'knotty entrails of the tree was found dead and decayed at the end of the first year Four toads were, at the time the others were shut up, each placed in a small basin of plaster of paris, four inches deep and five inches in diameter, having a cover of the same material luted over them: these were buried at the same time and in the same place with the blocks of stone, and on being examined at the same time with them, in December, 1826, two of the toads were dead; the other two alive, but greatly emaciated. Dr. Buckland concludes from the experiments generally, that toads cannot live a year excluded totally from atmosperic air; and from the experiments made in the larger cells in the oolite, that there is a probability that those animals cannot survive two years entirely excluded from food. (Zoological Journal,' vol. v. p. 314.) These experiments bring us to faculties more especially possessed by the Reptiles in general, and especially by the Anurous Batrachians. chord; and the nerves which are given off from these sources to the different organs of the body. So far the system is modelled upon that of mammiferous animals and birds, but the cerebellum is proportionally much less. The reptiles have also a ganglionary nervous system, or a great double sympathetic nerve. Touch.-The naked skin and its sensibility to variations of temperature would seem to indicate a considerable degree of perception, as to the physical and even chemical nature of the bodies with which it comes in contact. But touch, properly so called, can hardly exist in a high state of development in the greater part of the Anurous Batrachians. They have, indeed, no nails on their toes, which are much longer in the frogs than in the toads; and in many of the genera and species the toes are terminated by fleshy appendages, as in Pipa, which has also an elongated fleshy muzzle; the tree frogs also (Hyla), have the extremities of their toes dilated into fleshy disks, which, like the acetabula of the Sepiade, adhere by their circumference. These enable the animals to walk in all directions upon flat surfaces, and to adhere to them even when they are of the smoothest nature. The sense of touch is probably more highly developed where this organization is manifested. Taste.-Probably not at all acute. The tongue, as we have seen, is an organ for the capture of the prey, which is swallowed entire almost in the same moment that it is taken. Smell.--This sense would seem to be almost rudimentary in the Batrachians. A simple opening pierced from the end of the muzzle to the front of the palate, with a fleshy and concave membrane at its external extremity, moving in unison with the respiratory action, is strongly contrasted with the intricate and beautiful structure of the nasal organs, which are so highly developed in the carnivorous mammalia and birds. Absorption of Air and Water, Exhalation, and Transpiration. A rapid process of absorption and evaporation of fluids, by the pores of the skin, gives to the Anurous Batrachians the power of resisting heat. If a frog be plunged into water, of a temperature of 40° (centigrade), it will not, it is asserted, live more than two minutes, though the head be left out so as to enable it to respire freely; yet a frog will sustain the action of humid air heated to the same temperature, for four or five consecutive hours. A sudden transition however, from a low temperature to a high one, is generally speedily fatal to these`animals. Their proper balance of animal heat is kept up by a regulation of the evaporation of liquid absorbed, or by the transpiration of the matter, the quantity of which is augmented in proportion as the external heat is more intense; and the animal resists it as long as the moisture is not desiccated by the air. When it can no longer repair the loss of the moisture already taken up, by a fresh absorption of liquid, it perishes. The frogs, in this particular of their organization, have been compared to the vessels called Alcarazas, used for cooling water, by the transudation permitted by their porous structure. Dr Townson, who made observations to some extent upon this subject, and had two frogs, which he named Damon and Musidora, found that a frog would sometimes absorb in half an hour as much as half its own weight in water, and, in a few hours, nearly its entire weight: when the animal so filled was placed in a warm and dry situation, it gave off this fluid nearly as rapidly as it had accumulated it. He contends that the frog tribe never drink, and general observation goes to prove that the frogs, tree frogs, and salamanders do not swallow liquids, being supplied by the process before mentioned. The meagreness of some of these animals, in a state of comparative desiccation, and their apparent plumpness after they have renewed their supply of moisture, is very striking. If, when so supplied, they are suddenly surprised, they can get rid of their load instantaneously. Few who have come on a frog by surprise, in a moist meadow, have not observed that, during its