No. 405. DEVELOPMENT AMONG ANURA. OI 
7 
The hind legs develop before the fore legs and in late stages 
the feet are webbed. The tail is weak and small, and in the 
youngest embryos lies along the middle line of the egg-sphere. 
The oldest tadpoles had lost the tail, but at a period before its 
absorption both fore and hind legs were present and free. 
The adults of Hy/a gældii have been found in Rio de Janeiro 
in water, contained in the central cup of certain Bromeliacee, 
and also on dry bamboo near Bromelia. The dorsal skin of 
the female is slightly raised around the edge of the back, form- 
ing a shallow cup, where the eggs are carried. In one case 
the dorsal vessel contained twenty-six pale eggs. Judging 
from the figures, the embryos, in external appearance, resemble . 
to a remarkable degree those of Hylodes martinicensis. They 
are unpigmented and are bent around a large yolk-mass, 4 mm. 
in diameter. The head, which is large and flat, and the eyes 
may be seen through the egg-membrane. No traces of gills 
were discovered. The accounts vary as to the condition of 
the embryo when hatched. According to Goeldi (95), frogs 
that hatched in confinement possessed both pairs of legs 
and small tails; the young jumped about actively and pre- 
ferred not to stay in water. No details are recorded, but 
it is implied that the development is abridged and direct. 
Werner (98) affirms that the tadpoles are ready to swim when 
hatched, and that the mother finds water to deposit them in. 
According to Fritz Müller's description in a letter to Darwin, 
the tadpole which he observed did not possess fore legs until 
two weeks after hatching; he saw no external branchiz or 
opening that might lead to internal branchiz. 
: Another mode of carrying eggs by the female frog is seen 
in the case of Rhacophorus reticulatus (Polypedates reticu- 
latus). A single specimen, which was captured at a high ele- 
vation in Ceylon, carried twenty-one ova adhering firmly to the 
abdomen, _It is uncertain whether the frog was caught in water 
?r on land, and nothing has been noted as to the development. 
An interesting adaptation in a dry climate is recorded of 
à Species of Spea (hammondii ?) in western North America. 
The eggs are deposited in rain pools, which collect in the dry 
atroyas and in the low lands. The tadpoles acquire their legs 
