Eleanor Stackhouse Atkinson

“ Frog to say about all this?
He says he agrees to every word of it. He says this by his actions—and actions speak louder than words. Like most otherpeople he seems happiest when he is young; when he is a lively little tadpole. See him flirt and flip and flash through the water, playing with his little brother and sister tadpoles, as boys and girls play with each other, in the sunshine. Later, when he puts legs on his body and teeth in his mouth, hops out into the hard world and earns his living, he has many sober moments. ”

“ Or the change from the flower-seed to flower, and back to seed again, just as strange as either the frog's life story or a chicken's life story?
In the growth of everything in the world—all plants and all animals—there is this beginning in a lower form of life, and a growing up through higher forms. And all plants and all animals begin with the lowest form of life—with a single cell. This is the way of growth of everything: Flower seed to flower, and back again; little egg to little bird and back again to egg; egg to tadpole, tadpole to frog and back again to egg. ”

“ So, if we ever wonder whether all the different kinds of insects and other animals could have grown out of one common cell, we have only to think of the strangely different parts that frog plays on the stage of life, in his one little lifetime ”