The Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1877-1885, 1883-05-21
FROGS.
From the Cincinnati inquirer.

| The oyster season has ended; the fatal
| months without the r. have begun to run
| their course. Let not he who loves bis
| stomach despair, however, for the juicy,
| tender delicious frog has come he who
| in France makes his entrance and exit by
the light of wax b0ugies and the popping
of seductive Widow Clicquot. There is a
prejudice among some people about frogs
as a steady diet. 1t is not founded on
reason. What animal or reptile so much
resembles man as the frog2 Many men
and more women think they can sing.
They can't Neither can the frog, though
| from time immemorial his lugubrious
| wall solemn croak, had been heard at
dewy eve by all summer boarding. Who
has not seen men that looked just like
| frogs-beardless bald-pated, wide mouth
receding chin, prominent eyes. alder
manic beiiied sort of fellows? Then their
eyes they exercise the electric power
natural history that some men have en-
deavored to stand the gaze of the frogs
eve, and Telling fainting to the ground.
Though frogs never pay millener's or
tailors bill, yet noe FEATURES follow so
many fashions. No spring, summer, au
tumn and winter for them. They put on
new suits every two weeks, and what
woman would not delight in this arrange
ment.
There are people who go away TO spend
the summer ny locking the front door,
pulling down the blinds and living, no
one knows how. The frog retires for
whole season, living on his own re-
eourses-only to save Goals and light he
selects the winter.
When the frog has Matched q family of
tadpoles into the world his beauty fades,
he becomes old and wrinkled, and the
country people think he is toad. One of
the quaint fables of Esopelates how they
elected a king, showing certainly human
science, but the old legend of LatoDa pas
sing by pond of water. and STOPPING
To ouench her thirst. some rude pumpkins
on the bank so muddied it that she could
not drink it, and, waving her wand she
changed them into frogs. is much prettier-
The frog, too, has been celebrated in
song poorly, sacred history and koran.
Two thousand years ago Aristophaues
brought frog. people onto the stage, and
n poem attributed to Homer relates of
the battle between the frogs and mice.
Then, too, frogs gave Moses and his PEG
pie good deal of trouble in Egypt once,
which might have all been avoided ii
they had fallen to eating them, as we do
now. And the Koran relates that when
the Chaldeans cast Abraham into the
flames the frogs spat into and extinguised
the fire. Therefore, says Mohamned,
respect the frog for having saved the
patriarch.
A learned Swiss physician as early as
1926, Tcheachzer. discovered the petrified
skeleton of frog, and declared it to be
an antediluvian man. It's strange but true
that this impression prevailed in the
world for century until Cuvier,
the great French naturalist, exposed it.
Then the scholars retorted by naming
the petrifaction after the learned Swiss
SCIENTIST who had fooled the world for
full century.
When the summer sun breathes his
warm rays on the surface of the water
Mrs. Frog will sit for hours talking and
lulling to sleep her 500 spawny offspring
with all the watchful care of mother
over her first-born as she toddles it on her
knee, cooling il to slumber. Yet he has his
enemies. Science persecutes him. They
will jump into the mouths of snakes.
Hawks love them as chickens, and owls
wink, blink and bounce down
upon them at night.
But the epicureanl With what delight
will he hail his arrival A French cook in
time realized fortune of
DOC, 900 frances from his famous frog pies |
In Illinois and the north of Ohio are sew
eral large ponds where these chickens of
the land and water are reared and |
and fed for the market. These are the
fat, Jack Falstaff looking sort of fellows |
that one sees at the game dealers and |
Frogs are good fried, |
stewed, with creamsauce and in pies |
Boys. now get your spears and red rags
and catch the luscious, juicy delicacy for |
he frog eaters