104 RANAD.E. 



year, until the approach of winter warns them to betake 

 themselves to their places of hibernation. But, in the mean 

 time, thousands of them have fallen a prey to their nume- 

 rous enemies ; even in the Tadpole state they are devoured 

 in hosts by the different species of newts, and small fishes ; 

 and when adult, by pikes, and others of the larger species 

 of fish, many by the smaller carnivora, such as the weasel 

 and the polecat, and many by almost every species of 

 water-fowl, as well as by the Common Snake, of which 

 they constitute the principal food. Such is the destruction 

 which thus takes place amongst them at different periods 

 of their growth, that probably not one in a thousand that 

 had emerged from the egg in the spring, ever reaches its 

 winter retreat. 



That the Frog is susceptible of being tamed to almost 

 as great a degree as the Toad, is proved by the following 

 anecdote, for which I am indebted to my friend, Dr. Wil- 

 liam Boots, of Kingston, who informs me that he was in 

 possession for several years of a Frog in a perfect state of 

 domestication. It appears that the lower offices of his house 

 were what is commonly called underground, on the banks 

 of the Thames. That this little reptile accidentally appear- 

 ed to his servants, occasionally issuing from a hole in the 

 skirting of the kitchen, and that during the first year of his 

 sojourn, he constantly withdrew upon their approach ; but 

 from their shewing him kindness, and offering him such food 

 as they thought he could partake of, he gradually acquired 

 habits of familiarity and friendship ; and during the follow- 

 ing three years he regularly came out every day, and par- 

 ticularly at the hour of meal-time, and partook of the food 

 which the servants gave him. But one of the most remark- 

 able features in his artificial state of existence, was his 

 strong partiality for warmth, as, during the winter seasons, 



