them alive so long
in such places. But the distinguished M. Majendie suggested that it was
just possible that an attempt was being made to hoax the Academy, by
making it believe that the Toad had been found in the hole, whereas it
might only have been put in by the mischievous workmen after the stone
was broken. Terrified at the idea of becoming the laughing-stock of the
public, the Academy declined to take any formal resolution about the
Toad, but thanked the committee for its very interesting communication;
and so the subject dropped."

This statement does not, to be sure, bear about it that character of
precision which should mark the report of a scientific body, nor is it
verified by authority; but the terror ascribed to L'Academie at the idea
of being hoaxed, and the instant quashing of the inquiry, are so true to
nature, so accurately characteristic of our august associations of
savans, that I cannot help believing the story.

Here is another, which has the air of a _bona fide_ account, though I
have no knowledge of the writer, nor does he himself seem to pretend to
personal autopsy of the discovery.

On Monday last, September 20, while some workmen were engaged in getting
iron ore at a place called Paswick, in the north of this county,
[Derby,] they came upon a solid lump of ore, which, being heavier than
two men could lift, they set to work to break with their picks, when, to
their surprise, in a cavity near the centre of the stone, they found a
Toad alive. The cavity was much larger than the Toad, being nearly six
inches in diameter, and was lined with crystals of what I suppose to be
carbonate of lime. The stone was about four yards from the surface of
the ground; it is now in the possession of Mr Haywood of Derby, by whose
men it was found; but unfortunately the Toad was not preserved after its
death, which took place almost immediately on its exposure to the
atmosphere.[100]

_Audi alteram partem._ Mr Plant of the Salford Museum tells us, both in
sorrow and in anger, a story, doubtless more amusing to us who read it
than to him, of his adventures among the toad-finders. When geologising
in the neighbourhood of Chesterfield, a quarryman, whom he had invited
to share a bottle of porter, informed him in confidence that Toads
inclosed in stone were plentiful thereabout. "He said he had often found
them, and that he knew a stone before it was broken that would contain a
Toad; giving me long and circumstantial