“The toad, when molested, discharges its urine as a means of defense, but not to any distance. You would have to hold your face close to the animal to receive the discharge in the eyes. If that should happen to some careless person, a temporary redness of the eyes would be the utmost result. But no one would think of putting his face so close to the animal, and so there is no cause for alarm on that score.” “What about the creature’s terrible breath?” was Jules’s next inquiry. “Another calumny on a par with that about the saliva. Its breath is no more harmful than any other animal’s. So there is absolutely nothing left of the charges brought against the toad. The poison it sweats in moments of danger to drive away its enemies cannot injure as venom injures, because the animal has no means of injecting it into a wound and mixing it with the blood, as venom must be mixed to take effect. The discharge of its urine falls too short to be dangerous, and even if it should reach its mark its effect would be so slight that it is not worth considering. Does any one give a thought to the hedgehog’s urine when that animal sprays itself with this liquid on being molested? The toad’s similar mode of defense is no more to be feared. The other complaints, such as the swelling of one’s hands after touching the animal, air poisoned by its breath, fruit and vegetables infected by the saliva and the creature’s tracks, all come from people’s prejudice, their imagination, which has given the poor batrachian a bad reputation. “The toad is harmless, but that is not enough to entitle it to our consideration. It is also a very useful helper, a devourer of beetles, slugs, larvæ—vermin of every description, in short. After spending the day under a cool stone or in some dark hole, it leaves its retreat at nightfall to make its rounds, hunching itself along on its big belly. Here is a slug making such haste as it can toward the lettuce bed, there a cricket chirping at the mouth of its hole, and there again a June-bug laying its eggs in the ground. Very softly the toad approaches and in three mouthfuls gobbles them all up with a gurgle of satisfaction. Ah, those tasted good! And now for some more. “It continues on its way, and by the time it has finished its rounds, at daybreak, you may imagine what a multitude of worms and other small prey the glutton has stowed away in its capacious stomach. And yet this useful creature is stoned to death because it is ugly! My children, never commit any such act of cruelty, at once foolish and harmful; do not stone the toad, for you would thereby deprive the fields and gardens of a vigilant guardian. Let it go its way in peace and it will destroy so many insects that you will in the end find it less ugly than you had thought.