8928 Reptiles. 
Climbing Propensity of Frogs.—In the ‘Zoologist’ for December (Zool. 8861) 
there is a communication from Mr. Jobns concerning the climbing powers of the frog. 
I have myself observed a very similar instance. In one of my fern-cases I had a 
small specimen of the common frog, which was in the habit of mounting the fronds in 
pursuit of flies, &c. He used to climb, in the manner described by Mr. Johns, up the 
middle of the upper surface of the fronds (which were often nearly vertical), placing 
the fore and hind feet alternately on-the successive pinne of the frond. The motion 
greatly resembled that of a sailor ascending the rigging, only that the movements 
were of course performed slowly and leisurely, lest the fly should be disturbed. He 
would proceed in this manner until be arrived within a little distance of the insect, 
when he would make a spring, seldom missing his prey, though sometimes rolling 
over to the bottom with it. Should it happen to move to an adjoining fern before he 
was near enough to spring, he would follow it, climbing from one fern to the other in 
the most deliberate manner. He spent his time almost exclusively on the ferns, 
when he was of a beautiful bright yellow colour; but when he was on the soil his 
colour was a dull brown. Unfortunately my little pet, after above twelvemonths’ con- 
finement, succumbed during the early part of the autumn.—Charles Adcock, jun. ; 
Stafford Street, Birmingham, December 4, 1863. 
Capture of Coronella levis in Dorsetshire—It was in Dorsetshire last spring that 
I captured the new British snake. I well remember the day, and will endeavour to 
reproduce a portion of it for your entertainment. We are out to sun ourselves and 
taste the sweet pure air in the vicinity of Warebam. We saunter pass the tall elms 
that shelter the farmer’s rick-yard, and behold the miscreant rats dangling overhead sus- 
pended by their tails from the branches (a mode of warning rats below much affected 
in these parts): we cross the fragrant fresh meadows, where village urchins have left 
traces of their idle industry in the shape of broken daisy chains, withered cowslips and 
the scattered leaves of “ lords-and-ladies.” On the foot-path lies the mangled form of 
hapless shrew-mouse, snatched from the sheltering hedge-row by some passing cur. 
Under the trees the ground is strewn with fallen catkins and the brown glossy scales 
from bursting leaf-buds. Other forms and other sounds are all about and around us. 
The bee hums jubilant above the clover; the pretty lizard, flat and extended, pants on 
the broad hot stones, and the amorous toads sing guttural love-ditties in all the 
weed-choked ditches. We stoop to note some glittering object on the ground, when 
it speedily resolves itself into a vivacious long-bodied “Staph.,” a brassy bright 
Amara or a mimic Hister motionless and feigning death. We pass a shady pool, 
where we see the fish-like Tritons swimming in the deeper parts, the little imp-like* 
tadpvles wriggling in the weedy shallows, and in the open spaces between the leaves of 
the floating duck-weed the burnished Gyrini performing their circling, mystic, mazy 
water-dances. We cross a wild brown moor, where the timid brood of a lapwing is 
detected cowering among the “ zedge-mocks,” and we stand by the flag-fringed margin 
of the dark weir where the comfrey grows, and where the sluggish waters are green 
with arrow-heads and lily-leaves. Here stands the patient miller, rod in hand, fishing 
for roach at the mill-race, and here in the hollow trunk of an old black poplar the bats 
have chosen for themselves a citadel. And now, as we enter Holme Lane, long, green 
and fringed with trees, we note the undulating vertical flight of the green woodpecker 
(not uncommon in these parts), and observe iv profusion the golden stars of 
Ravunculus Ficaria and the purple flowers of the Lamium, and, crossing the road, 
unconscious of his fate, my Corunella levis! As I arrest his progress by a gentle 
