20 REPTILES AND BIRDS. 
inharmonic consonants, brekekexkoax, coax! It is principally during 
rain, or in the evenings and mornings of hot days, that frogs are to 
be heard. Under the feudal system, during the “ good old times” 
of the Middle Ages, the country seats of many of the nobility and 
country squires were surrounded by ditches half full of water, and, 
as might be expected, inhabited by a population of frogs. Vassals 
and villeins were ordered to beat the water in these ditches morning 
and evening in order to keep the frogs from croaking and disturbing 
the sleep of the lords and masters of the houses. Independent of 
the resounding and prolonged cries of which we have spoken, at 
certain times the male frog calls the female in a dull voice, so plain- 
tive that the Romans described it by the words “ ololo,” or “ ololygo.” 
“Truly,” says Lacépede, “ the accent of love is always mingled with 
some sweetness.” 
When autumn arrives Frogs lose their voracity, and cease to eat. 
To protect themselves from the cold, when the season has advanced, 
they bury themselves deeply in the mud, troops of them joining 
together in the same place. Thus hidden, they pass the winter in a 
state of torpor. This state gives way early in spring. During the 
month of March they begin to awake and move about ; soon after, 
their breeding season commences. Their race is so prolific, that a 
female can produce from 600 to 1,200 eggs annually. These eggs 
are globular, and are in form spheroid, glutinous and transparent, 
in the centre of which is a little blackish globule; the eggs float on 
the surface of the water, and at a distance look like froth or air 
bubbles. 
All who have observed the small ponds and ditches in the 
country at this season, will have seen these light glutinous formations 
swimming on the surface of the water. After a few days, more or 
less according to the temperature, the little black spot, which is the 
embryo of the egg, and which has developed itself in the interior of 
the glairy mass which envelops it, disengages itself and shoots forth 
into the water—this is the tadpole in its earliest stage. 
The body of the tadpole at birth is oval in shape, destitute of legs, 
and terminates in a long flat tail, which forms a true fin; on each 
_ side of the neck are two large gills, in shape like a plume of feathers ; 
these gills soon begin to wither, without aquatic respiration ceasing, 
for, besides these, the tadpole possesses interior gills like those of 
a fish. Soon after, the legs begin to show themselves, the hind legs 
appearing first ; which acquire a considerable length before the fore 
feet show themselves. ‘These are developed under the skin, which 
they pierce through. When the legs have appeared, the tail begins 
