?7 



evenings, but the number seen becomes smaller and smaller; and 

 finally as the cold November weatlier comes on, none are seen. Where 

 are they ? The toad seems to know that winter is coming, that the 

 insects and worms will disappear so that no food can be found. It 

 must go into a kind of death-like sleep in which it hardly moves or 

 breathes. A toad is sensible enough to know that it will not do tc go 

 into this profound sleep except in some safe and protected place. If 

 it were to freeze and thaw with every change in the weather it would 

 not wake up in the spring. 



The wonderful foresight which instinct gives it, makes the toad 

 select some comparatively soft earth in a protected place where it can 

 bury itself. The earth chosen is moist, but not wet. If ir were dry, 

 the toad would dry up before spring. It is not uncommon for farmers 

 and gardeners to plough them up late in the fall or early in the spring. 

 Also in digging cellars at about these times, they are found 

 occasionally. 



It is very interesting to see a toad bury itself. If one is found 

 hibernating in the fall, or if one is found very early in the spring on 

 some cold day after a warm spell, the process can very easily be seen. 

 Put some loose earth in a box or a glass dish and put the toad on the 

 top of the earth. It will be found that the toad digs backwards, not 

 forwards. It digs with its hind legs and body, and pushes itself back- 

 ward into the hole with the front legs. The earth caves in as the 

 animal backs into the ground so that no sign is left on the outside. 

 Once in far enough to escape the freezing and thawing of winter the 

 toad moves around till there is a little chamber slightly larger than its 

 body ; then it draws its legs up close, shuts its eyes, puts its head down 

 between or on its hands, and goes to sleep and sleeps for five months 

 or more. 



When the warm days of spring come it wakes up, crawls out of bed 

 and begins to take interest in life again. It looks around for insects 

 and worms, and acts as if it had had only a comfortable nap. 



The little toad that you saw hatch from an egg into a tadpole and 

 then turn to a toad, would hibernate for two or three winters, and by 

 ihat time it would be quite a large toad. After it had grown up and 

 had awakened from its winter sleep some spring, it would have a great 

 longing to get back to the pond where it began life as an egg years 

 before, Once there it would lay a great number of eggs, perhaps a 



