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Tortoise [BB/FF]

ONE fine morning, Chester the tortoise stepped out for a stroll. He did not go far - across to the rough copse, round to the bus stop and up to the village church.

The entrie 750-yard journey from his garden took him no more than 35 years.

Chester was bought for eight-year-old Malcolm Edwards in 1960. The 10-year-old tortoise joined the boy's small menagerie in the village of Lyde, Herefordshire.

To make th pet easier to spot in the grass, Malcolm's father painted a white mark on his shell.

The tortoise, however, yearned for the broader horizon beyond the garden gate. He escaped and vanished.

There was one poosible sighting, 18 years ago in the woods, but Mr Edwards eventually accepted that his tortoise was dead.

Then his neighbour, Flossie Masshder, found a mud-covered tortoise crawling along a grass verge near the village church.

Mr Edwards, who still lives in his boyhood home, recognised the faded white paint mark on his pet's shell.

He said yesterday: "It appears that Chester has been living wild since he escaped from the garden in 1960. I knew immediately I saw him that it was the same tortoise."

George Cooper, the vet who examined Chester, said: "Chester could easily have survived all those years just living in local woodland. He would have found food in abundance, including dandelions, fruit, grass and vegetables."

Mr Edwards, who now has two children and runs a garden centre, said: "We are hoping Chester might decide to stay this time."