first leap, it emits a quantity of liquid from its vent. Whatever this fluid may be," says Dr. Townson, "it is as pure as distilled water and equally tasteless; this I assert, as well of that of the toad, which I have often tasted, as that of frogs." This fluid is the liquid absorbed, by the skin of the abdomen principally, and for which toads and frogs are ever on the look-out. The dew on the herbage is a frequent source of this necessary supply, and in dry seasons toads will bury themselves in moist sand or earth for the purpose of sucking up through their skin any aqueous particles which may be around them. The fluid is contained in a sac, generally consisting of two lobes, situated in the lower part of the abdomen under the viscera, and is conducted to the receptacle by particular vessels, which are certainly not the ureters or urinary canals from the kidneys: these urinary canals have their exit lower down in the cloaca. Blumenbach, and even Cuvier, in his "Leçons d'Anatomie Comparée," considered this bilobated bag as the urinary blad-high and accurate development of the organs of sight, as der in the frog and toad; but Townson shows that it has no connexion with the ureter, which, as we have seen, has its posterior opening lower down in the cloaca, while these receptacles terminate in the front of that intestine. Brain, Nervous System, and Senses.-The brain and nervous system of the Anurous Batrachians are, as in the reptiles generally, composed of an encephalon consisting of a cerebrum, cerebellum, and medulla oblongata; a spinal Hearing.-There is a considerable difference in the structure of the organ of hearing among the Anurous Batrachians. The Pipas, for instance, have a sort of small valve upon the tympanum, somewhat similar to that possessed by the crocodiles, and probably intended to protect the mem brane against the pressure of the water when the animal resorts to great depths. Hyla and Rana have the ty uranum distinctly manifested by the delicacy of its structure when compared with the other integuments of the head. In the toads the tympanum is not apparent. The reader wil find a good example of the organ of hearing in a prepara tion (No. 1575), in the Museum of the College of Surgeons. It is the head of a bull-frog (Rana pipiens, Linn.), showing the free and wide external communication, or “meatus” of the organ, and the thin, semi-transparent vibratile mem brane, or drum of the ear, which is stretched across the entrance of the meatus, and is adapted to respond to the impulse of sound conveyed through air. The cavity of the tympanum is laid open on the left side from below, showing the long, slender bone (columella, or ossiculum_awiitus) which forms the medium of communication between the membrana tympani and the labyrinth or internal ear. The wide vertical passage, or Eustachian tube, by which the cavity of the tympanum communicates with the fauces, is also laid open on the left side, but is seen entire on the right. This communication preserves the equilibrium be tween the air in the cavity of the tympanum and the atmosphere without; and an equable pressure is consequently sustained by the membrana tympani under every barometrical variation. It may be observed,' continues the learned author of the Catalogue, that the extent and freedom of the Eustachian passage are in relation to the size and exp sed condition of the tympanic membrane, and perhaps also to its form, which is convex externally, and therefore the more liable to be affected by undue pressure from without, being only supported behind at a small part of its superficies.'-(Cat. Gallery Physiol. Series, vol. iii., part 1.) Sight. The precision with which a toad measures the distance of an insect, and captures it with its tongue the moment the victim is within reach of that organ, shows a applicable to short distances at least. The pupil is, in general, round, but in the Anurous Batrachians, whose halis are nocturnal (the toad, for instance) it is angular cr linear. The humours vary in their proportions in the different genera, but the crystalline humour has been noticed of greater density and of a more spherical figure in the aqua i pe cies. The orbits are generally incomplete, and sometimes protected, as in Ceratophrys, by folds of thickened cuticle. In the Anurous Batrachians there are lachrymal glands, and the tunica conjunctiva is so pierced as to permit the tears to run into the cavity of the mouth. Reproduction. The male organs of generation in the Anurous Batrachians consist of true testicles situated in the cavity of the abdomen below the kidneys, and the deferent canals terminate in the cloaca, there being no external male organ. The ovaries in the females correspond in situation with that of the testicles of the males, and are of considerable volume. Their free extremity forms a sort of trumpet-shaped opening, and the oviduct terminates in the cloaca, whence the eggs are excluded. Blumenbach describes the frogs of his country as having a large uterus divided by an internal partition into