the Midwife Toad. 177 



arrival (April 21). On many occasions Kanimerer has 

 appealed to the higlily perfected installation of histerrarium * 

 to account for the marvellous way in which breeding experi- 

 ments succeed under his care, and I am quite ready to concede 

 hiin this point to some extent ; but he surely cannot make 

 such a claim in this case. Knowing by experience how 

 Alytes behaves under the circumstances, I cannot imagine 

 this shy and highly impressionable batracliian, which, in 

 common with many others, is able to withhold parturition, 

 setting down to breed with such promptitude after a long 

 journey. Considering the protracted breeding-season of 

 the species (usually from April to August, each female ovi- 

 positing two or three times), how can as many females as 

 there were males have been ready to lay almost at tiie same 

 time? 



De I'Isle was, as I have said before, tlie first to give a full 

 and true account of the breeding operations in Brittany, 

 which, having been so fortunate as to witness several times 

 myself in Belgium, I have verified in all essential points, 

 whilst I cannot conlirm Ilarlniann's and Kammerer's state- 

 ments. Is it possible to think that specimens from West- 

 phalia and Switzerland should behave in a manner so 

 different? The Zoological Society received some years ago 

 a number of Westphalian Alytes purchased from the same 

 Dr. Hartmann. Contrary to what happened when sent to 

 Kammerer, they did not breed with us; but I saw them 

 at the time, and they did not strike me as in any way different 

 from the French and Belgian. Yet Kammerer's account of 

 the manner in which the eggs are laid differs entirely from 

 what de I'Isle has witnessed twenty-three times. Heron lioyer 

 once, and I seven times. Nowhere can I find a circum- 

 stantiated note of Kammerer's observations on the breeding, 

 or how many times he has seen it, or on how many occasions 

 he has spent part of the night at the Versuchsanstalt — the 

 latter a subject worth enquiring into, considering that 

 Kammerer tells us himself t that he does not reside at the 

 Versuchsanstalt, but at Hiitteldorf, two miles from Vienna^ 

 whilst the extent of his multifarious experiments on 

 salamanders, Froteiis, Alijtes, Hijla, &c., would, it seems to 

 me, have required his almost constant watch, especially after 



* In using the term in tlie singular, I do not mean to convey the idea 

 that Kammerer keeps all bis batracbians in a single case, any more than 

 ■when speaking of an aquarium 1 have iu mind a single tank. 



t Arch. Entwicklmech. xxxvi, 1913, p, 168, 



