386 DAN BEARD'S ANIMAL BOOK 



ing little creature and very common in the moun- 

 tains of Pike County. 



After a rain one may pick up hundreds of them 

 on any mountain trail, path or wood road, and 

 from the time little Barbara was able to creep she 

 has taken great delight in gathering red Billies, 

 and each year we bring home a lot with us to the 

 city, where they live on some damp sphagnum 

 moss in a fish globe in apparent contentment all 

 winter. Down in the lake among the lily pads 

 there is a 



WATER "BILLY," 



in other words an aquatic vermilion-spotted newt. 

 Surrounding these two newts and their life history 

 there is a great mystery. It is claimed by 

 Professor Simon Henry Gage of Cornell Uni- 

 versity who has written an exceedingly interesting 

 paper on the subject, that the vermilion-spotted 

 newt deposits its eggs upon water plants and stones 

 in the water. The eggs are sticky and adhere to 

 the plants and stones until they are hatched. The 

 young live in the water for a while and then leave 

 it and take to the land. When they take to the 

 land they are known as the vermilion-spotted 

 newts, and by the country people as the 



LITTLE RED "LIZARDS." 



I have kept the vermilion-spotted newts all winter 

 and they did change their color and assume the 

 yellowish brown of the aquatic specimens, but I 



