New Species of Batracian Reptiles. a5 
length of the tail wera inches eight tenths; gencral colour dark 
slate-green; abdomen white or cllow, s sometimes mixed: 
beneath the throat noulede tail elongated, compressed, fur- 
nished with a membranous fringé on the _— rand lower 
orders. 
The extremities, or legs, which are shout ct pt ob are 
not merely hid beneath the skin, as was asserted by 
ut exist as mere rudiments, and grow out like the stem ‘of a a 
tree. 
It has not yet been accurately ascertained how long a time 
it requires for these larve to complete their metamorphose, 
or how-frequently during the year the frogs produce their 
spawn: we know that some ofthe young of these animals 
pass the winter ina larva state. on @ commencement 
na ord 
A stenilas henomenon has been observed: in the whe sco- 
vedasma. Vide Dict. des Sc. Med., Art. Germ. p. 259. 
It was by inquiries directed to this stage of the animal’s ex- 
istence, that Spallanzani, een Swammerdam, was ena to 
detect one of the most curious facts which physiology has 
gained from natural hiatostps The egg of a frog plunged into 
water, swells, and, becoming transparent, permits us to see a 
blackish body, wh hich the microscope proves to be a tadpole.” 
And Spallanzani convinced himself of the existence of tadpoles 
in the eggs laid by a female which had been entirely excluded 
canst period varies under various circumstances, as the degree of 
eat, &c. to which the spawn is exposed. Shaw, in Zool. Gen., mentions 
es month. or five weeks. 
