No More Learning

It is manifest,
then, that the animals above mentioned are in possession of all the
five senses.

All other animals may, with very few exceptions, be comprehended
within four genera: to wit, molluscs, crustaceans, testaceans, and
insects. Of these four genera, the mollusc, the crustacean, and the
insect have all the senses: at all events, they have sight, smell, and
taste. As for insects, both winged and wingless, they can detect the
presence of scented objects afar off, as for instance bees and
snipes detect the presence of honey at a distance; and do so
recognizing it by smell. Many insects are killed by the smell of
brimstone; ants, if the apertures to their dwellings be smeared with
powdered origanum and brimstone, quit their nests; and most insects
may be banished with burnt hart's horn, or better still by the burning
of the gum styrax. The cuttle-fish, the octopus, and the crawfish
may be caught by bait. The octopus, in fact, clings so tightly to
the rocks that it cannot be pulled off, but remains attached even when
the knife is employed to sever it; and yet, if you apply fleabane to
the creature, it drops off at the very smell of it. The facts are
similar in regard to taste. For the food that insects go in quest of
is of diverse kinds, and they do not all delight in the same flavours:
for instance, the bee never settles on a withered or wilted flower,
but on fresh and sweet ones; and the conops or gnat settles only on
acrid substances and not on sweet. The sense of touch, by the way,
as has been remarked, is common to all animals. Testaceans have the
senses of smell and taste. With regard to their possession of the
sense of smell, that is proved by the use of baits, e. g. in the case
of the purple-fish; for this creature is enticed by baits of rancid
meat, which it perceives and is attracted to from a great distance.
The proof that it possesses a sense of taste hangs by the proof of its
sense of smell; for whenever an animal is attracted to a thing by
perceiving its smell, it is sure to like the taste of it. Further, all
animals furnished with a mouth derive pleasure or pain from the
touch of sapid juices.

With regard to sight and hearing, we cannot make statements with
thorough confidence or on irrefutable evidence. However, the solen
or razor-fish, if you make a noise, appears to burrow in the sand, and
to hide himself deeper when he hears the approach of the iron rod (for
the animal, be it observed, juts a little out of its hole, while the
greater part of the body remains within),-and scallops, if you present
your finger near their open valves, close them tight again as though
they could see what you were doing. Furthermore, when fishermen are
laying bait for neritae, they always get to leeward of them, and never
speak a word while so engaged, under the firm impression that the
animal can smell and hear; and they assure us that, if any one
speaks aloud, the creature makes efforts to escape. With regard to
testaceans, of the walking or creeping species the urchin appears to
have the least developed sense of smell; and, of the stationary
species, the ascidian and the barnacle.

So much for the organs of sense in the general run of animals.
We now proceed to treat of voice.

9

Voice and sound are different from one another; and language
differs from voice and sound. The fact is that no animal can give
utterance to voice except by the action of the pharynx, and
consequently such animals as are devoid of lung have no voice; and
language is the articulation of vocal sounds by the instrumentality of
the tongue. Thus, the voice and larynx can emit vocal or vowel sounds;
non-vocal or consonantal sounds are made by the tongue and the lips;
and out of these vocal and non-vocal sounds language is composed.
Consequently, animals that have no tongue at all or that have a tongue
not freely detached, have neither voice nor language; although, by the
way, they may be enabled to make noises or sounds by other organs than
the tongue.

Insects, for instance, have no voice and no language, but they can
emit sound by internal air or wind, though not by the emission of
air or wind; for no insects are capable of respiration. But some of
them make a humming noise, like the bee and the other winged
insects; and others are said to sing, as the cicada. And all these
latter insects make their special noises by means of the membrane that
is underneath the 'hypozoma'-those insects, that is to say, whose body
is thus divided; as for instance, one species of cicada, which makes
the sound by means of the friction of the air. Flies and bees, and the
like, produce their special noise by opening and shutting their
wings in the act of flying; for the noise made is by the friction of
air between the wings when in motion. The noise made by grasshoppers
is produced by rubbing or reverberating with their long hind-legs.