two cavities, from which two long convoluted oviducts arise, and terminate by open orifices at the sides of the heart. The ovaria, he says, lie under the liver, so that it is difficult to conceive how the eggs get into the above-mentioned openings. The uterus, he adds, opens into the cloaca. The toads, according to him, have not the large uterus; but their oviducts terminate by a common tube in the cloaca. At the season of reproduction, besides the vocal manifestations, there are others which visibly distinguish the male in many of the Anurous Batrachians. At each croak, the male green frogs project from the commissure of the mouth two globular bladders into which the air is introduced and the throat swells and becomes coloured. In the males of the red frog the thumbs of the anterior feet become considerably swollen and covered by a black and rugose skin at this period. The usual mode of union of the male and female, which generally takes place in the water, is too well known to require description; the former excites the latter to exclude the eggs, and fecundates them as they are protruded. These eggs are enveloped in a sort of delicate, mucous, permeable membrane; they are, when excluded, most frequently agglomerated either in glutinous masses or chaplets, and increase considerably after they are plunged in the water. There are however some curious modifications of the disposition of the eggs in certain species of the Anurous Batrachians. The accoucheur toad (Bufo Obstetricans of Laurenti), for instance, assists the female in excluding the chaplets of eggs, and disposes them round his thighs, something in the form of a figure of 8. He is then said to carry them about till the eyes of the embryo become visible. At the proper period for hatching, he conveys his progeny to some stagnant piece of water, and deposits them, when the eggs break and the tadpole comes forth and swims about. The male Pipa, or Surinam toad, as soon as the eggs are laid, places them on the back of the female, and fecundates them. The female (see the cuts at the end of this article) then takes to the water, and the skin of her back swells, and forms cellules, in which the eggs are hatched, and where the young pass their tadpole state, for they do not quit their domicile till after the loss of their tail and the development of their legs; at this period the mother leaves the water, and returns to dry land. Swammerdam gives the number of eggs in a female frog as 1400, and M. de Montbeillard counted 1300. In these eggs there is a greenish albumen which is not easily coagulable. The yolk or vitellus is absorbed by the embryo, and an abdominal cicatrice indicates the umbilicus in young individuals. It is not rare to meet with double germs in a single egg, but most of these prove abortive, though some give birth to monsters with two heads, six legs, and two tails, as well as to hermaphrodites. The act of copulation is of considerable duration, both in the Chelonians and Anurous Batrachians; and is recorded as being prolonged from a period of eighteen days to thirty-one and upwards before the male quits the female. There seems to be a preponderance of males over females; and to this most probably may be ascribed the frequent occurrence of frogs and toads sticking on the heads of fishes, such as carp and tench. In our climates, the early part of the spring is the season of reproduction, when the frogs and toads of both sexes quit the localities of their late hybernation and their ordinary haunts, and move instinctively to those stagnant waters which are proper for their purpose, and where they are then collected in swarms. The young Anurous Batrachian enters life under an eutirely different form from that which it is afterwards to assume; and undergoes, like the insects, a series of metamorphoses or transformations till it arrives at its perfect state. In their first stage, the voung have an elongated body, a laterally compressed tail and external branchiæ; their small mouth is furnished with horny hooks or teeth for the separation of vegetables, and they have a small tube on the lower lip by which they attach themselves to aquatic plants, &c. The external branchia next disappear, and become covered with a membrane, being placed in a sort of sac under the throat; and the animal then, as we have observed when treating of its respiration, breathes after the manner of fishes. The head, which is furnished with eyes and nostrils, is confounded with the large globular trunk distended with the great extent of the digestive canal, and it has a large tail for swimming. In this state it is called in English a tadpole, and in French têtard, from the great apparent volume of the head. Soon the posterior limbs are gradually put forth near the origin of the tail, and are developed first; the anterior feet then begin to show themselves; the tail gradually becomes less and less, shortens, shrinks, and seems at last to be absorbed; the mouth widens, and looses its horny processes or jaws; the eyes are guarded by eye-lids; the