1825-1830.] 
TOADS IN STONES. 
89 
receptacles in slabs of stone for experimenting on toads. 
The house which he occupied has since been assigned as the 
residence of the Archdeacon of Oxford, and Archdeacon 
Palmer, who now resides there, has placed the stones in 
a rockery in his garden in memory of these experiments. 
“ In consequence,” Buckland writes, “ of many stories of 
toads being found alive in stones I began in 1825 a series 
of careful experiments. Twelve circular cells were pre¬ 
pared in a block of sandstone, to each of which a plate of 
glass was fitted. Toads were then placed in these cells 
and buried beneath three feet of earth, where they were 
left for over a year. Every toad shut up in sandstone 
died ; but the greater number of those in the porous 
limestone were still alive, though greatly emaciated : these 
were again shut up ; the end of the second year every toad 
had died. I also enclosed four toads in holes cut in the 
trunk of an apple-tree, and closed the holes with a plug of 
wood ; all these toads were found dead at the end of a 
year. It seems from these experiments to follow that 
toads cannot live a year totally excluded from atmo¬ 
spheric air, or two years entirely excluded from food. 
Admitting that toads are found in cavities of stone and 
wood, we may account for it by supposing that the toad 
seeks a cavity while in the tadpole state, and feeds on 
insects which, like itself, seek shelter within such cavities. 
It then becomes too large to leave the hole ; but there is 
always some small crack by which air and food can come 
in to support life. This tiny aperture is very likely to be 
overlooked by workmen, who are the only people whose 
work on stone or wood leads them to disclose cavities in 
these substances. No examination is made until the toad 
is discovered by breaking the mass in which it was con¬ 
tained, and then it is too late to ascertain, without carefully 
replacing every fragment (and in no case that I have seen 
reported has this been done), whether or not there was 
any crevice or hole by which the animal may have entered 
the cavity.” 