No mollusc or crustacean can produce any natural voice or sound.
Fishes can produce no voice, for they have no lungs, nor windpipe
and pharynx; but they emit certain inarticulate sounds and squeaks,
which is what is called their 'voice', as the lyra or gurnard, and the
sciaena (for these fishes make a grunting kind of noise) and the
caprus or boar-fish in the river Achelous, and the chalcis and the
cuckoo-fish; for the chalcis makes a sort piping sound, and the
cuckoo-fish makes a sound greatly like the cry of the cuckoo, and is
nicknamed from the circumstance. The apparent voice in all these
fishes is a sound caused in some cases by a rubbing motion of their
gills, which by the way are prickly, or in other cases by internal
parts about their bellies; for they all have air or wind inside
them, by rubbing and moving which they produce the sounds. Some
cartilaginous fish seem to squeak.

But in these cases the term 'voice' is inappropriate; the more
correct expression would be 'sound'. For the scallop, when it goes
along supporting itself on the water, which is technically called
'flying', makes a whizzing sound; and so does the sea-swallow or
flying-fish: for this fish flies in the air, clean out of the water,
being furnished with fins broad and long. Just then as in the flight
of birds the sound made by their wings is obviously not voice, so is
it in the case of all these other creatures.

The dolphin, when taken out of the water, gives a squeak and moans
in the air, but these noises do not resemble those above mentioned.
For this creature has a voice (and can therefore utter vocal or
vowel sounds), for it is furnished with a lung and a windpipe; but its
tongue is not loose, nor has it lips, so as to give utterance to an
articulate sound (or a sound of vowel and consonant in combination. )

Of animals which are furnished with tongue and lung, the oviparous
quadrupeds produce a voice, but a feeble one; in some cases, a
shrill piping sound, like the serpent; in others, a thin faint cry; in
others, a low hiss, like the tortoise. The formation of the tongue
in the frog is exceptional. The front part of the tongue, which in
other animals is detached, is tightly fixed in the frog as it is in
all fishes; but the part towards the pharynx is freely detached, and
may, so to speak, be spat outwards, and it is with this that it
makes its peculiar croak. The croaking that goes on in the marsh is
the call of the males to the females at rutting time; and, by the way,
all animals have a special cry for the like end at the like season, as
is observed in the case of goats, swine, and sheep. (The bull-frog
makes its croaking noise by putting its under jaw on a level with
the surface of the water and extending its upper jaw to its utmost
capacity. The tension is so great that the upper jaw becomes
transparent, and the animal's eyes shine through the jaw like lamps;
for, by the way, the commerce of the sexes takes place usually in
the night time. ) Birds can utter vocal sounds; and such of them can
articulate best as have the tongue moderately flat, and also such as
have thin delicate tongues. In some cases, the male and the female
utter the same note; in other cases, different notes. The smaller
birds are more vocal and given to chirping than the larger ones; but
in the pairing season every species of bird becomes particularly
vocal. Some of them call when fighting, as the quail, others cry or
crow when challenging to combat, as the partridge, or when victorious,
as the barn-door cock. In some cases cock-birds and hens sing alike,
as is observed in the nightingale, only that the hen stops singing
when brooding or rearing her young; in other birds, the cocks sing
more than the hens; in fact, with barn-door fowls and quails, the cock
sings and the hen does not.

Viviparous quadrupeds utter vocal sounds of different kinds, but
they have no power of converse. In fact, this power, or language, is
peculiar to man. For while the capability of talking implies the
capability of uttering vocal sounds, the converse does not hold
good. Men that are born deaf are in all cases also dumb; that is, they
can make vocal sounds, but they cannot speak. Children, just as they
have no control over other parts, so have no control, at first, over
the tongue; but it is so far imperfect, and only frees and detaches
itself by degrees, so that in the interval children for the most
part lisp and stutter.

