. Man, who brought them a great many good things to eat. ”

“ The Musk Turtle is a common type of the Mud Turtle and is found in abundance in the muddy streams of the eastern, part of the United States. It will often be taken on a fish [180] hook. It derives its name from the odor it gives forth. Seldom is it found out of the water. It snaps when taken in a way which rivals the Snapping Turtle. The common Mud Turtle is not as abundant as the Musk Turtle to which it is similar in habit, crawling along the muddy bottoms of ponds and rivers. The under shell of the Mud Turtles is much broader than that of the Musk Turtles. ”

“ Nor must it be thought that Nature was cruel to the turtles only to be generous to the other creatures. This very emergency had been amply provided for by the fact that each adult turtle during her annual visit to land deposited as many as one hundred eggs in the hole she carefully scooped in the sand, and had all her offspring survived the rivers would soon be overstocked, constituting a real menace to the perpetuation of the race. So long as the others took their toll, that generation was safe. ”