222 SECRETS OF EARTH AND SEA 



Such questions have been, and are being, considered by 

 experts on behalf of the Goverrunent. A matter of interest 

 of another kind is that in and associated with the coal 

 seams of our Coal Measures, fossilized remains of peculiar 

 fern-like trees, ferns, and other strange plants, and of very 

 pecular, extinct newt-like animals (as large as crocodiles) 

 are found in great variety. The notion that the toads 

 occasionally found embedded in the black mud of a coal- 

 yard or even in a fractured lump of coal are survivals from 

 the time — many millions of years past — when the plants 

 and animals of the Coal Measure swamps were living, is 

 a baseless fancy. The toads so found are of the kind or 

 species now living on the earth — totally different from 

 those whose bones occur in the Coal Measures, and the 

 presence of such modern toads embedded in black slime, 

 in coal-heaps in store-yards, or even in coal-scuttles, is 

 only what may be expected to occur and does occur in 

 damp quarries and other places where these familiar little 

 beasts love to hide. 



