Page:British Reptiles, Amphibians, and Fresh-water Fishes.djvu/53

INTRODUCTION, overlooked, and all the bad points are brought into play. Newts, or Wet Efts, as they are frequently called, are often accused (and of course wrongly) of being poisonous, and of stinging. With the welcome dawn of a new era in Nature Study we may reasonably expect to find these misleading statements gradually subsiding, but it is difficult to stamp them out when they have become so firmly rooted, and for so long a time. Personal observation and experience are the prime tests.

That fear of Newts has existed for more years than one cares to recount is proved by Shakespeare's passage in "A Midsummer Night's Dream," thus:—

They certainly would not do any wrong because they cannot! The Fairy Queen seems doomed to close association with these "dreadful creatures," for Edmund Spenser has more than a sly dig at them when he says:

"These marishes and myrie bogs In which the fearfull Ewftes do build their bowres." Needless to add. Newts need not be regarded as "fearfull," and they do not build "bowres." Spencer's use of the word "Ewftes" serves, however, a useful purpose as it shows how our modern word "Newt" has become 37