752 
THE SALAMANDER. 
greatest facility those insects upon which it feeds. Itlives upon flies, 
beetles, snails, and earth-worms. When it reposes, it rolls up its 
body in several folds like serpents ; it can remain some time in the 
w^ater without danger, and it casts a very thin pellicle of a greenish 
gray colour. Salamanders have even been kept more than six months 
in water without food ; care only was taken to change the water 
often. Every time a salamander is plunged into the water, it attempts 
to raise its nostrils above the surface of it, to seek for air, which is a 
new proof of the need that all oviparous quadrupeds have to breathe 
during the time they are not in a state of torpor. The salamander 
has apparently no ears, and in this it resembles serpents. It has 
even been said that it does not hear, and on this account it has 
got a suitable name in some provinces of France. This is very pro- 
bable, as it has never been heard to utter any cry, and silence in 
general is coupled with deafness. Having then, perhaps, one sense 
less than other animals, and being deprived of the faculty of commu- 
nicating its sensations to those of the same species, even by imper- 
fect sounds, it must be reduced to a much inferior degree of instinct ; 
it is therefore very stupid, and not bold, as has been reported ; it 
does not brave danger, for it does not seem to perceive it. What- 
ever gestures one makes to frighten it, it always advances without 
turning aside ; however, as no animal is deprived of that sensation 
necessary for its preservation, it suddenly compresses its skin when 
tormented, and spurts forth, upon those who attack it, that corrosive 
milk which is under it. If beaten, it begins to raise its tail ; afterwards 
it becomes motionless, as if stunned by a kind of paralytic stroke, for 
we must not, with some naturalists, ascribe to an animal so devoid of 
instinct, so much art and cunning, as to suppose that it can counter- 
feit death. In short, it is difficult to kill it, but when dipped in vine- 
gar, or surrounded with salt reduced to powder, it expires in convul- 
sions, as is the case with several other lizards and worms. 
The ancients, and even Pliny, have affirmed that the poison of the 
salamander is the most dangerous of all, and that it might even cause 
the destruction of whole nations. The moderns also for a long time 
believed the salamander to be very poisonous ; but they have at 
length had recourse to observation, with which they ought to have 
begun. The famous Bacon wished naturalists would endeavour to 
ascertain the truth respecting the poison of the salamander. Gesner 
proved by experiment that it did not bite, whatever means were used 
to irritate it, and Wurfbainus shewed that it might safely be touched, 
and that one might without danger drink the w'ater of those wells 
which it inhabited. 
M. de Maupertuis studied also the nature of this lizard. In making 
researches to discover what might be its pretended poison, he de- 
monstrated experimentally that fire acted upon the salamander in 
the same manner as upon all other animals. He remarked that it 
was scarcely on the fire, when it appeared to be covered with the 
drops of its milk, which, rarefied by the heat, issued through all the 
pores of the skin, but in greater quantity from the head and dugs, and 
that it immediately became hard. It is needless to say, that this 
milk is not sufficiently abundant to extinguish even the smallest 
