No. III.

An account of Frogs dug out of the earth at BURLINGTON, CHAP. VI. p. 154.

THE accounts which natural history has recorded of the difcovery of toads and frogs, in fruations in which it has been fuppofed it was impoffi ble they fhould exift, have been of a fingular and extraordinary kind.

A very remarkable inftance of this nature, has lately fallen under my own obfervation. On October 9th, 1807, Mofes Catlin, Elq of Burling ton, was digging a well a few rods diftant from his dwelling houfe. His house was about twenty rods fouth of the College, on a hard gravelly foil and on the highest land in the neighborhood. When the workmen had dug about five feet below the furface of the ground, they found fix frogs, which did not appear to be in a torpid or weak state; but as foon as they were thrown out of the earth, dilcovered the full powers of activity and health. Two of thefe frogs lay together in the earth, the others were separate; most, or all of them were covered, or lay under fmall ftones. October the 13th, two more of the tame kind were found; feparate, but under Imall ftones as before October the 14th, in the morning five more were found, at the depth of about eleven feet from the furface of the ground. Two of thefe lay together, the others were feparate; none of them were covered with any ftones, but furrounded with hard gravelly earth. Alexander Catlin, Elq. a man of the most refpectable character, affured me, that he faw the workmen dig up three of these frogs: and that another man was prefent, when the workmen dug up the fourth.

At my requeft Mr. Catlin preferved two of them in a tumbler. Eight hours after they were dug up, I viewed them with all the attention and care in my power. They were of the fame kind as the frogs which are generally feen in this vicinity. One of them appeared to have attained its full growth; the other was not of the full fize. Their bodies did not appear to be fhrivelled, or in any degree emaciated, but full, plump and healthy. Their eyes were lucid and brilliant, without any appearance of defect. Their limbs fecmed to be in perfect proportion and order; and their claws long, flender and delicate. Refpiration appeared to be strong and unembarraffed; and carried on with as much eate and regularity as in any other frogs. On moving the cover from the tumbler in which they were confined, both of them jumped out from the glass, and hopped round the room; and we had to chafe them feveral times round the room before. we could catch them. They feemed perfectly well to understand the best way of evading our purfuit; did not attempt to leap against the wall or furniture, but kept in that part of the room where they were apparently beft fecured by the wall, chairs and tables. Nor have I ever feen more activity, fprightlinefs, or ftronger powers of life and action in any frogs, than what appeared in these two, eight hours after they were dug out of the earth; and had been preferved in a tumbler, without any kind of food or nourishment. To render the evidence of thefe facts as compleat as the na-. ture of the fubje&t would admit, we preferved both the frogs in fpirits and. exhibited them to the view of the ftudents in the univerfity; and they are now in poffeffion of the prefident of that feminary. The workmen funk the well to the depth of about eighteen feet, but did not find any more of these animals.

October the 26th, the workmen were digging another well for Mr. Cate lin, about eighty rods north east of the College. The foil was of a looses

gravelly kind. At the depth of eleven feet, they dug up a frog in this well. Upon examination, I found it was of the fame kind, form, fize and appearance, as the frogs in the other well; and had the fame phenomena of health, vigor and activity. To afcertain the internal state and contents of this frog, we opened it. On diffection, it was found to contain a fmall quantity of blood. The heart, lungs and other entrails, were in a natural and perfect state. The inteftines contained a white mucus, of a middling confiftence. The internal parts neither appeared to be loaded with fat, or emaciated by leannefs; but to be in a state that denoted regular but moderate nourishment. And nothing like putridity, deficiency, or decay, appeared in any part of the animal. Uncomfortable weather coming on, the workmen did not fink this well to any greater depth.

It is fcarcely to be expected that more compleat evidence ever should be found attending any inftances of this nature: And whether we can ac count for them, or not, their reality cannot, I think, be called in question. In what manner fhall we go about to explain the philofophy of these frogs; or to account for their formation, fituation, and life?

