174 THE SMOOTH NEWT. 



1 changed the water ; and it was very curious to see them swimming about with the flakes of 

 transijareiit membrane clinging to their sides. The skin of the paws is drawn off just like a 

 glove, every finger being perfect, and even the little wrinkles in the palms being marked. 

 These gloves look very pretty as they float in the water, but if removed tiiey coUajase into a 

 shapeless lump. 



The food of the Newt consists of worms, insects, and even the young of aquatic reptiles. 

 1 have seen a large male Crested Newt make a savage thxrt at a younger individual of the same 

 species, but it did not succeed in eating the intended victim. 



This creature is very tenacious of life, and the muscular irritability of the body seems to 

 endure for a long time after the creature is dead. One of these animals, that had been deail 

 for some time, whose heart and lungs had been removed, and whose limbs had been pinned 

 out ready for dissection, was so retentive of this singular irritability, that when the tail was 

 touched with the point of a scalpel, the body and limbs writhed so actively as to free the 

 limbs from their attachments. On rei)eating the exiieriment, it was found that this suscepti- 

 bility gradually departed, lingering longest towards the body. The eel possesses an even 

 greater degree of this muscular irritability, as is well known by all \\\\o have made an eel-pie 

 or seen it prejjared. The tail of the blind-worm, too, which has already been described, is 

 equally irritable when separated fi'om the body. 



The color of the Crested Newt is blackish or olive-brown, with darker circular spots, and 

 the under parts are rich orange-red, sprinkled with black spots. Along the sides are a number 

 of white dots, and the sides of the tail are pearly-white, becoming brighter in the spring. The 

 length of a large specimen is nearly six inches, of which the tail occupies rather more than 

 two inches and a half. 



The Straight-lipped Newt of Mr. Bell {Triton hibrunii) is only ranked as a variety of 

 this species. In this variety the upper lip does not overhang the lower, and the skin is more 

 tubercular than in the ordinary examples. 



The MaPvBled Newt {Triton marmordtus) is a continental species, and is found plenti- 

 fully in the southern parts of France. 



It is a much larger species than the preceding, often attaining the length of eight or nine 

 inches. It mostly lives in the water, but will leave that element voluntarily when the weather 

 is stormy, or even if the hot sunbeams are too powerful to please its constitution. A rather 

 powerful and not very pleasant odor is exhaled from this creature. During the winter it 

 leaves the water, seeks for some liole in a decaying tree, and there remains imtil the following- 

 spring. The color of the Mai'bled Newt is olive-brown above, marbled with gray and 

 dotted with white on the back. The head is gray, with black dots and spots. Along the 

 centre of the back runs a streak of white and oi-ange, and the under parts are dotted with 

 white. 



The Smooth Newt is more terrestrial in its habits than the crested species, and is often 

 seen at considerable distances from water. 



By the rustics this most harmless creature is dreaded as much as the salamander 

 in France, and the tales related of its venom and spite are almost equal to those already 

 mentioned. During a residence of some years in a small village, I was told some very 

 odd stories about this Newt, and my own powers of handling these terrible creatures with- 

 out injury was evidently thought rather supernatural. Poison was the least of its crimes, 

 for it was a general opinion among the rustics in charge of the faiTii-yard that my poor 

 Newts killed a calf at one end of a farm-yard, through the mediumshii> of its motlier, 

 who san- them in a water-trough at the other end; and that one of these creatures bit a 

 man on his thumb as he was cutting grass in the church-yard, and inflicted great damage on 

 that member. 



The worst charge, however, was one wliich I heard from the same person. A woman, he 

 told irie, had gone to the brook to draw watei-, when an Eflt'ert, as he called it, jumped out of 