belly lengthens and diminishes in comparative size; the intestines become short; the true lungs are developed, and the internal branchiæ are obliterated; the circulation undergoes an entire change; and the animal, hitherto entirely aquatic and herbivorous, becomes carnivorous, and for the most part terrestrial. Mr. Thomas Wharton Jones (Zool. Proc., March, 1837) observes, that when the right gill of the tadpole disappears, it is not, as is usually supposed, by the closure of the fissure through which it protrudes, but by the extension of the opercular fold on the right side towards that of the left, forming but a single fissure, common to the two branchial cavities, through which the left gill still protrudes. He also remarks, that conditions analogous to those which occur during several stages of this process exist in the branchial fissures of the anguilliforin genera, Sphagebranchus, Monopterus, and Synbranchus. In the museum of the Royal College of Surgeons there are numerous instructive preparations illustrative of the reproductive function in the Anurous Batrachians; they are at present unnumbered, but their numbers will be soon attached, and their descriptions published in the fourth volume of the Physiological Series' (Gallery). In this interesting collection will be found the male organs in Rana, Bufo, and Pipa (Asterodactylus of Wagler), and the female organs in the same genera, both in the unexcited and procreative state. There is a very complete series of the metamorphic stages of Rana puradora, with dissections demonstrative of the internal branchia, the convoluted intestine, and the rudimental extremities. We would particularly draw the student's attention to a female Pipa with the cells fully developed, containing the tadpoles in different stages, and a section showing that the cells are only skin deep, and that the cutis is separated from the subjacent muscles by large lymphatic reservoirs. Another female specimen shows the cells in progress to disappearance after their function has been performed. Particular Excretions.-The alleged venom of the common toad, so long a subject of popular belief, had been rejected by many modern naturalists, among whom Cuvier may be particularly mentioned. Dr. Davy however found the venomous matter to be contained in follicles, chiefly-in the true skin and about the head and shoulders, but also distributed generally over the body and on the extremities. Pressure causes this fluid to exude or even spirt out to a considerable distance, and a sufficient quantity may be thus collected for examination. Dr. Davy found it extremely acrid when applied to the tongue, resembling the extract of aconite in this respect; and it even acts upon the hands. With a small residuum it is soluble in water and in alcohol: acetate of lead and corrosive sublimate do not affect the solutions. It remains acrid on solution in ammonia; and when dissolved in nitric acid, it imparts a purple colour to it. Combined with potash or soda, it becomes less acrid, apparently in consequence of partial decomposition. It is highly inflammable as left by evaporation of its aqueous or alcoholic solutions; and the residuum which appears to give it consistence seems to be albumen. More acrid than the poison of the most venomous serpents, it produces no ill effect when introduced into the circulation. A chicken inoculated with it was not affected. Dr. Davy conjectures that this sweltered venom' is a defence to the toad from carnivorous animals; and we have seen a dog, when urged to attack one, after some hesitation, drop the animal from its mouth in a manner that left no doubt that he had felt the effects of this excretion, which Dr. Davy thinks may be auxiliary in decarbonizing the blood. The toads are also said to possess, besides, two glandular masses (parotids), which, when pressed, exude through small holes a yellowish thick humour of a musky odour. The other odours also which many species of toads produce, it does not seem yet ascertained from what source, are very remarkable. Roesel, author of the beautiful work on Frogs, compares some of these to the smell of garlick or of volatilized sulphur of arsenic, or even ignited gunpowder; others again, he says, produce an effect on the nose like the vapour of horseradish, mustard, or the leaves of monk'shood rubbed between the fingers. In one instance only he states it to be probable that this emanation comes from the cloaca; and such seems to be the opinion of M. Duméril, who states that he has been assured that, in certain instances, the water in which some of these animals had been placed and there purposely irritated or excited, had become so acrid that the tadpoles of frogs and salamanders introduced therein hardly survived the immersion. Geographical Distribution and Habits. - Warm and temperate but moist climates are the localities most favourable to the Anurous Batrachians. Extreme cold is fatal to them, and so is extreme dry heat. They are unable to sustain violent and sudden changes of temperature. In moderately