154 NATURAL AND CIVL 



the place from whence these frogs wert taken, 

 v.'as once the bottom of a channel or lake, form- 

 ed by the waters of Onion river. In digging 

 the same well, at the depth of forty one feet and 

 an half from the surface, the workmen found 

 the body of a tree eighteen or twenty inches in 

 diameter ; partly rotten, but the biggest part 

 sound. The probability is, that both the tree, 

 and the frogs were once at the bottom of the 

 channel of a river, or lake ; that the waters of 

 Onion river, constantly bringing down large 

 quantities of earth, gradually raised the bottom : 

 that by the constant increase of earth and water, 

 th.Q water was forced over its bounds, and form- 

 ed for itself a new channel or passage, in its de- 

 scent into Lake Champlain. How vigorous and 

 permanent must the principle of life be, in this 

 animal ! Frogs placed in a situation, in which 

 they are perpetually supplied with moisture, 

 and all waste and perspiration from the body 

 prevented, preserve the powers of life from age 

 to age ! Centuries may have passed since they 

 began to live, in such a situation ; and had that 

 situation continued, nothing appears, but that 

 they would have lived for many centuries yet 

 to come !* 



SERPENTS. 



Tlie Rattle Snake. Crotalus horridus. 

 Black Snake. Coluber cojistrictor. 

 Green Snake. Coluber saurita. 

 Striped Snake. Angiits oryx. 

 Water Adder. Coluber faseiatus, 



* ^Appendix No, III. 