Vocal sounds and modes of language differ according to locality.
Vocal sounds are characterized chiefly by their pitch, whether high or
low, and the kinds of sound capable of being produced are identical
within the limits of one and the same species; but articulate sound,
that one might reasonably designate 'language', differs both in
various animals, and also in the same species according to diversity
of locality; as for instance, some partridges cackle, and some make
a shrill twittering noise. Of little birds, some sing a different note
from the parent birds, if they have been removed from the nest and
have heard other birds singing; and a mother-nightingale has been
observed to give lessons in singing to a young bird, from which
spectacle we might obviously infer that the song of the bird was not
equally congenital with mere voice, but was something capable of
modification and of improvement. Men have the same voice or vocal
sounds, but they differ from one another in speech or language.

The elephant makes a vocal sound of a windlike sort by the mouth
alone, unaided by the trunk, just like the sound of a man panting or
sighing; but, if it employ the trunk as well, the sound produced is
like that of a hoarse trumpet.

10

With regard to the sleeping and waking of animals, all creatures
that are red-blooded and provided with legs give sensible proof that
they go to sleep and that they waken up from sleep; for, as a matter
of fact, all animals that are furnished with eyelids shut them up when
they go to sleep. Furthermore, it would appear that not only do men
dream, but horses also, and dogs, and oxen; aye, and sheep, and goats,
and all viviparous quadrupeds; and dogs show their dreaming by barking
in their sleep. With regard to oviparous animals we cannot be sure
that they dream, but most undoubtedly they sleep. And the same may
be said of water animals, such as fishes, molluscs, crustaceans, to
wit crawfish and the like. These animals sleep without doubt, although
their sleep is of very short duration. The proof of their sleeping
cannot be got from the condition of their eyes-for none of these
creatures are furnished with eyelids-but can be obtained only from
their motionless repose.

Apart from the irritation caused by lice and what are nicknamed
fleas, fish are met with in a state so motionless that one might
easily catch them by hand; and, as a matter of fact, these little
creatures, if the fish remain long in one position, will attack them
in myriads and devour them. For these parasites are found in the
depths of the sea, and are so numerous that they devour any bait
made of fish's flesh if it be left long on the ground at the bottom;
and fishermen often draw up a cluster of them, all clinging on to
the bait.

But it is from the following facts that we may more reasonably
infer that fishes sleep. Very often it is possible to take a fish
off its guard so far as to catch hold of it or to give it a blow
unawares; and all the while that you are preparing to catch or
strike it, the fish is quite still but for a slight motion of the
tail. And it is quite obvious that the animal is sleeping, from its
movements if any disturbance be made during its repose; for it moves
just as you would expect in a creature suddenly awakened. Further,
owing to their being asleep, fish may be captured by torchlight. The
watchmen in the tunny-fishery often take advantage of the fish being
asleep to envelop them in a circle of nets; and it is quite obvious
that they were thus sleeping by their lying still and allowing the
glistening under-parts of their bodies to become visible, while the
capture is taking Place. They sleep in the night-time more than during
the day; and so soundly at night that you may cast the net without
making them stir. Fish, as a general rule, sleep close to the
ground, or to the sand or to a stone at the bottom, or after
concealing themselves under a rock or the ground. Flat fish go to
sleep in the sand; and they can be distinguished by the outlines of
their shapes in the sand, and are caught in this position by being
speared with pronged instruments. The basse, the chrysophrys or
gilt-head, the mullet, and fish of the like sort are often caught in
the daytime by the prong owing to their having been surprised when
sleeping; for it is scarcely probable that fish could be pronged while
awake. Cartilaginous fish sleep at times so soundly that they may be
caught by hand. The dolphin and the whale, and all such as are
furnished with a blow-hole, sleep with the blow-hole over the
surface of the water, and breathe through the blow-hole while they
keep up a quiet flapping of their fins; indeed, some mariners assure
us that they have actually heard the dolphin snoring.

Molluscs sleep like fishes, and crustaceans also. It is plain also
that insects sleep; for there can be no mistaking their condition of
motionless repose. In the bee the fact of its being asleep is very
obvious; for at night-time bees are at rest and cease to hum. But
the fact that insects sleep may be very well seen in the case of
common every-day creatures; for not only do they rest at night-time
from dimness of vision (and, by the way, all hard-eyed creatures see
but indistinctly), but even if a lighted candle be presented they
continue sleeping quite as soundly.

