CLASS IV. BATRACHIA: ORDER 2. URODELA. 



415 



brooks of New York and neighboring states : the Dusky Triton, T. nicjcr^ five to six inches 

 long ; found in wet and springy places near running streams ; liabitat as the preceding : the 

 Gray-spotted Triton, T. por'phyriticus^ seven inches long, exceedingly active, concealing itself 

 under rocks and stones in moist places ; found in the State of New York and vicinity. Tlie T. 

 bujcns is eleven inches long and found in the region of New Orleans : the T. Jeffersoni is seven 

 inches long, and found in Pennsylvania. 



Genus LISSOTRITON : Lissotriton. — To this belongs the Smooth ^kwt, L. punctatus, called 

 Eft and Evct in England. It is three and a half inches long, the skin smooth as a frog's ; it lives 

 in ponds and ditches, and is devoured in great quantities by fish of various kinds. The Pal- 

 mated Smooth Newt, Z. palmipes, resembles the preceding; both are European species. 



There are several other genera of Triton in difterent parts of the world. Their tenacity of 

 life is wonderful ; some of the species may be mutilated, and will reproduce the lost members. 





SALAMANDERS. 



The Land Salamanders, unlike the Tritons, are ovo-viviparous, though the young at first in- 

 habit the water and undergo metamorphoses till they arrive at the mature state which fits them for 

 living upon land, where they haunt cool and moist places, being not unfrequently found about 

 fallen timber or old walls. Their food principally consists of insects, worms, and small molluscous 

 animals. In the winter they retire to some hollow tree or hole in an old wall, or even in the 

 I ground, where they coil themselves up and remain in a torpid state till the sjiring again calls 

 them forth. 



Genus SALAMANDRA : Scdamandra. — This includes the Spotted Salamander, S. macu- 

 losa^ distributed over Central Europe, and Northern and Western Asia, and the subject of many 

 ancient superstitions. It is six to seven inches long, and feeds on flies, worms, snails, and beetles. 

 The body is covered with warty glands, which secrete a milky fluid of a glutinous and acrid 

 nature like that of the toad, and which, if not capable of affecting the larger and more highly- 

 organized animals, appears to be a destructive agent to some inferior species. Thus Laurenti 

 provoked two gray lizards to bite a salamander, which at first attempted to escape from them, 

 but being still persecuted, ejected some of this fluid into their mouths ; one of the lizards died 

 instantly, and the other fell into convulsions for two minutes, and then expired. Some of this 

 juice was introduced into the month of another lizard ; it became convulsed, was paralytic on 

 the whole of one side, and soon died. This power is the only foundation for the long-cherished 

 notion that the Salamander was one of the most venomous of animals. Nicander, in his Alexi- 

 pharmaca, gives an appalling picture of the symptoms produced by its bite. The Romans looked 



