60 ANIMALS OF NO IMPORTANCE. 



water frog, the rana esculenta that has the bad fortune to 

 be born in France, runs the further risk of being cooked 

 and eaten. Few Englishmen have been bold enough to 

 try this form of diet, but those who have done so report 

 that frogs are preferable to the most tender rabbit. In France 

 the frog-catcher goes out at dusk, armed with a lantern and 

 a long stick, at the end of which is attached a piece of red 

 cloth. The light attracts the frogs to the place where the 

 "fisherman" is standing. He then drops his cloth on to 

 the surface of the water ; and the greedy frogs bite at it, 

 their teeth become entangled, and thus they fall an easy 

 prey. 



Some eighty species of frog are known, ranging in size 

 from the great Louisiana Bellower to the diminutive tree- 

 frog. We in India, however, are chiefly interested in the 

 grass frog, who keeps us awake by his perpetual croaking. 

 This is doubtless his way of revenging himself on men for 

 all the cruelties they practice on his brethren. We must, 

 however, remember in justice to human beings that their 

 rest was disturbed by frogs long before the scientist came 

 upon the scene with his scalpel. For the classical poets 

 are continually complaining of the frog. Ovid writes : 

 " Qamvis sint sub aqua, sub aqua maledicere tentent, 



Vox quoque jam rauca est, inflataque colla tumescunt." 

 While Horace complained on his way to Brundusium : 



Mali culices, ranaeque palustres 

 Avertunt somnos." 



What would he have written after a night spent in the 

 Indian plains during the rains? It is said that in France 

 in the good old days the nobles employed the peasants 

 during the whole of the night in beating the ponds within 

 earshot of the chateaux, with boughs of trees, to prevent 

 the sleep of the lords and ladies being disturbed by their 

 batrachian neighbours. 



The frog spends the greater portion of his time in a 

 quiescent state. In England he hibernates throughout the 

 winter either in some damp hole or in the soft mud at the 



