San Antonio light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1911-1993, 1925-08-23

. than oxen, were his Chief enemies. Inc
fights these two gladiators had were fierce
and bloody contests. After one of them the
ground would be ripped up and the big
trees splineered over an area of an acre
or more. They were always started by
the lion, who would circle around the
turtle for hours, roaring at him, spring
ing on his back and off again, and grad
ually driving the peace loving creature to
fury. Then finally the tortoise would
stop his placid stripping of the soft
shrubs and face his adversary and the
fight would begin in earnest.
The lion, gathering his great muscles
under HIM, would leap on the motionless
tortoise and try to fasten his fangs in the
skin of his neck. He could make little
impression on the leathery skin, Just
enough to drive the turtle to frenzy.
Crashing back and forth among the trees,
they would wrestle. And at last the lion,
bloody foam streaming from its mouth,
would make its fatal mistake and lean
straight for the eyes of its enemy.
And with roars of rage and pain that
re-echoed for miles through the forest, he
would find himself held helpless prisoner
in the tortoise's two-foot beak. Then the
tortoise, calmly and with his natural lack
of hurry, would press the edges of his
beak through the neck of the lion and
leave the bleeding remains for other meat
eating animals to devour.
II was thus that the giant tortoise sur
vived the bitter struggle for existence
and preserved his species from annihila-
ton for millions of years-and became
the ancestor of all the tortoises there are
on earth to-day.
"The Siwalik Hills, where we found the
skeleton" says DR.. Brown, "are 200 miles
from Rawalpindi. They are low-lying
hills thanking the Himalayas. / invaded
the country with a caravan of a score of
swarthy diggers and we took out two car
loads of fossils We had to beat our way
under the terrific Indian sun, averaging
l20 degrees of temperature, to reach the
Siwalik formations, which are an outwash
from the main ranges of the Himalayas,
or a chain of uplifted strata whipped by
wind and rains but barren of vegetation.
Certain areas bulge with fossils, but most
often they are hidden by drift.
I'VE were miles from accessible trails,
in a country which could not be reached
by either bullocks or camels. After dig
ging out the fossils from shale and rock,
we had to bandage and rope them care
fully and carry the whole two carloads
down the Siwalik ranges on the shoulders
of the natives. 1t required Is men to
tote the shell Of the gigantic tortoise on
an imprOvised stretcher. At that, they
were obliged TO rest every hundred feet,
grOaning and sweating under the load in
the intense heat"
DR.. Browns discovery not only gives
TO science the largest turtle that has ever
been known, but also the oldest type that
has so far been found That is why these
fossils constitute one of the most valuable
prizes unearthed in years.
They throw light on the very early
history Of the tortoise species, and the
tortoise is one of the most interesting of
all living vertebrate animals, TO science.
Through all the centuries he has remained
very much as he was at the beginning of
time. Great changes have occurred in
the bOny structure of nearly all other liv-
ing things, but in the tortoise there have
been few Improvements, few evolutionary
developments.
EARLY in their history, tortoises seemed
to have adapted themselves to their own
peculiar mode of life so thoroughly that
no other creatures have been able to drive
them from it. That is the reason why
their structure has remained so surpris-