Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 17.djvu/115

 Regularly, year by year, and in company with the reports of the sea serpent's reappearance, we may read of the discoveries of toads and frogs in situations and under circumstances suggestive of a singular vitality on the part of the amphibians, of more than usual credulity on the part of the hearers, or of a large share of inventive genius in the narrators of such tales. The question possesses for every one a certain degree of interest, evoked by the curious and strange features presented on the face of the tales. And it may therefore not only prove an interesting but also a useful study, if we endeavor to arrive at some just and logical conceptions of these wonderful narrations.

Instances of the discovery of toads and frogs in solid rocks need not be specially given; suffice it to say that these narratives are repeated year by year with little variation. A large block of stone or face of rock is detached from its site, and a toad or frog is seen hereafter to be hopping about in its usual lively manner. The conclusion to which the bystanders invariably come is, that the animal must have been contained within the rock, and that it was liberated by the dislodgment of the mass. Now, in many instances, cases of the appearance of toads during quarrying-operations have been found, on close examination, to present no evidence whatever that the appearance of the animals was due to the dislodgment of the stones. A frog or toad may be found hopping about among some recently formed debris, and the animal is at once seized upon and reported as having emerged from the rocks into the light of day. There is in such a case not the slightest ground for supposing any such thing; the animal may more reasonably be presumed to have hopped into the debris from its ordinary habitat. But, laying aside narratives of this kind, which lose their plausibility under a very commonplace scrutiny, there still exist cases, reported in an apparently exact and truthful manner, in which these animals have been alleged to appear from the inner crevices of rocks after the removal of large masses of the formations. We shall assume these latter tales to contain a plain, unvarnished statement of what was observed, and deal with the evidence they present on this footing.

One or two notable examples of such verified tales are related by Smellie, in his "Philosophy of Natural History." Thus, in the "Memoirs of the French Academy of Science" for 1719, a toad is described as having been found in the heart of an elm-tree; and another is stated to have been found in the heart of an old oak-tree, in 1731, near Nantz. The condition of the trees is not expressly stated, nor are we afforded any information regarding the appearance of the toads—particulars of considerable importance in view of the suggestions and explanations to be presently brought forward. Smellie himself, while inclined to be skeptical in regard to the truth or exactness of many of the tales told of the vitality of toads, yet regards the matter as affording food for reflection, since he remarks: "But I mean not to persuade, for I