warm climates, and those where there is a considerable degree of cold during a part of the year, they bury themselves, in winter, either under the earth or in the mud at the bottom of the water, and there pass the season of hybernation without taking food or air, till the spring calls them forth; when the same frog which had passed so many months without respiration would expire in a few minutes if prevented from shutting its mouth and so supplying itself with air by deglutition. The general habits of the tribe may be collected from the different sections of this article, and from the descriptions of those forms in it which may be noticed in the course of this work. NATURAL HISTORY AND SYSTEMATIC ARRANGEMENT. Aristotle appears to have been well acquainted with such of the Anurous Batrachians as fell within the scope of his observation. He separates the marsh-frogs from the toads and tree-frogs, and gives a good account of their organization, habits, and reproduction, excepting that he seems to have been of opinion (Hist. lib. v. c. 3) that there was intromission on the part of the male. (Hist. lib. i. c. 1; lib. ii. c. 1, 15; lib. iii. c. 1, 12; lib. iv. c. 5, 9, 11; lib. vi. c. 14; b. viii. c. 2, 28, &c.) Pliny, whose Natural History is little better than a collection of ill-digested notes, and who borrowed most largely from Aristotle, treats of the Reptiles in book xi,, and describes with suflicient accuracy the tongue and voice of frogs (c. 65, 112). * Bélon, Rondelet, Salviani, and Gesner, are the first authors who claim our attention after the long dark period which began to brighten about the commencement of the sixteenth century. The latter, who devoted thirty-four folio pages to the natural history of frogs, accumulated a vast mass of facts, and deserves the praise lavished upon him by such men as Boerhaave and Tournefort. Aldrovandi followed towards the close of the same period, and, at his death, in 1605, left materials for fourteen volumes, in folio, which were afterwards published. A considerable portion of his first book on digitated oviparous quadrupeds is occupied by his history and commentaries on the frog tribe. Jonston notices them, but comprises his compiled history within the compass of two not very long articles. Our countryman Ray appears at the head of the systematic writers on the subject, and though his 'Synopsis' cannot be considered as much more than a sketch, it deserves attention as an attempt at natural classification. Linnæus, at first, made his Amphibia' consist of animals whose body was either naked or scaly, whose teeth were pointed and which had no grinders, and no radiated fins. He afterwards added the Diodon, and the greater part of the cartilaginous fishes, under the designation of Amphibia Nantes.' The first classification was the result of his own views, *Un auteur sans critique, qui, après avoir passé beaucoup de temps à faire des extraits, les a rangés dans certains chapitres, en y joignant des reflexions qui ne se rapportent pas à la science proprement dite; mais qui offrent alternativement les croyances les plus superstitieuses unies aux déclamations d'une philosophie chagrine.' (Cuvier.) and he appears to have been misled into the second by the assertions of Dr. Garden. In the last edition of the Stema Naturæ (the 12th) he places the great genus Kara between the genera Testudo and Draco, making it th second genus of his first order, Reptilia, of his third clasă, Amphibia. The Reptilia he shortly characterizes as pedati, spirantes ore,' and admits into it the genus Lacerta in addition to the genera above stated. The Amphibia Serpentes' and Amphibia Nantes' form the other two orders. Passing by Klein (1751) we come to the work published with the name of Dr. Laurenti,* which has done so much for this branch of zoology. The class Reptilia comprehends, in this book (1768), three orders only, viz. the Salientia, Gradientia, and Serpentia. The Salientia comprise the Anurous Batrachians, consisting of the following genera: the Pipas (Pipa), the Toads (Bufo), the Frogs (Rana), and the Tree-Frogs (Hyla). The author adds the genus Proteus, founded on the larva of Rana paradora. Before the appearance however of the Specimen Medicum' of Laurenti, Roesel published his magnificent work on the Frogs of his country (Nuremberg, 1758). He is justly noticed by Cuvier as one of the most ingenious ob servers and elegant designers of subjects of natural history. Scopoli (1777) varies so little in arrangement from Linnæus, though the characters are differently but not better worded, that he need not detain us from the work of Lacépède, published (1788, 1790) as a continuation of Buffon, under the title of Histoire Naturelle des Quadrupèdes Ovipares et des Serpens.' Under the second class of his oviparous quadrupeds he ranges the Frog tribe in three genera, Les Grenouilles, Les Raines, et Les Crapauls, and these genera comprise 33 species. M. Alex. Brongniart (1799, 1800, 1803) divides his class Reptiles into four orders, viz. Chelonians, Saurians, Ophidians, and