Of all animals man is most given to dreaming. Children and infants
do not dream, but in most cases dreaming comes on at the age of four
or five years. Instances have been known of full-grown men and women
that have never dreamed at all; in exceptional cases of this kind,
it has been observed that when a dream occurs in advanced life it
prognosticates either actual dissolution or a general break-up of
the system.

So much then for sensation and for the phenomena of sleeping and
of awakening.

11

With regard to sex, some animals are divided into male and female,
but others are not so divided but can only be said in a comparative
way to bring forth young and to be pregnant. In animals that live
confined to one spot there is no duality of sex; nor is there such, in
fact, in any testaceans. In molluscs and in crustaceans we find male
and female: and, indeed, in all animals furnished with feet, biped
or quadruped; in short, in all such as by copulation engender either
live young or egg or grub. In the several genera, with however certain
exceptions, there either absolutely is or absolutely is not a
duality of sex. Thus, in quadrupeds the duality is universal, while
the absence of such duality is universal in testaceans, and of these
creatures, as with plants, some individuals are fruitful and some
are not their lying still

But among insects and fishes, some cases are found wholly devoid
of this duality of sex. For instance, the eel is neither male nor
female, and can engender nothing. In fact, those who assert that
eels are at times found with hair-like or worm-like progeny
attached, make only random assertions from not having carefully
noticed the locality of such attachments. For no eel nor animal of
this kind is ever viviparous unless previously oviparous; and no eel
was ever yet seen with an egg. And animals that are viviparous have
their young in the womb and closely attached, and not in the belly;
for, if the embryo were kept in the belly, it would be subjected to
the process of digestion like ordinary food. When people rest
duality of sex in the eel on the assertion that the head of the male
is bigger and longer, and the head of the female smaller and more
snubbed, they are taking diversity of species for diversity of sex.

There are certain fish that are nicknamed the epitragiae, or
capon-fish, and, by the way, fish of this description are found in
fresh water, as the carp and the balagrus. This sort of fish never has
either roe or milt; but they are hard and fat all over, and are
furnished with a small gut; and these fish are regarded as of
super-excellent quality.

Again, just as in testaceans and in plants there is what bears and
engenders, but not what impregnates, so is it, among fishes, with
the psetta, the erythrinus, and the channe; for these fish are in
all cases found furnished with eggs.

As a general rule, in red-blooded animals furnished with feet
and not oviparous, the male is larger and longer-lived than the female
(except with the mule, where the female is longer-lived and bigger
than the male); whereas in oviparous and vermiparous creatures, as
in fishes and in insects, the female is larger than the male; as,
for instance, with the serpent, the phalangium or venom-spider, the
gecko, and the frog. The same difference in size of the sexes is found
in fishes, as, for instance, in the smaller cartilaginous fishes, in
the greater part of the gregarious species, and in all that live in
and about rocks. The fact that the female is longer-lived than the
male is inferred from the fact that female fishes are caught older
than males. Furthermore, in all animals the upper and front parts
are better, stronger, and more thoroughly equipped in the male than in
the female, whereas in the female those parts are the better that
may be termed hinder-parts or underparts. And this statement is
applicable to man and to all vivipara that have feet. Again, the
female is less muscular and less compactly jointed, and more thin
and delicate in the hair-that is, where hair is found; and, where
there is no hair, less strongly furnished in some analogous substance.
And the female is more flaccid in texture of flesh, and more
knock-kneed, and the shin-bones are thinner; and the feet are more
arched and hollow in such animals as are furnished with feet. And with
regard to voice, the female in all animals that are vocal has a
thinner and sharper voice than the male; except, by the way, with
kine, for the lowing and bellowing of the cow has a deeper note than
that of the bull. With regard to organs of defence and offence, such
as teeth, tusks, horns, spurs, and the like, these in some species the
male possesses and the female does not; as, for instance, the hind has
no horns, and where the cock-bird has a spur the hen is entirely
destitute of the organ; and in like manner the sow is devoid of tusks.
In other species such organs are found in both sexes, but are more
perfectly developed in the male; as, for instance, the horn of the
bull is more powerful than the horn of the cow.

