COMMON WARTY-NEWT. 133 



common in many ponds and ditches, and may generally be 

 easily obtained by means of a minnow net. In the neigh- 

 bourhood of London, especially, they are to be found in 

 numbers every spring ; and I have had no difficulty in pro- 

 curing as many as I wished for the purposes of observation. 

 From this facility of obtaining them, the number of eggs 

 which each produces, and the time which is occupied in 

 the act of deposition, it is astonishing that the mode above 

 described was never observed until of late years, and that 

 many excellent naturalists have given most erroneous ac- 

 counts of the process. Spallanzani, for instance, declares 

 that the eggs fall at once to the bottom of the water when 

 deposited ; and Cuvier asserts that they are produced by 

 several at a time, attached to each other like beads. These 

 mistakes have arisen from the fact that the precaution was 

 not taken of placing aquatic plants in the vessel with the 

 Newts, the consequence of which has been that, in the 

 first place, the eggs of course fell to the bottom of the ves- 

 sel ; and, in the next place, as they fell into contact with 

 each other, they became united by the mass of tenacious 

 matter by which they are surrounded. This shews how 

 important it is, in all observations on the habits of animals, 

 made on individuals in confinement, to place them in cir- 

 cumstances as nearly natural as possible, and never to rest 

 satisfied by any results obtained under artificial restraints. 

 Rusconi has the merit of first publishing an accurate account 

 of the process in question, and I have observed it many times, 

 and long before I was acquainted with Rusconi's book. 



As soon as the female has in this way deposited a single 

 egg, she quits the leaf; and after the lapse of a short time 

 seeks another, there to place another egg. 



I now proceed to describe briefly the developement of the 

 embryo in this species, which, as it is the largest, is the 



