ACCOUCHEUR FOOD. 167 



obstetricans), from a singular habit which, the male has of as- 

 sisting the female in the exclusion of the eggs, which he after- 

 wards attaches to his own hiud-legs, and carries about with him 

 till the young Tadpoles are ready to escape, when he conveys his 

 charge to the water, where henceforward the young make their 

 way in the world just as Tadpoles that are less highly favoured 

 with parental care. Still more extraordinary is the procedure of 

 the monstrous Surinam Toad (Pipa Americana). The eggs of this 

 species are deposited by the female at the margin of the water, 

 and are then carefully collected by the male and deposited upon 

 the back of his partner in a number of singular pits or cells 

 which stud the skin. A single egg is pressed by the male 

 Toad into each of these cells, which are then closed with a 

 sort of lid. The development of the Tadpole proceeds in these 

 confined spaces in exactly the same way as with those of the 

 other Batrachia which roam at large in the water ; and when the 

 young animal has completed its changes, it comes forth at once a 

 perfect Toad. In the Salamanders, again, the early part of the 

 development of the young takes place within the body of the 

 parent. It is not a little singular, too, that in the conversion of 

 the bi-concave into cup-and-ball vertebrae, in the development of 

 the Tadpole of the Salamander, the newly-formed bone fills up 

 and extends from the front cavity, so that in the adult vertebras 

 the ball is anterior and the cup posterior, as in some of the 

 more reptile-like fishes. The Water-Newt, instead of depositing 

 its eggs in patches or masses like the Frog, or in long chains like 

 the common Toad, doubles them up singly in the leaves of 

 aquatic plants. In the young Newts, again, the development of 

 the fore-legs precedes that of the hind pair, while, as we have 

 already stated, the reverse of this takes place in the young Frog, 

 which, by the way, appears from observations communicated to 

 Mr. Patterson of Belfast, to be in the habit of literally " putting 

 its left leg foremost," the left fore-limb being perfectly developed, 

 while the other is still "nowhere." 



Mr. Bell, in his " History of British Eeptiles," brings a serious 

 charge against the Tadpole of the Frog, accusing it of no less a 

 crime than downright cannibalism ; and what is not a little odd 

 in the matter is, that the horrible propensity is said to manifest 

 itself only when the limbs first make their appearance in any of 

 the Tadpole's companions. Suspecting that this was the case, 



