FROGS IN STONE

Evening Post, Volume CV, Issue 124, 26 May 1923, Page 21

FROGS IN STONE

HOW DO THEY GET

THERE?

STRANGE EXAMPLES INSTANCED

We hare all heard, at some time or mother, of the remarkable frog, which, let free by a fortuitous blow of the quavryman's hammer, in the exuberance of its newly.found freedom, jumped out of a cavity in the solid rock that had been its prison home, since how long imagination fails to conceive. The incident invariably opens up a subject for' lively discussion, primarily on the age of the said frog, and incidentally- "how the mischief it got there." Entering a railway cutting recently,. where some workmen were busy excavating the, atone, writes F. Chapman, A.L.S., in the Melbourne "Argus," I inquired_ if they had seen any shell impressions in the rocks, which was my immediate quest. They had not, but had I heard of frogs in the solid rock? of which they were living witnesses. "How do you explain that?" It was useless to try. to solve the mystery for them by .bringing in the theory of a communicating pipe or fissure through which the frogß must have crawled. They would have none of n! '

Looking through some old volumes of "Science Gossip" a little time ago, one came upon the following story of a "Frog in Oolite," a solemn declaration of the discoverer. It reads thus:—"l, William Munton, of Waltham, in the county of Leicester, quarryman, hereby, certify that I was witness to the discovery of the stone and frog, now before me (in possession of Mr. Simon Hutchinsgn, of Manthorpe Lodge, Grantham), in the stone quarry at Waltham, from ten to twelve feet- below the natural surface of the ground, in solid rock. When the rock was split, the frog appeared alive, in size equal.to the cavity therein. It continued to live about tan days- after its release, and was -afterwards preserved ,in spirit by the late Mr. Stow, of Waltham. Before ,the stone was broken, no crack'or crevice, was anywhere visible. Aa witness, my hand this Ist day of December, 186^.—William Munton." The ingenious remarks which followed, by the sponsor of. this story, Simon Hutchinson, suggested the idea that the frog ensconced iteslf in the Oolit when the mud was still soft, and naively adds, "As to the age of the animal, I offer no theory. " v . Incidentally, however, he concludes that the frog was as old as the Oolite, when that rock-was laid down as "soft mud."

Thia frog, then,., according to the age of the rook, would be at least twelve million years old-, and might easily' claim the prize for batrachian senility. One little obstacle to a belief in this theory . is that palaeontologists declare that the fossil remains of the frog, Bana^ do not date back further than three million years. The above discoverer mentioned the existence of a cavity, and the only charitable .way to accept the story is to strongly suspect the presence of a fissure leading into that cavity, through which the frog, probably when smaller, may have crept when on one of his wooing expeditions. ■-. And this hypothetical crack may have been easily overlooked in the excitement of discovering the entrapped frog, or may even have closed np later. t \ ■ _ Some thirty years ago th'» '•' Scotsman " recorded " an extraordinary discovery " by Mr. Wiljon, the manager of the Summerlee Iron Company, at the Shieldmuir pit, near Motherwell, Airdrie, who, "whilst superintending the-driving of a mine through sandstone, was surprised to find from 30 to 40 live young frogs issue from the centre of a > mass of stone that had been dislodged. The level in which the frogs wera found/is 330 ft under the surface, and the mass ofvstone was fully a hundred yards from the pit bottom. No crevice oj fissure could be observed in the stone, and all who were present are positive that the frogs came from a cavity in the centra of the block. The frogs,_ apparently quite fresh after their imprisonment, at once made for a pool of water, in which element, of course, they were quite at home."

A short time since a friend placed in my hands a veritable Australian frog which had been discovered under similar circumstances "to some of the foregoing at Portsea, in October last, by Mr. Mat Mathison, who was sinking a well.. The authenticity of the discovery was vouched for by Colonel Daly, of Portsea, on the label on the bottle, which reads: " Frog found living in sandstone 75ft from the surface and 15ft from water level by a man digging a well at Portsea, 24th October, 1922:—Colonel. Dalv." When found the frog, I am informed, was alive, changed colour, and shortly afterwards died. The ruck in which the frog occnrred is the ordinary hardened dune-limestone of the Heads, in which there are. many cavities and loose sand pipeß. In a hard, but porous, rock of this nature moisture would percolate, into any cavity, and carry with it gome small amount of organic matter, which would tend to keep the animal alive for a considerable period; but, of course, it could not thrive under such conditions. As to the cavities and pipes, these are seen in process, of formation in our recent calcareous sandstones on the coasts The sand invades the scrub, the trees perish, and the stems gradually decay within the sand bed, which often speedily becomes hardened by a solution of the sand and redeposition. Thus we have a pipe representing the former tree stem.'and this may communicate with others situated near it, and so a " swallow-hole " of considerable length would be naturally formed, even without the ordinary means of mere water trickles and solution along fissures.

The Portsea frog has been identified by Mr. J. A. Kershaw, F.E.S., the curator of ths National MiiEeum, as Hyla ewingii, Dum. and Bibr. . Mr. Kershaw notes that it is commonly found iv damp situations! often among leaves of young eucalyptus and other shrubs. It is widely distributed, being found in Western Australia, New South Wales, Victoria, and Tasmania. '"■"...

The above examples of frogs. which have been enclosed in cavities in stone could be multiplied to a, score or more. Frogs haw been found in co«l beds, and even in bluestone lava. The excessive age of the beds in' which they hay* occurred, and the original heated condition of the lay a, is sufficient evidence to disprove their contemporaneity with those rocks. We also know that these amphibia can hibernate for long periods, during which time, except for moisture, which is a necessity for keeping the skin in condition for breathing, tha# seem to want next to nothing in the way of sus tenance. This would make' it passible ior them to exist for some years without succumbing to their confined surroundings. We a! 66 know- tha.fr-.practically all. underground rocks are more or Jess moist; and, further, that joints, fissures; and pipes are common features of' these rocks. The conclusions, then, are obvious, that there is nothing magical in these discoveries of imprisoned frogs. Probably, it is;.only our perception that is at fault, which prevents us from seeing the mode of entry of these cheerful little creatures—l say cheerful advisedly, for their very name seems to be derived from tbs wffl« root as our word frolic—yheu

■they first left their humdrum surroundings of moor and fen to seek a quiet rest-ing-place in a nioistuve-laden rock, with no foresight of the disastrous effects .of their subsequent growth. This factor explains why they could not make; .their escape without the agency of the man who wields the hammer.