THE TOAD. 



387 



in the heart of an old oak, without the small- 

 est issue to its cell ; and the discoverer was of 

 opinion, from the size of the tree, that the 

 animal could not have been confined there 

 less than eighty or a hundred years, without 

 sustenance and without air. To all these we 

 can only oppose the strangeness of the facts; 

 the necessity this animal appears under of 

 receiving air; and its dying, like all other 

 animals, in the air-pump, when deprived of 

 this all-sustaining fluid. But whether these 

 !)e objections to weigh against such respect- 

 able and disinterested authority I will not 

 pretend to determine ; certain it is that if 

 kept in a damp place, the toad will live for 

 several months without any food whatsoever. * 



1 In 1777, Herissaut undertook some experiments to 

 ascertain the truth of facts of this kind, which might 

 appear fabulous. He shut up three toads in sealed boxes 

 in plaster, and they were deposited in the Academy of 

 Sciences. At the end of eighteen months one of these 

 toads was dead, but the other two were still living. 

 Nobody could doubt the authenticity of this fact, yet the 

 experiments were severely criticised, as well as the ob- 

 servations which they seemed to confirm. It was con- 

 tended that the air must have come to these animals 

 through some imperceptible hole which escaped the 

 notice of the observer. Some probability, however, was 

 piven to this circumstance by the researches of Dr 

 Edwards, published in 1817. He observed that toads, 

 shut up totally in plaster, and absolutely deprived of air, 

 lived for a great number of days, and much longer than 

 those which were forced to remain under water. This 

 certainly is one of the most extraordinary phenomena 

 which the history of reptiles can furnish. It appears an 

 exception to the necessity of air, which is regarded as 

 indispensable to the life of all animals, and seems to 

 break the chain which united them under the most in- 

 teresting relations. of existence. It appears, however, 

 that the air evidently penetrated through the plaster, as 

 Dr Edwards proved, for the toads perished as soon as the 

 plaster which enclosed them was placed under water. 

 The opponents of Herissaut were therefore justified to 

 some degree in theirTscepticism. Still the fact of ani- 

 mals existing so long under such circumstances, even 

 with a little air, is most surprising, and calculated to 

 produce very strange reflections. If these reptiles lived 

 in this manner longer than they would have done in the 

 open dry air, the reason is that they lost less by trans- 

 piration, and if they died much later than they would 

 have done in water, ft was because the air certainly had 

 some access to them. 



Professor Buckland has recently made some experi- 

 ments in order to throw light on this obscure subject. 

 Two blocks of stone were taken, one of porous oolite 

 limestone, and one of a compact silicious sandstone ; 

 twelve cells, five inches wide, and six inches deep, were 

 /ut in the sandstone, and twelve others, five inches wide, 

 and twelve inches deep, in the limestone. In November, 



1825, one live toad was placed in each of the twenty, 

 four cells, its weight being previously ascertained with 

 care. A glass plate was placed over each cell as a cover, 

 with a circular slate above to protect it ; and the two 

 Mocks of stone, with the immured toads, were buried in 

 Dr Buckland's garden under three feet of earth. They 

 were uncovered after the lapse of a year, in December, 



1826. All the toads in the small cells of compact sand- 

 stone were dead, and their bodies so much decayed as to 

 prove that they had been dead for some months. The 

 greater number of the toads in the larger cells of porous 



To this extraordinary account, which is 

 doubtful, I will add another not less so; which 

 is, that of toads sucking cancerous breasts, 

 and thus extracting the venom, and perform, 

 ing a cure. The first account we have of 



limestone were alive ; but they were all a good deal 

 emaciated, except two, which had increased in weight, 

 the one from one thousand one hundred and eighty-five 

 grains to one thousand two hundred and sixty-five, the 

 other from nine hundred and eighty-eight to one thous- 

 and one hundred and sixteen. With regard to these two, 

 Dr Buckland thinks they had both been nourished by in- 

 sects, which had got into the one cell through a crack 

 found in the glass cover, and into the other probably by 

 some small aperture in the luting, which was not carefully 

 examined. No insects were found in either cell, but an 

 assemblage of insects were found on the outside of an- 

 other glass, and a number within one of the cells whoso 

 cover was cracked, and where the animal was dead. 

 Of the emaciated toads, one had diminished in weight 

 from nine hundred and twenty-four grains to six hundred 

 and ninety-eight, and one from nine hundred and thirty- 

 six to six hundred and fifty-two. " The results of the 

 experiments," says Dr Buckland, "amount to this: 

 All the toads, both large and small, enclosed in the 

 sandstone, and the small toads inclosed in the limestone 

 also, were dead at the end of thirteen months. Before 

 the expiration of the second year, all the large ones alsc 

 were dead. These were examined several times, dur- 

 ing the second year, through the glass covers of the cells, 

 but without removing them to admit air. They ap- 

 peared always awake, with their eyes open, and never 

 in a state of torpor, their meagerness increasing at each 

 interval, until at length they were found dead. Those 

 which had gained an increase of weight at the end of the 

 first year, and were then carefully closed up again, were 

 emaciated and dead before the expiration of the second 

 year." Four toads, inclosed in cavities cut in the trunk 

 of an apple tree, and closed up by plugs so tightly as to 

 exclude insects, and "apparently air," were found dead 

 at the end of a year. 



The phenomena, then, of live toads inclosed in rocks, 

 he explains in this way. The young toad, as soon as it 

 leaves its tadpole state, and emerges from the water, 

 seeks shelter in holes and crevices of rocks and trees. 

 One may thus enter a small opening in a rock, and 

 when there find food, by catching the insects which seek 

 shelter in the same retreat ; and its increase of size 

 may prevent it from getting out again by the same open- 

 ing". It is probable that there are some small apertures 

 in all the stones in which toads are found, though they 

 escape the notice of the workmen, who have no motive 

 to induce them to make a narrow examination. In 

 other cases, there may have been an opening, which had 

 been closed up, alter the animal was immured, by 

 stalactitic incrustation. Deprived of food and air, it 

 might fall into that state of torpor, or suspended anima- 

 tion, to which certain animals are subject in winter; but 

 how long it might continue in this state is uncertain. 



The Rev. George Young, in his Geological Survey of 

 the Yorkshire Coast, second edition, 1828, mentions 

 several recent instances of living toads having been 

 found within solid blocks of sandstone. " We are the 

 more particular in recording these facts," he observes, 

 " because some modern philosophers have attempted to 

 explode such accounts as wholly fabulous." Mr Jesse 

 informs us, that he knew a gentleman who put a toad into 

 a small flower-pot, and secured it, so that no insect 

 could penetrate it, and then buried it so deep in hi? 

 garden that it was secured against the influence of frost. 

 At the end of twenty years he took it up,, and found th* 

 toad increased in bulk, and healthy. 



