AMERICAN NATURALIST. 
Vol. XXIII. MAY, 1889. 26£ 
ARBOREAL TADPOLES. 
r^N the 2oth of July, while engaged at Nikko in collecting 
entomological .specimens, I entered a small field enclosed 
by a low stone wall near the banks of the Daiya-gawa in the 
lower part of Iri-machi, not far from the famous red bridge. 
The field had evidently once been used for growing tea, but 
had lain neglected for several years, and was partly overgrown 
by weeds and tangled bushes, among which were a good many 
willows some of them already twenty or more feet in height. 
While beating this growth for beetles I observed, pendant from 
the branches of a thrifty clump of willows, several objects 
which at first reminded me of hornets' nests save that they 
were of a light reddish color. They hung over a pool of stag- 
nant water about twenty feet in diameter situated upon what 
1 took to have formerly been the site of a house. A nearer 
inspection of these objects convinced me that they were not 
infested by aculeate insects and that in attempting to get at 
them I would not run any painful risk save that of being mired 
in the stagnant pool. I observed that one of the objects seemed 
to be in an apparently decomposing condition, saturated with 
moisture, and dropping to pieces. Long filaments of slimy 
froth-like matter were hanging from it, and clinging in 
streamers from the twigs of the trees just below. I also ob- 
'Naturalist of the U. S. Eclipse Expedition to Japan, 1887. Extract from the 
|<eport of the Expedition made by Prof. D. P. Todd and presented bv Prof. Simon 
- cwcomb, at the meeting of the National Academy of Sciences, April 19, i889- 
