COMMON SMOOTH-NEWT. 149 
erack in the cuticle from the legs and feet, but it had 
slipped off the limbs exactly as a glove would if pulled by 
the extremities of the fingers, and was not inverted ; in this 
respect resembling the slough from the tail of the snake 
and slow-worm,—the tail in them being said to slip out of 
its covering ‘like a sword out of its scabbard.’ 
“The little sheaths of the legs, feet, and toes, were 
very beautiful, they were almost transparent, excepting 
the points corresponding to the black markings of the 
skin; here they were blackish, and their integrity was 
so complete that when removed from the basin the 
water did not run through them, but distended them lke 
tiny gloves. 
“Tt is singular that the colour of the newt should 
have been so much altered by merely removing an almost 
colourless cuticle, but I think that this most probably 
arose from the partial washing off of the soft refe mucosum 
on the removal of the harder cuticle; for certain it is, 
that the colour of the newt, as I saw it, after it had thrown 
off the slough, added to the colour of the slough itself 
would not give the same hue as it exhibited prior to the 
change. 
“The manner of shedding the epidermis by shreds, which 
I have repeatedly seen during the spring and summer, 
never appears to affect for any length of time the 
colour and general aspect of the newt, simply making the 
part from which it has come rather lighter for a few 
hours ; and pieces of epidermis may be seen to peel off the 
dorsal crest without in any degree altering its form. May 
not this partial casting off of the cuticle—this desquama- 
tion—during the summer be connected with the very 
abundant growth of epidermis which occurs at this season ? 
And may not the entire shedding of the slough with the 