Could these animals have been produced in fuch a fituation by the earth? The doctrine of equivocal generation does not feem to have anything in theory, obfervation or experiment to fupport it. No one thing in nature appears to be the refult of chance, or accident. Every plant, every tree, and every body in the whole fyftem of nature, is evidently the refult of defign, contrivance, and adjustment; and appears to be preferved and regulated by ftated and permanent laws. The object or the body is not to be named, in the heavens, or in the earth, which appears to be produced, to be governed, or to be moved by chance or accident; that is by no caufe, or law at all. Leaft of all is this to be expected in animals, every one of which has an appropriate form, conftitution, inclinations, and manner of life, motion, and propagation. That men fhould be produced by corruption, or that the rocks and woods fhould engender ftags and tygers, would be an affertion too improbable and ludicrous for folly to make, or for infidelity to believe. It has been contended that infects are bred by corruption and putrefaction. Malpigi, Swammerdam, Redi and others have confuted' this doctrine; and fhown that it does not agree with obfervation. The refult of their inquiries and obfervations is, that most of the infects are derived ex ovo, and that they depofit their eggs wherever they can find a fit place for incubation; in water, flesh, fruits and vegetables, in or about the bodies of animals, in the feathers of birds, hair of beafts, fcales of fishes, and in every acceffible part of nature. Nor will experiment help the doctrine of equivocal generation in any degree. From the corruption of a body arifeth not activity and life, but a diffolution of its parts. You' cannot reduce a piece of fleth to putrefaction, and out of that putrid mass make an animal body, which fhall have a head, a heart, entrails, veins, and blood veffels; all of which are neceflary to conftitute a living creature. Nor can you take a piece of rotten cheese, or meat and make out of it a handful of mites or worms, any more than you can form it into lions or whales. A doctrine then which has nothing in theory, obfervation or experiment, to fupport it, cannot be advanced with any appearance of probability to account for the formation of thefe frogs.

Could they have been preferved or exifted in the earth for a long number of years? This feems to have been the cafe, and does not appear to be contrary to the laws and phenomena of nature. Every animal that we are acquainted with, has apparently two modes of exifting. fleeping and waking. When awake, all the fprings of nature feem to be active and in motion; when afleep, the organs of the body feem to be fufpcoded as to thei

activity and exertions, but the circulation of the blood, and the active pow. ers of life ftill remain. And from the one to the other of these states all the animals of which we have any information, have a regular and natural tranfition. When wearied or reduced by activity and exertion, the ani mal frame relaxes and yields, and we find in reft and fleep both relief and refreshment. When the body has been relieved and refreshed by reft, the powers of nature seem to be recruited, the pulfe gradually quickens, the organs of fenfe refume their functions, and the animal awakes from fleep. In most animals, both these states are neceffary to his health and life; they regularly succeed each other, and the one is as natural and neceffary as the other.

In fome animals this alternate and regular fucceffion of fleeping and waking is either not kept up, or it is fubject to very long periods of time. Bears, Serpents, Toads, Frogs, Flies, and various other animals are known to live through the winter months in a torpid state. At the approach of cold weather they retire into the earth, to the bottom of waters, or to fome place of fecurity, and do not appear again till the warmth of fpring has foftened and vivified the earth. They then leave their places of concealment, and come forth into the atmosphere; apparently weak at first, but not emaciated, lean, or deprived of their flesh.

