CHAPTEE VIJ. 



FROGS, TOADS, NEWTS, AND OTHER AMPHIBIANS. 



(Class Amphibia.) 



S distinguished from the Class Beptilia, which contains 

 the turtles, tortoises, snakes, lizards, crocodiles, etc., 

 the Class Amphibia is made to contain such groups of 

 amphibious animals as those arrayed under the Uro- 

 dcla (Siren, Proteus, Menobranchus, Amphiuma, Menopoma, and 

 Cryptobranchus) , the Anura (as frogs, toads, hylas, etc.), the 

 Peromela (Ccecilia, etc.), and the Labyrinthodonta (fossil forms). 



In the fauna of the United States we have many of this Class 

 of the Vertebrata represented, as for example we have among the 

 Urodela, the Siren (Siren lacertina), the Proteus (Necturus), the 

 Congo snake (Amphiuma means), the Three-fingered siren (Mu- 

 rwnopsis tridactylus), the Hellbender (Menopoma), a great many 

 salamanders (Amblystoma), a hosted tritons and their allies 

 (Plethrjdon, etc., etc.); while among the Anura we have all the 

 frogs (Rana, etc.), the toads (Bufo, etc.), and the Tree frogs 

 (Hi/la, etc.). 



During the last fifteen years many of these forms have been 

 treated by me in a variety of publications, but it is evident that 

 in a brief chapter like the present one it will be quite out of the 

 question to do more than to briefly refer to some of the better 

 known United States Amphibia, and thus incite the reader to 

 carry his investigations further, and consult other volumes upon 

 their life-histories. As I have said in another chapter, we stand 

 very much in need of exhaustive and recent treatises upon both 

 the Beptilia of this country, as well as the Amphibia. Nearly or 

 quite all of our systematic works upon these subjects are now 

 antiquated. Professor Cope, at his death, left the manuscripts 

 for a fine volume treating of them, and I presume, sooner or 

 later, it will be published by the United States National Mu- 

 seum, but just how much of the ground it will cover I am at this 

 writing unable to state. 



A good many years ago I had the opportunity to study a very 

 good representative of one branch of the Urodela group, at New 

 Orleans, Louisiana. It was the Three-toed siren, there called, in 



