342 Wild Life in a Southern County. 
cottage folk will still tell you that the hundreds and 
hundreds of tiny frogs which may sometimes be seen 
quite covering the ground fall from the sky, notwith- 
standing the fact that they do not appear during the 
rain, but a short time afterwards. And there are 
certain places where such crowds of these creatures. 
may be oftener found than elsewhere. I knew one 
such place; it was a gateway where the clayey soil 
for some way round the approach had been trampled 
firm by the horses and cattle. This gateway was 
close to a slowly running brook, so slow as to be all 
but stagnant. Here I have seen legions of them 
on several occasions, all crowding on the ground 
worn bare of grass, as if they preferred that to the 
herbage. 
Newts seem to prefer stagnant or nearly stagnant 
ponds, and are rarely seen inrunning water. Claypits 
from whence clay has been dug for brickmaking, and 
which are now full of water, are often frequented 
by them, as also by frogs in almost innumerable 
numbers in spring, when their croaking can be heard 
fifty yards away when it is still. 
Labourers say that sometimes in grubbing out the 
butt of an old tree—previously sawn down—they 
have found a toad in a cavity of the solid wood, and 
look upon it as a great wonder. But such old trees. 
are often-hollow at the bottom, and the hollows com- 
municate with the ditch, so that the toad probably 
had no difficulty of access. The belief in the venom 
