HASTY OBSERVATION 255 



the ground or in hollow trees, and takes to the 

 marshes in May to deposit its eggs. The common 

 bullfrog and the pickerel frog doubtless pass the 

 winter in the bed of ponds and streams. I think 

 it is quite certain that hibernating animals in the 

 ground do not freeze, though by no means beyond 

 the reach of frost. The frogs, ants, and crickets are 

 probably protected by some sort of acid which their 

 bodies secrete, though this is only a guess of my 

 own. The frog I dug out of the leaves one spring 

 day, while the ground above and below him was 

 frozen hard, was entirely free from frost, though his 

 joints were apparently very stiff. A friend of mine 

 in felling some trees in winter cut through a den 

 of field crickets; the ground was frozen about their 

 galleries, but the crickets themselves, though motion- 

 less, were free from frost. Cut the large, black tree 

 ants out of a pine log in winter, and though appar- 

 ently lifeless, they are not frozen. 



There is something in most of us that welcomes 

 a departure from the ordinary routine of natural 

 causes; we like to believe that the impossible hap- 

 pens ; we like to see the marvelous and mysterious 

 crop out of ordinary occurrences. We like to be- 

 lieve, for instance, that snakes can charm their prey ; 

 can exert some mysterious influence over bird or 

 beast at a distance of many feet, which deprives it 

 of power to escape. But there is probably little 

 truth in this popular notion. Fear often paralyzes, 

 and doubtless this is the whole secret of the power 

 of snakes and cats to charm their prey. It is what 



