1886.] Notes on the Life-history of the Common Newt. 23 
year on land barely two inches, tail included. The atrophy of- 
the branchiz begins at the extremities and goes on very gradually 
till the fimbriz are absorbed, when the rest roll up and leave two 
rounded tubercles that I have still found in specimens taken in 
December just before hibernation.’ As the gills are absorbed the 
form of the head changes. During their growth it widens con- 
siderably in front of them, but on absorption the neck becomes 
narrow, and between the eyes it is broader. The fin, round back 
and tail vanishes at the same time. , 
Both sexes leave the water after the mating is over for a time, 
and hide, without feeding, under stones and tussocks. The young 
of the second year sometimes leave the water for months to- 
gether and secrete themselves in damp places. When droughts 
occur and the ponds dry up I have often dug them out, all hud- 
dled together, more than a foot below the surface, and where the 
clayey-ground has become so parched that they are unable to 
burrow they are often seen several together, dead and dried up. 
This season, 1884, an exceptionally mild one, I took, ona bright 
warm day early in December, quite a number of large viridescens, 
both male and female, very active although there was a thin coat- 
ing of ice on the pond. The former had the legs already barred 
and the tails finned, while the latter were large and fat. I dis- 
sected a female and found her full of good-sized ova. 
Diemyctylus mineatus (Raf.) Cope (Eastern water newt).—This 
little animal, formerly supposed to be distinct from the last de- 
scribed, and mentioned in the latest bulletin of the Smithsonian 
Institution, is now generally acknowledged to be only a color 
variety of the D. viridescens. Dr. Hallowell was the first to 
express his belief that the so-called distinct species were the 
same. Professor Cope’ says, “the nominal D. miniatus is a state 
of D. viridescens,” and that he has had it change to the latter in 
confinement. 
Mr. Howard A. Kelly, in an article in the Am. NATURALIST, 
states, “he brought home a number of D. miniatus (Raf.) or little 
red lizard or red eft, and after keeping them in a dark box filled 
l These animals do not, I believe, really hibernate in the usual acceptation of “a8 : 
term, thats, they do not often become dormant. In January and February, w 
the ponds are frozen over, they resort to the deep holes, where they remain Lada 
together, if not disturbed, till the genial sunshine again calls them forth to activity. 
; ? Professor Cope has studied the Urodela perhaps as much and as carefully as any 
one in this cquntry, and is therefore an undoubted authority on the subject,” —- 
