31G Rev. Dr. Bucklaiid f»i the Vitafiti/ oj' 



unnatural, so that they were in an unhealthy and somewhat meagre state 

 at the time of their imprisonment. We can therefore scarcely argue 

 with certainty from the death of all these individuals within two years, as 

 to the duration of life wh'ch might have been maintained had they retired 

 spontaneously and fallen into the torpor of their natural hybernization 

 in good bodily condition. 



The results of our experiments amount to this ; all the Toads both 

 large and small inclosed in sandstone, and the small Toads in the lime- 

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

 of the second year, all the large ones also were dead ; these were examined 

 several times during the second year through the glass covers of the cells, 

 but without removing them to admit air ; they appeared always awake 

 with their eyes open, and never in a state of torpor, their meagreness 

 increasing at each interval in which they were examined until at length 

 they were found dead ; those two also which had gained an accession 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. 



At the same time that tliese Toads were enclosed in stone, four other 

 Toads of middling size were enclosed in three holes cut for this purpose 

 on the North side of the trunk of an apple tree ; two being placed in the 

 largest cell, and each of the others in a single cell ; the cells were nearly 

 circular, about five inches deep and three inches in diameter; they were 

 carefully closed up with a plug of wood so as to exclude access of insects, 

 and apparently were air-tight; when examined at the end of a year, 

 every one of the Toads was dead and their bodies were decayed. 



From the fatal result of the experiments made in the small cells cut in 

 the apple tree, and the block of compact sandstone, it seems to follow 

 that Toads cannot live a year excluded totally from atmospheric air, and 

 from the experiments in the larger cells within the block of oolitic lime- 

 stone, it seems also probable that they cannot survive two years entirely 

 excluded from food ; we may therefore conclude that there is a want of 

 sufficiently minute and accurate observation in those so frequently recorded 

 cases, where Toads are said to be found alive within blocks of stone and 

 wood, in cavities that had no communication whatever with the external 

 air. The fact of my two Toads having increased in weight at the end of 

 a year, notwithstanding the care that was taken to enclose them perfectly 



