20 THE SPRING OF THE YEAR 



to see how long a tree-toad might live, unprotected, 

 in his own natural environment. 



Upon moving into this house, about nine years 

 ago, we found a tree-toad living in the big hickory 

 by the porch. For the next three springs he reap- 

 peared, and all summer long we would find him, now 

 on the tree, now on the porch, often on the railing 

 and backed tight up against a post. Was he one or 

 many ? we asked. Then we marked him ; and for the 

 next four years we knew that he was himself alone. 

 How many more years he might have lived in the 

 hickory for us all to pet, I should like to know ; but 

 last summer, to our great sorrow, the gypsy moth 

 killers, poking in the hole, hit our little friend and 

 left him dead. 



It was very wonderful to me, the instinct for 

 home the love for home, I should like to call it 

 that this humble little creature showed. Now, a toad 

 is an amphibian to the zoologist ; an ugly gnome 

 with a jeweled eye, to the poet; but to the naturalist, 

 the lover of life for its own sake, who lives next 

 door to his toad, who feeds him a fly or a fat grub 

 now and then, who tickles him to sleep with a rose 

 leaf, who waits as thirstily as the hilltop for him 

 to call the summer rain, who knows his going to 

 sleep for the winter, his waking up for the spring 

 to such a one, I say, a tree-toad means more 

 than the jeweled eye and the strange amphibious 

 habits. 



