48 THE NATURAL HISTORY 



when I came to attend to his account, I thought I discerned 

 circumstances which did not a little invalidate the woman's 

 story of the manner in which she came by her skill. She 

 says of herself "that, labouring under a virulent cancer, she 

 went to some church where there was a vast crowd : on 

 going into a pew, she was accosted by a strange clergyman ; 

 who, after expressing compassion for her situation, told her 

 that if she would make such an application of living toads 

 as is mentioned she would be well." Now is it likely that 

 this unknown gentleman should express so much tender- 

 ness for this single sufferer, and not feel any for the many 

 thousands that daily languish under this terrible disorder ? 

 Would he not have made use of this invaluable nostrum 

 for his own emolument ; or, at least, by some means of 

 publication or other, have found a method of making it 

 public for the good of mankind ? In short, this woman 

 (as it appears to me) having set up for a cancer-doctress, 

 finds it expedient to amuse the country with this dark and 

 mysterious relation. 



The water-eft has not, that I can discern, the least 

 appearance of any gills ; for want of which it is continually 

 rising to the surface of the water to take in fresh air. I 

 opened a big-bellied one indeed, and found it full of spawn. 

 Not that this circumstance at all invalidates the assertion 

 that they are larvae : for the larvae of insects are full of 

 eggs, which they exclude the instant they enter their last 

 state. The water-eft is continually climbing over the brims 

 of the vessel, within which we keep it in water, and wander- 

 ing away : and people every summer see numbers crawling 

 out of the pools where they are hatched, up the dry banks. 

 There are varieties of them, differing in colour ; and some 

 have fins up their tail and back, and some have not. 



