(^^^^ 



Vol.. II. JANUARY, 1893. No. i. 



IS THE FROG A NATIVE OF IRELAND? 



BY R. F. SCHARFF, PH.D., B.SC. 



Thk following paper does not profess to answer this question 

 decidedl}^ in the affirmative, but I venture to think that I shall 

 be able to show that the belief generally held that the Frog 

 has been introduced by man, is not supported by sufficient 

 evidence. 



In an inquiry into the origin of any Irish animal we naturally 

 consult first Thompson's standard work on the Natural History 

 of Ireland,^ and in the case of the Frog we find that the 

 author had no doubt that it had been artificially introduced 

 into this country, and that it was therefore no true native. 

 His belief appears to be principally founded on a passage 

 referring to Ireland by St. Donatus,= who died in the year 

 840, of which the following lines are a translation :— 



" No savage bear with lawless fury roves, 

 No raging lion through her sacred groves, 

 No poison there infects, no scaly snake ,, 



Creeps through the grass, no croaking frog annoys the lake. 



Thompson also refers to an introduction of the Frog, which does 

 certainly seem to have taken place some time about the year 

 1699 when Dr. Guithers, one of the Fellows of Trinity College, 

 Dublin, placed spawn from England in a ditch ni the Uni- 

 versity Park, whence the species is supposed to have spread 



all over Ireland. . 



But Thompson, without comment, also quotes this passage 

 from Stuart's History of Armagh : " The first Frog that was 

 ever seen in this country made its appearance in a pasture 



'~~T^j^j^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ History- of Ireland.'' vol. iv., 1856. 



2 Camden's "Britannia," vol. vi., p. 234, Gough's edition. 