An ani

During this period of their torpid ftate, the appearances are, that they exift without any regular fupplies of food; but not without fomething that operates to their prefervation, fupport, nourishment, or continuation. As nature is not wearing away by continued activity, or by conftant perspiration, it should seem that it does not require conftant fupplies of food, to recruit, what in the torpid ftate is not much spent or wafted. mal then may exift in the torpid ftate without regular fupplies of food or victuals, to restore or recruit that wafte of nature, which always takes place in the active, but does not seem to have much effect in the torpid state of exiftence. But ftill, fomething is neceffary to preferve the animal in that ftate in which it went to fleep, and fell into the infenfible lethargy. In fome animals, water answers this purpose ; in others, earth contributes to the effect; in others, a rock, or a tree, or any thing that tends to preferve and fupport the powers of nature, and prevent their being exhaufted. And to every fpecies of animals, the author of nature feems to have given a faculty, to difcern and select what is best suited to their purpose.

How long may an animal exist in a torpid, or in an infenfible state ? Many of them, we know from observation, do annually live one half the year in this ftate. We have well attefted accounts of a man living many days in a state of fleep or torpor ;* of flies, immerfed and corked up in a bottle of Madeira wine in Virginia, and many months after coming to life, when the wine was opened in London;† of a toad that lived eighty or a hundred years in the heart of an old oak at Nantz And if all the powers of animal life may be fufpended in fuch animals for fo long a period, what should prevent their continuance in such a state for a much longer period of time; for hundreds, or thousands, or any given number of years? Or who would pretend to affign any data, to determine the maxi mum, to which fuch a ftate might extend? If all circumftances fhould remain the fame, as they were when the animal first went into the torpid ftate, it does not appear that the powers of life mufi neceffarily waste away

* Philofophical Transactions.

+ Franklin.

Memoirs of the Academy of Sciences for 1719.

for want of food, or of fomething to fupport and preferve them. And if they were preferved, whenever the animal is by any means brought into Stuation in which the lethargy or torpor fhould naturally go off, what should prevent its tranfition to the natural fta e of animal life and vigor ?

In what manner was it poffible that the frogs (hould ever have affumed, or been placed in fuch a fituation? The ground round Mr. Catlin's house in which the well was dug, was of a hard, compact, gravelly foil, intermixed with fome fmall ftones; but without any appearance of pores, vacuities, or currents of water; and is the highest land in the vicinity. The fpot of land in which the fecond well was dug, was of a loose gravelly foil, with fome intermixtures of clay; and on a small eminence or hill, There was not any thing in the fituation or appearance of either, from which any probability or conjecture could arife, that either of thefe places were ever covered or overflowed by the waters of Lake Champlain, or from any of the adjacent rivers. Both thefe places however. had till within fix or seven years, been covered with heavy timber; and which proba bly had never been touched by the hand of man, till it was cut down a few years ago, to make way for the fettlement of Burlington. In their original and natural ftate, our woods are damp, moift, and miry. The trees are alternately growing up, decaying, rotting, falling down; and new ones arifing up, from the decays, and in the places of others. In this procefs nothing is more common, than for holes and vacuities to appear in the bodies and in the roots, of the old and decaying trees; these vacuities and fiffures are of different figures and dimenfions, and every where to be found in the uncultivated lands. And fuch a kind of procefs has probably been going on in the woods of Vermont, from their first production unti! now. In the fucceffive changes that nature in this refpect may have paffed through, there does not feem to be any thing unnatural or improbable, in there having been times, places, and circumftances, in which frogs might have been conveyed in their eggs, or alter their fuil growth have found a paffage feveral feet below the furface of the earth; and thus made their way into fituations, in which the powers of life, might be prelerved, but from which they could not find any pallage or way to elcape.

This conjectural method of reafoning, may I believe ferve to account for the phyfical poffibility of facts, which we are certain have taken place; but it is far from being certain that they do in fact explain the actual procefs of nature, in the prefervation of fuch animals. And I am in much doubt whether the obfervations on the torpid ftate of animals, will apply to the cafe of the frogs. It did not appear to me that any of thefe frogs were in a torpid ftate, when they were dug up; the phenomena rather denoted. that they were in the full powers of animation, activity, and health; and that nothing was wanting for their exertion. but freedom from their con. fined and unnatural situation. Upon diffecting one of them, no one of the appearances denoted that it had lived without fome kind of food or neurifhment; but that it had in fact derived fomething from the earth, which formed the regular mucus that was fpread through the inteftines; and in this way, received regular fupplies of food and fupport. in fuch a fuation, it is probable, it might have lived as long as the earth continued to afford the moisture and aliment neceffary for its fupport; but when these fhould have been carried off by evaporation, drought, or being expofed to the fun and winds, the life of the animal could not have been preferved."