Batrachians: in this fourth order he admits the genera Grenouille, Crapaud, Raine, and Sulamandre. Latreille (1801, 1825) makes the Amphibia a class, which he divides into two orders, the Caducibranchiata and Perennibranchiata. The Caducibranchiate Amphibia he subdivides into the Anurous or tailless, and the tailed (Urodeles). The first subdivision comprises the genera Pipo, Buf Rana, and Hyla. Daudin, in his 'Traité Général' (1802, 1803), adopts the method of Brongniart, and seems to have bestowed much research on the Anurous Batrachians, of which he has left an Histoire Particulière,' in one vol. 4to. with 38 plates representing 54 species. Cuvier (1798, 1817, 1829) admits the following genera among the Anurous Batrachians in his last edition of the Règne Animal:'-Rana, Ceratophrys, Dactylethra, Hy's (Calamita of Schneider and Merrem), Bufo, Bombinatiæ (Rhinella of Fitzinger, Oxyrhynchus of Spix), the OttoneS (Cuv.), Breviceps of Merrem (Engystoma of Fitzinger in part), and Pipa. M. Duméril, who states that he has made Reptiles his particular study, and who succeeded to the chair of M. Lacepède, has published much on the subject, and promises at the end of the last volume on the Reptiles' (Suites à Buffon) to present a complete table of arrangement. This work has not yet advanced to the Batrachians. Oppel, besides his two memoirs in the 19th vol of the 'Annales du Muséum de Paris,' one of which was upon the Batrachians, published in 1811 his Prodromus, in 4to. His third order of Naked Reptiles or Batrachians' is divided into the Apoda (Cecilia), the Ecaudata or Anurous Batrachians (Frogs), and the Caudata, Urodèles or Tailed Batrachians. Bufo, Pipa, Rana, and Hyla, are the genera of the Anurous Batrachians. Merrem (1790, 1820, 1821) makes his second class, the Batrachians, consist of three orders, viz.: 1, Apoda (Corridas; 2, Salientia; and 3, Gradientia. Among the Salentia which are the Anurous Batrachians, are comprised the genera Hyla or Calamita, Rane Breviceps, Bomberaz, Pipa, and Bufo. M. de Blainville (1816, 1828) divides the Reptiles into two classes, the second of which, Ichthyoid Amphibiars or Nuits four orders the Batrachians, which consist of the four dipelliferous (naked-skinned) Reptiles, has for the first of leading generic forms of Anurous Batrachians, and are There are those who attribute this leading work to Winterl, a chemat. and the companion of Laurenti's studies. + Type, Rana Margaritifera. separated into two suborders according to their habits, the first being the Aquiparous, and the second the Dorsigerous (Pipa). Mr. Gray (1825, 1831) considers the Amphibia a separate class, and, like Fitzinger (1826), divides them into those which undergo a metamorphosis and those which do not. He subdivides the Ranidae into the genera Rana, Ceratophrys, Hyla, Bufo, Rhinella, Dactylethra, Bombinator, Strombus, Breviceps, and Asterodactylus (Wagler), or the Pipas. In 1835 he introduced to the Zoological Society a toad (Bombinator Australis) from Swan River, observing that the form had not been previously met with out of Europe. The zoological divisions of MM. Carus and Ficinus appeared about the same time, and they adopt, with regard to the Reptiles, very nearly the classification of Merrem and the views of Oken, whose works were published in 1809, 1816, and 1821. Dr. Harlan, in 1825, published his account of the American Reptiles, which he divides into Batrachians, Ophidians, Saurians, and Chelonians. Several species of the Caudated Batrachians are enumerated, and they are followed by the Tailless Batrachians, as Rana, Bufo, Hyla. Mr. Haworth, in his dichotomous or binary method (1825), divides the Batrachia into Apoda and Pedata: the latter he subdivides into Salientia, as Pipa, Hyla, Bufo, Bombinator, Breviceps, Rana; and Gradientia, which he subdivides into the Mutabilia (those which undergo a metamorphosis, Salamandra for instance) and the Immutabilia (those which do not, Proteus and the Sirens). Fitzinger (1826) separates the Reptiles into the Monopnoa and Dipnoa, and the latter he subdivides into-1, the Mutabilia; 2, the Immutabilia. In the first subdivision are found the Ranoids, the Bufonoids, the Bombinatoroïds, the Pipoids, and the Salamandroids. The four first embrace the whole of the Anurous Batrachians. The Pipoids are characterized as having no tongue, an organ which exists in the three other families. In the Bombinatoroids the tympanum is hidden, whilst it is perceptible in the Bufonoids, which have no teeth, and are thus distinguished from the Ranoids, where the teeth are distinct. Ritgen (1828) divides the Anurous Batrachians or Pygomolgi into the Tree-Frogs, Bdallipodobatrachians; the Frogs, Phyllopodobatrachians; and the Toads, Diadactylobatrachians. The system of Wagler (1830) takes organization as the basis of its arrangement, and he makes the class Amphibia consist of eight orders, viz.: the Tortoises, the Crocodilians, the Lizards, the Serpents, the Orvets, the Cecilias, the Frogs, and the Ichthyodes. He then characterizes the seventh