SOME FACTS AND FICTIONS OF ZOOLOGY. 93 



position it was inferred that they had succumbed long before 

 the date of disinterment. The majority of the toads in the 

 limestone block were alive, and, curiously enough, one or 

 two had actually increased in weight. Thus, No. 5, which 

 at the commencement of its captivity had weighed 1185 

 grains, had increased to 1265 grains ; but the glass cover of 

 No. 5's cell was found to be cracked. Insects and air must 

 therefore, have obtained admittance and have afforded 

 nourishment to the imprisoned toad ; this supposition being 

 rendered the more likely by the discovery that in one of the 

 cells, the covers of which were also cracked and the tenant 

 of which was dead, numerous insects were found. No. 9, 

 weighing originally 988 grains, had increased during its 

 incarceration to 1116 grains; but No. i, which in the year 

 1825 had weighed 924 grains, was found in December, 

 1826, to have decreased to 698 grains; and No. n, origin- 

 ally weighing 936 grains, had likewise disagreed with the 

 imprisonment, weighing only 652 grains when examined in 

 1826. 



At the period when the blocks of stone were thus pre- 

 pared, four toads were pinned up in holes five inches deep 

 and three inches in diameter, cut in the stem of an apple 

 tree ; the holes being firmly plugged with tightly fitting 

 wooden plugs. These four toads were found to be dead 

 when examined along with the others in 1826 ; and of four 

 others enclosed in basins made of plaster of Paris, and which 

 were also buried in Dr. Buckland's garden, two were found 

 to be dead at the end of a year, their comrades being alive, 

 but looking starved and meagre. The toads which were 

 found alive in the limestone block in December, 1826, were 

 again immured and buried, but were found to be dead, 

 without leaving a single survivor, at the end of the second 

 year of their imprisonment. 



These experiments may fairly be said to prove two points. 

 They firstly show that under circumstances even of a favour- 

 able kind when compared with the condition popularly 

 believed in namely, that of being enclosed in a solid rock 



