which are not, however, peculiar to it; Asia nine; Africa two; Australia one; and America seventeen; and there are four or five whose locality is unrecorded. This enumeration, however, must be greatly under the mark; as many species have been lately added to those previously known.
Genus Bufo. (Laur.)
The characters by which the true Toads are distinguished are thus enumerated by Professor Bell. Body inflated, skin warty, parotids (or glands behind the eyes) porous, hind feet of moderate length, toes not webbed, jaws without teeth, nose rounded.
Eighteen species of this genus are recorded, of which the best known is the Common Toad (Bufo vulgaris, Laur.), which is spread over Europe, Asia, and North Africa, being found from Great Britain to Japan. It is nearly three inches and a half in length, of an unpleasing form and aspect; the body puffed and swollen, covered with warts, which are larger on the upper parts, smaller, but more numerous beneath. The colours are commonly a dull lurid blackish hue above, with the warts brown; and a dirty yellowish white beneath.
The Toad is not poisonous in the sense in which the Viper is; but the popular prejudice is not wholly without foundation, which attributes “sweltered venom” to this animal. On the back and sides are situated many glands in the skin, which secrete a fetid and acrid matter. This substance exudes from the glands on pressure,
