Rana and Bufo. 185 
After a rainy season the Spade-foot will emerge from its 
hiding-place, attract attention by its loud cries, swarm by 
hundreds about the ponds, lay innumerable eggs, and vanish. 
But while thousands of eggs are laid, scarcely any hatch, for 
most of them perish from being laid so near to the water’s 
edge as to become dried up on the subsidence of the water. 
Thus we find that toads have three different methods of 
life. Some live on trees, but seldom appear upon the ground. 
Others are underground dwellers, and hardly ever come to 
the surface. But the Common Toad, and his numerous kin, 
are dwellers in the ground, hiding among grass and other 
herbage when asleep, or when the sun is too intense for their 
comfort. But all toads, excepting the two varieties men- 
tioned above, which carry their young on their bodies, repair 
to the water to drop their eggs, and the young live in the 
water until they have attained the adult state. 