Inflcad then of pretending to give a full and adequate explanation of thefe mysteries of nature, I have only fated what occurred to my mind upon the fubject. When 'there fhall be more information derived from facts and obfervation, it is not improbable that the improvers of natural history will be able to give a more fatisfactory account and explanation ef thefe extraordinary, but well attefted phenomena.

No. IV.

Observations on the fafcinating power of Serpents. CHAPTER VI, P. 156.

WHEN the remarks refpecting the fafcinating power of Serpents, inferted page 155-6 was written, I had not met with any American obferva tions which appeared to me to be fufficiently accurate to ascertain the fact, or to justify any decifion on the fubject.. I have fince been favored with obfervations which appear to be marked with precision and accuracy, and may afford further information in this mysterious part of natural hiftory.

This fubject was mentioned by Dr. Cotton Mather, fo early as the year 1712 In a communication which he made to the Royal Society of Lon don, he treats of the Rattle Snake of America, and relates a story, as he fays, conftantly affirmed by the Indians, viz. " that these Snakes frequently lie coiled at the bottom of a large tree, with their eyes fixed on some squir rel above in the tree, which though feeming by his cries, and leaping about to be in a fright, yet at laft runs down the tree into the jaws of this de

vourer."*

The Hon. Paul Dudley of Roxbury, Mafiachusetts, Fellow of the Royal Society of London, and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court in Maffachufetts, about the year 1721, wrote thus to the Royal Society,† that he

would not pretend to anfwer for the truth of every story he had heard of their charming or power of fascination; yet he was abundantly satisfied from several witneffes, both English and Indian, that a rattle fnake will charm both squirrels and birds from a tree into his mouth. Mr. Dudley was told by one of undoubted probity, that as he was in the woods he ob ferved a fquirrel in great diftrefs dancing from one bough to another, and making a lamentable noife, till at last he came down the tree and ran be hind a log; the perfon going to fee what was become of him, spied a large Inake that had fwallowed him.

"Mr. Dudley is the rather confirmed in this relation, because his own brother, being in the woods, opened one of these fnakes and found two ftriped fquirrels in his belly, and both of them head foremost. When they charm, they make a hoarfe noife with their mouths, and a foft rattle with their tails, having the eve at the fame time fixed on the prey.'

Beverly, in his Hiftory of Virginia, edit. 2. p. 260. Lond. 1722, 8vo. obferves, that all forts of fnakes will charm both birds and fquirrels, and the Indians pretend to charm them. Several perfons have feen squirrels run down a tree directly into a inake's mouth: They have likewife feen birds fluttering up and down, and chattering at these snakes, till at last they have dropped down before them."

In the year 1748, M. Kalm, professor of economy in the University of Abo, in Sweden, was fent into North America, for the particular purpose of making obfervations on the Natural Hiftory of the country. During his tay in New York, he paid particular attention to this fubje&t, of which he gives the following account :-" Moft of the people in this country afcribed to this fnake a power of fafcinating birds and fquirrels, as I have defcribed in feveral parts of my journal. When the fuake lies under a tree, and has fixed his eyes on a bird or squirrel above, it obliges them to come down and to go directly into its mouth. I cannot account for this, for I never faw it done. However, I have a lift of more than twenty perfons, among which are fome of the moft creditable people, who have all unani. moufly, though living far distant from each other, afferted the fame thing, Phil, Trans, No. 376. p. 292.

Phil. Trans. No. 339.