174 INDOOE STUDIES 



old grandson, upon her back. It is apparently a 

 copartnership between a dwarf and a giant. When 

 the female is disturbed, she plunges to the bottom 

 of the pool, and buries herself in the mud, carrying 

 the clinging male with her, as if he was a very 

 slight appendage indeed. The chain of eggs that 

 trails behind, and that may be many yards in length, 

 looks like a knitted black yarn in a cord of transpar- 

 ent jelly. White says of the British frogs, that as 

 soon as they have passed out of the tadpole state 

 they take to the land, and that at times the lanes, 

 paths, and fields swarm with myriads of them on 

 their travels. A similar phenomenon may be wit- 

 nessed in this country, except that the tiny trav- 

 elers are toads, and not frogs, and they are not 

 migrating, but are out only when it rains, and then 

 to wet their jackets. I have never seen them 

 except along the highway upon gravelly hills in 

 early summer. They are then scarcely as large as 

 bumblebees. 



White repeatedly speaks of the house swallow, 

 which corresponds to our barn swallow, as a fine 

 songster. In soft, sunny weather, he says, it sings 

 both perching and flying. If this is so, it is a 

 point in favor of the British bird. Our swallow is 

 not a songster; and yet the epithet which Virgil 

 applies to the swallow — garrula — fits our bird. 

 It twitters and squeaks and calls; but is that sing- 

 ing? Our clifi' swallow does the same; and yet 

 White says the English martin, or martlet, which 

 is like our bird, is not a songster, though it twitters 



