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, brought forth troupe 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 phereoikoi (in Greek) for so
the Greeks call both the shell-snail and the tortoise.
Summer birds are, this cold and backward spring, unusually late: I
have seen but one swallow yet.
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