INTRODUCTION 



in the adult state, all the seven species of amphibians 

 upon the British List visit water for the purpose of 

 spawning, and their young are at first exclusive water- 

 dwellers. When in the latter state they have gills, and 

 later breathe by means of lungs. Some kinds, however, 

 retain their gills during all their various stages, but 

 none of these occur in Britain. When Frogs and Toads 

 have become mature, and hence have developed lungs, 

 they have the habit of immersing themselves in water 

 with the head just protruding at the surface so as to take 

 in a sufficient supply of air. Even so, they can and do 

 remain well below the surface for quite a long time, and 

 if a pond is frozen in early Spring, and they are im- 

 prisoned beneath the ice, they emerge after a thaw none 

 the worse for their adventure. Newts, on the other 

 hand, are much more reconciled to an aquatic life, and 

 although our British species do not possess any gills in 

 the adult state, they appear to experience no difficulty^in 

 remaining submerged in the same position under water 

 for hours at a stretch. All the amphibians with which 

 we are concerned have four legs when in the final stage 

 of development, although Hmbless amphibians do exist, 

 but not in our own country. There are several ana- 

 tomical features of interest in Frogs, Toads, and Newts, 

 but these need not detain us as, at best, they can only be 

 described in dry-as-dust terms, and that is not the idea 

 aimed at in these popular books, but rather succinct 

 life-stories of the animals under review. Far be it for us 



to write, for example, that " the hind legs have an 



27 



