

TOAD.] NATURAL HISTORY. 309 



for they eat so much every day as they can grip in their 

 fore-foot, as it were sizing themselves, lest the whole earth 

 should not serve them, till the spring. They also love to 

 eat sage, and yet the root of sage is to them deadly 

 poison. They destroy bees, without all danger to them- 

 selves, for they will creep to the holes of their hives, and 

 there blow in upon the bees, by which breath they draw 

 them out of the hive and so destroy them as they come 

 out. About their generation, there are many worthy ob- 

 servations in nature ; sometimes they are bred out of the 

 putrefaction and corruption of the earth ; it hath also been 

 seen, that, out of the ashes of a Toad burnt, not only one, 

 but many Toads, have been regenerated the year following. 

 In the New World there is a province called Darien, the 

 air whereof is wonderful unwholesome, because all the 

 country standeth upon rotten marshes. It is there observed, 

 that when the slaves, or servants water the pavements of 

 the doors, from the drops of water which fall on the right 

 hand are instantly many Toads engendered, as in other 

 places such drops of water are turned into gnats. It hath 

 also been seen that women conceiving with child have like- 

 wise conceived at the same time a frog, or a Toad, or a 

 lizard. And for this cause, women, at such time as their 

 child beginneth to quicken in their womb, do drink the 

 juice of parsley and leeks, to kill such conceptions if any 

 be. But in men's stomachs there are found frogs and 

 Toads. This evil happeneth unto such men as drink water. 

 And Toads are bred in the bodies of men, and yet after- 

 wards these Toads do kill the bodies they are bred in ; for 

 the venom is so tempered, that at last it worketh when it 

 is come to ripeness. For the casting out of such a Toad 

 bred in the body, they take a serpent and [disem]bowel 

 him ; then they cut off the head and the tail ; the residue 

 of the body they likewise part into small pieces, which they 

 seethe in water and take off the fat which swimmeth at 

 the top, which the sick person drinketh, until by vomiting 

 he avoid all the Toads in his stomach. Toads sometimes 

 in anger lift up themselves, for great is their wrath, 

 obstinacy, and desire to be revenged upon their adversaries, 

 especially the red Toad ; for if she take hold of any thing 

 in her mouth, she will never let it go till she die, and 

 many times she sendeth forth poison out of her buttocks 



