One of the most interesting developments of this peculiarity is found in the case of the common skunk. This creature has in each groin a gland capable of secreting a highly offensive fluid. Ordinarily this liquid is kept safely within its sac, and for a long time none of it may escape. When closely cornered, the skunk will turn its tail toward the enemy and with a quiver and a flip of his tail it can guide the openings of two little tubes that come out along the root of the tail in such fashion as to eject the fluid in a fine and foul-smelling stream against the animal from which the skunk would escape. Once fairly hit by this fluid, I imagine most animals will drop the skunk. A dog surely will, and will hate himself for having made the attempt to capture anything which must be so ignominiously allowed to escape. If ones clothing is well saturated with it, it is nearly useless to hope to remove the odor. A dog will carry the smell for several weeks. For a long time it will be so strong as to make him an unfit denizen of the house. Even swimming in deep water does not remove it. After two weeks, although he may seem to be practically free from the odor, a light rain will bring it all out again and make him nearly as offensive as before. Not as prompt in its action, but in the end nearly as effective, is the protective device which the toad sometimes uses to his distinct advantage. May I be pardoned a personal account of this particular feature. It was my good fortune to be for a short time a student in a class taught by Edward Drinker Cope, one of the most brilliant of our American biologists. Prof. Cope mentioned in class the fact that the Batrachians (the group to which the toad belongs) have in many cases the power to emit from their skin a fluid which is sufficiently nauseous to deter an animal from eating the creature that secretes it. Upon such authority as this, I had no hesitancy whatever in repeating Cope's statement. One morning I had a class in the field studying the ground ivy, whose dainty blue flowers were lifting themselves out of the dewy grass. While we were thus engaged, a toad joined the circle. He came out of his dewy retreat clean and fresh from his morning bath. I took him in my hands, and made him the subject of an immediate lesson. I showed to my pupils his eyes and his interesting method of handling them, his tongue and its strange insertion; showed them how to look into his mouth and look up his ears to his ear drums, and pointed out many other interesting facts. Then I told them how Cope had said that the toad had power to emit from its skin a fluid so nauseous that many an animal hesitates to eat it. This is the first peculiarity I had mentioned which I had not myself observed, and a scientific qualm came over my conscience. Why had I never verified this statement which I had so frequently repeated? On the impulse of the moment, with the bright, clean skin of the creature fresh from the