TENTH ANNUAL REPORT. 157 



are at once apparent, and death speedily follows. The symptoms 

 are similar to those described as due to the use of digitalis, and 

 appear to afifect both the heart and the nerve centres. 



All of the true toads are supplied with these venom-secreting 

 glands. Our Common Toad {Bufo Jentiginostis americanns) is a 

 good example. A dog rash enough to seize a toad courts imme- 

 diate trouble. It soon foams at the mouth, and from the champ- 

 ing of its jaws it is very liable to excite suspicions of that dread 

 disease, hydrophobia. The writer once saved the life of an 

 alleged " mad dog " that was pursued through a village street. 

 His opinion, in judging the animal to be the victim of a toad, was 

 based upon an accidental observation of the same dog but a few 

 minutes before, when it was quietly nosing about a stone pile. 

 The dog was confined, and for fully an hour seemed to be in much 

 distress. Its jaws seemed paralyzed. Later on it fully recovered 

 its normal condition, and was no longer a " mad dog," fit only for 

 speedy destruction. 



In the Park collection are several Spade-Foot Toads {Sea phi- 

 opus holbrooki) from southern New Jersey. In external structure 

 they differ from the common toad by their smoother skin and 

 less prominent glands behind the eye. The pupil is vertical (cat- 

 like) instead of horizontal, as in the common batrachian. These 

 animals are persistent burrowers, and embed themselves to the 

 full depth of the gravel in their cage. They receive their popu- 

 lar name from a spade-like process on each hind foot; but the 

 writer has noted a similar process, and considerably more devel- 

 oped, on many examples of the common toad, which are quite as 

 expert in burrowing as the " Spade-Foot," though less inclined to 

 do so. 



