SOME FACTS AND FICTIONS OF ZOOLOGY. 87 



arrive at some just and logical conceptions of these wonder- 

 fall narrations. 



Instances of the discovery of toads and frogs in solid 

 rocks need not be specially given ; suffice it to say, that 

 these narratives are repeated year by year with little variation. 

 A large block of stone or face of rock is detached from its 

 site, and a toad or frog is seen hereafter to be hopping about 

 in its usual lively manner. The conclusion to which the 

 bystanders invariably come is that the animal must have 

 been contained within the rock, and that it was liberated by 

 the dislodgment of the mass. Now, in many instances, cases 

 of the appearance of toads during quarrying operations have 

 been found, on close examination, to present no evidence 

 whatever that the appearance of the animals was due to the 

 dislodgment of the stones. A frog or toad may be found 

 hopping about amongst some recently formed debris, and the 

 animal is at once seized upon and reported as having 

 emerged from the rocks into the light of day. There is in 

 such a case not the slightest ground for supposing any such 

 thing ; and the animal may more reasonably be presumed to 

 have simply hopped into the debris from its ordinary habitat. 

 But laying aside narratives of this kind, which lose their 

 plausibility under a very commonplace scrutiny, there still 

 exist cases, reported in an apparently exact and truthful 

 manner, in which these animals have been alleged to appear 

 from the inner crevices of rocks after the removal of large 

 masses of the formations. We shall assume these latter tales 

 to contain a plain, unvarnished statement of what was ob- 

 served, and deal with the evidence they present on this footing. 



One or two notable examples of such verified tales are 

 related by Smellie, in his " Philosophy of Natural History." 

 Thus, in the " Memoirs of the French Academy of Sciences" 

 for 1719, a toad is described as having been found in the 

 heart of an elm tree ; and another is stated to have been 

 found in the heart of an old oak tree, in 1731, near Nantz. 

 The condition of the trees is not expressly stated, nor are we 

 afforded any information regarding the appearance of the 



