"Amphibian" Quotes from Famous Books
... the principal divisions of the animal world are fatal to this speculation, which rests upon nothing but the wish that it were so. Links are lacking between marine and amphibian animals; reptiles and birds; reptiles and mammals; between apes and man. Of course, we would find fossils of millions of these links if there were any. The missing links are necessary to the scheme. Is there one chance in a million that evolution is ... — The Evolution Of Man Scientifically Disproved • William A. Williams
... my Redfins were fish, but mentally they had advanced a little beyond the usual tadpole train of reactions, reaching forward toward the varied activities of the future amphibian. One noticeable thing was their segregation, whether in the mica pools, or in two other smaller ones near by, in which I found them. Each held a pure culture of Redfins, and I found that this was no accident, but aided and enforced by the ... — Edge of the Jungle • William Beebe
... under the influence of a heavy southwest storm. On flat coasts we are familiar with the wide frontier of salt marshes, that witness the border warfare of land and sea, alternate invasion and retreat. In low-shored estuaries like those of northern Brittany and northwestern Alaska, this amphibian girdle of the land expands to a width of four miles, while on precipitous coasts of tideless sea basins it contracts to a few inches. Hence this boundary zone changes with every impulse of the mobile sea and with every varying configuration ... — Influences of Geographic Environment - On the Basis of Ratzel's System of Anthropo-Geography • Ellen Churchill Semple
... well are not those who have taken courses in the theory of swimming at natatoriums, from professors of the amphibian art—they were just boys who jumped into the ol' swimmin' hole, and came home with shirts on wrong-side out and a tell-tale dampness ... — Love, Life & Work • Elbert Hubbard
... uncomely "scientific" boundary, and the joining together of distant and unrelated localities into a single district; such was the case in the famous original act of Governor Gerry, of Massachusetts, whence the practice obtained its amphibian name.[6] But it is not always necessary that districts be cut into distortionate shapes in order to accomplish these unjust results. (pp. ... — Proportional Representation Applied To Party Government • T. R. Ashworth and H. P. C. Ashworth
... earth's history. For it was the time of the establishment of flowering plants upon the earth and of terrestrial backboned animals. One would like to have been the discoverer of the Devonian foot-print of Thinopus, the first known Amphibian foot-print—an eloquent vestige of the third great invasion of the dry land. It was probably from a stock of Devonian lung-fishes that the first Amphibians sprang, but it was not till the next period that they came to their own. ... — The Outline of Science, Vol. 1 (of 4) - A Plain Story Simply Told • J. Arthur Thomson
... call such creatures amphibious, which means that they are able to live with equal ease on the land and in the water. The first frog who crosses your path can tell you all about the pleasures of the double existence of the amphibian. ... — The Story of Mankind • Hendrik van Loon
... than he thought it. Scientific names, for all their air of learned universality, are merely fossilized impressions, stereotyped portraits of a single aspect. The decorous obscurity of the ancient languages is used to conceal an immense diversity of principle. Mammal, amphibian, coleoptera, dicotyledon, cryptogam,—all these terms, which, if they were translated into the language of a peasant, would be seen to record very simple observations, yet do lend a kind of formal majesty ... — Romance - Two Lectures • Walter Raleigh
... say, as does the robin's, that life is cheerful, that another glorious day is dawning. It says, "Rest is over; another day of toil is here; come to work." It is monotonous as a frog chorus, but there is a merry thrill in the notes of the amphibian which are entirely wanting in the song. If it were not for the light-hearted tremolo of the chewink thrown in now and then, and the loud, cheery ditty of the summer yellow-bird, who begins soon after the pewee, one ... — A Bird-Lover in the West • Olive Thorne Miller
... advances, and the young amphibian ranges the waters, the terror of his insect contemporaries, not only are the nutritious particles supplied by its prey, by the addition of which to its frame, growth takes place, laid down, each in its proper spot, and in such due proportion to the rest, ... — Lectures and Essays • T.H. Huxley |