230 TOADS 



system. Few unprofessional persons, I fancy, would 

 care to emulate the intrepidity of the late Miss 

 Ormerod, who, desiring to verify or disprove the tradi- 

 tionary poison of amphibians, bit the back and tail of 

 a lively specimen of Triton cristatus, the gaily-coloured 

 crested newt of British horseponds. Proof was so con- 

 vincing as to have no need for further experiment. 

 The first effect was a bitter astringent feeling in the 

 mouth, with irritation of the upper part of the throat, 

 numbing of the teeth more immediately holding the 

 animal, and in about a minute from the first touch of 

 the newt, a strong flow of saliva. This was accom- 

 panied by much foam and violent spasmodic action, 

 approaching convulsions, but entirely confined to the 

 mouth itself. The experiment was immediately 

 followed by headache lasting for some hours, general 

 discomfort of the system, and half an hour after by 

 slight shivering fits. 



As a protective agent the poison of amphibians 

 operates only hi the interest of the race, not like the 

 spines of a hedgehog or the battery of electric flashes 

 in that of the individual. ' A dog/ says Mr. Gadow, 

 ' that has once been induced to bite a toad suffers so 

 severely that it will not easily repeat the experiment ' ; 

 and it may be supposed that an aversion to toads may 

 be hereditarily transmitted through generations of 

 dogs. Certainly it is difficult to account otherwise 

 than by heredity for one's own shrinking from certain 

 reptiles. Not one civilised man in a million has been 

 bitten by a snake, yet the warning hiss takes immediate 

 effect upon everybody. Whenever I meet a toad 