order, that of the Frogs (Rana), as having no penis, and undergoing a metamorphosis; and divides them into two families, the first consisting of those without a tongue (Aglossa), and the second of those which possess a tongue (Phaneroglossa). The first of these consists of but one genus, Asterodactylus (Pipa); the rest of the genera of the Anurous Batrachians belong to the second. Such are Xenopus (Wagler), Microps (Wagler), Calamita (Fitzinger), Hypsiboas (Wagler), Auletris (Wagler), Hyas (Wagler), Phyllomedusa (Wagler), Scinar (Wagler), Dendrobates (Wagler), Phyllodytes (Wagler), Enydrobius (Wagler), Cystignathus (Wagler), Rana (Linnæus), Pseudis (Wagler), Ceratophrys (Boïé), Megalophrys (Kuhl), Hemiphractus (Wagler), Systoma (Wagler), Chaunus (Wagler), Paludicola (Wagler), Pelobates (Wagler), Alytes (Wagler), Bombinator (Merrem), Bufo (Linnæus), Brachycephalus (Fitzinger). Müller (1832) divides the Amphibia into two great orders, the Scaly and the Nuked. The Anurous Batrachians belong of course to the latter. He thus places the characters of the two orders in opposition to each other. Eugystoma marmoratum India. Pipa monstrosa, Laurenti (Asterodactylus of Wagler), Surinam Toad, female, reduced. The upper figure shows the disposition of the cells, and their situation in the skin, which is turned back, and the muscle seen below. The small sepa rate figures are tadpoles, in different stages of development. Hyla bicolor (half nat. size). South America. FOSSIL FROGS. Fossil frogs have been found in the coal-formation of the Rhine (Papier-kohl) in company with the fishes Leuciscus macrurus and L. papyraceus. Two species have been de scribed, and there are many examples in the museum at Bonn. In this country specimens are to be found in the collections of Lord Cole and Sir Philip Egerton, bart. FROGSBIT, the common name of a wild water-plant, called Hydrocharis Morsus Ranæ. FROISSART (JEAN, or JOHN), was born at Valenciennes about 1337. He was the son, as is conjecture! from a passage in his poems, of Thomas Froissart, a heraldpainter, no inconsiderable profession in the days of chivalry. The youth of Froissart, from twelve years upwards, as lie himself informs us, was spent in every species of elegant indulgence. In the midst of his dissipation however, he early discovered the ardent and inquisitive spirit to which we owe so much; and even at the age of twenty, at the command of his dear lord and master, Sir Robert of Namur, lord of Beaufort,' he began to write the history of the French wars. The period from 1326 to 1356 was chiefly filled up from the chronicles of Jean le Bel, canon of Liège, a confident of John of Hainault, and celebrated by Froissart for his diligence and accuracy. It is reasonable to believe that this work was interrupted during a journey to England in the train of Philippa of Hainault, the heroic wife of Edward III., and mother of the Black Prince. Froissart was for three or four years secretary, or clerk of her chamber, a situation which he would probaby have retained but for a deep-rooted passion for a lady of Flanders, which induced him to return to that country; a circumstance equally favourable to the history of the Cou tinent, and unfortunate for that of Britain. During b.s residence in England he visited the Scottish mountains, which he traversed on a palfrey, carrying his own portшatteau, and attended only by a greyhound. His character of historian and poet introduced him to the court of David II, and to the hardly less honourable distinction of fifteen days' abode at the castle of Dalkeith with William, ear! t Douglas, where he learned personally to know the race of heroes whose deeds he has repeatedly celebrated. He wa in France at Melun-sur-Seine about April 20th, 1366. perhaps private reasons might have induced him to tak that road to Bordeaux, where he was on All Saints' day of that year, when the princess of Wales was brought to hel of a son, who was afterwards Richard II. The prince of Wales setting out a few days afterwards for the war Spain against Henry the Bastard, Froissart accompani him to Dax, where the prince resided some time. He ha: expected to attend him during the continuance of this great expedition, but the prince would not permit him t go farther; and shortly after his arrival sent him back to the queen his mother. Froissart could not have made any long stay in England, since in the following year, 1365, E was at different Italian courts. It was this same year tha! Lionel, duke of Clarence, son of the king of England, epoused Joland, daughter of Galeas II., duke of Milan. Froissart, who probably was in his suite, was present at the magnificent reception which Amadeus, count of Savoy, surnamed the Count Verd, gave him on his return: he describes the feasts on this occasion, and does not forget to tell us that they danced a virelay of his composition. From the court of Savoy he returned to Milan, where the same count Amadeus gave him a good cotardie, a sort of coat, with twenty florins of old; from thence he went to Bologna |