ON REPTILES. 123 



which it devours in large quantities, so that it 

 should always be encouraged in gardens. In 

 winter, they congregate in multitudes, generally 

 in the mud at the bottom of the water, adhering 

 together so closely that they appear like one 

 mass. They separate on the return of spring; 

 then their cheerful croak is again heard, and 

 they recommence their active life. 



Frogs have been supposed, as far back as the 

 times of good old Izaac Walton, to have a great 

 antipathy to pikes, killing that fish whenever it 

 can. There is some truth in this. A gentle- 

 man, walking in the spring on the banks of a 

 piece of water at Wimpole, the seat of Lord 

 Hardwicke, observed a large pike swimming 

 in a very sluggish manner, near the surface 

 of the water, having two dark-coloured patches 

 on the side. A few days afterwards he saw 

 the same pike floating dead upon the surface 

 of the water, and, having drawn it to land by 

 means of a stick, he found that the two dark- 

 coloured spots were two living frogs, still at- 

 tached to the fish, and that so firmly that it 

 required some force to push them off with a 

 stick. These reptiles are so well known that 

 little more need be said of them. They are a 