Book V

1

As to the parts internal and external that all animals are
furnished withal, and further as to the senses, to voice, and sleep,
and the duality sex, all these topics have now been touched upon. It
now remains for us to discuss, duly and in order, their several
modes of propagation.

These modes are many and diverse, and in some respects are like,
and in other respects are unlike to one another. As we carried on
our previous discussion genus by genus, so we must attempt to follow
the same divisions in our present argument; only that whereas in the
former case we started with a consideration of the parts of man, in
the present case it behoves us to treat of man last of all because
he involves most discussion. We shall commence, then, with testaceans,
and then proceed to crustaceans, and then to the other genera in due
order; and these other genera are, severally, molluscs, and insects,
then fishes viviparous and fishes oviparous, and next birds; and
afterwards we shall treat of animals provided with feet, both such
as are oviparous and such as are viviparous, and we may observe that
some quadrupeds are viviparous, but that the only viviparous biped
is man.

Now there is one property that animals are found to have in common
with plants. For some plants are generated from the seed of plants,
whilst other plants are self-generated through the formation of some
elemental principle similar to a seed; and of these latter plants some
derive their nutriment from the ground, whilst others grow inside
other plants, as is mentioned, by the way, in my treatise on Botany.
So with animals, some spring from parent animals according to their
kind, whilst others grow spontaneously and not from kindred stock; and
of these instances of spontaneous generation some come from putrefying
earth or vegetable matter, as is the case with a number of insects,
while others are spontaneously generated in the inside of animals
out of the secretions of their several organs.

In animals where generation goes by heredity, wherever there is
duality of sex generation is due to copulation. In the group of
fishes, however, there are some that are neither male nor female,
and these, while they are identical generically with other fish,
differ from them specifically; but there are others that stand
altogether isolated and apart by themselves. Other fishes there are
that are always female and never male, and from them are conceived
what correspond to the wind-eggs in birds. Such eggs, by the way, in
birds are all unfruitful; but it is their nature to be independently
capable of generation up to the egg-stage, unless indeed there be some
other mode than the one familiar to us of intercourse with the male;
but concerning these topics we shall treat more precisely later on. In
the case of certain fishes, however, after they have spontaneously
generated eggs, these eggs develop into living animals; only that in
certain of these cases development is spontaneous, and in others is
not independent of the male; and the method of proceeding in regard to
these matters will set forth by and by, for the method is somewhat
like to the method followed in the case of birds. But whensoever
creatures are spontaneously generated, either in other animals, in the
soil, or on plants, or in the parts of these, and when such are
generated male and female, then from the copulation of such
spontaneously generated males and females there is generated a
something-a something never identical in shape with the parents, but a
something imperfect. For instance, the issue of copulation in lice
is nits; in flies, grubs; in fleas, grubs egg-like in shape; and
from these issues the parent-species is never reproduced, nor is any
animal produced at all, but the like nondescripts only.

First, then, we must proceed to treat of 'covering' in regard to
such animals as cover and are covered; and then after this to treat in
due order of other matters, both the exceptional and those of
general occurrence.

2

Those animals, then, cover and are covered in which there is a
duality of sex, and the modes of covering in such animals are not in
all cases similar nor analogous. For the red-blooded animals that
are viviparous and furnished with feet have in all cases organs
adapted for procreation, but the sexes do not in all cases come
together in like manner. Thus, opisthuretic animals copulate with a
rearward presentment, as is the case with the lion, the hare, and
the lynx; though, by the way, in the case of the hare, the female is
often observed to cover the male.

The case is similar in most other such animals; that is to say,
the majority of quadrupeds copulate as best they can, the male
mounting the female; and this is the only method of copulating adopted
by birds, though there are certain diversities of method observed even
in birds. For in some cases the female squats on the ground and the
male mounts on top of her, as is the case with the cock and hen
bustard, and the barn-door cock and hen; in other cases, the male
mounts without the female squatting, as with the male and female
crane; for, with these birds, the male mounts on to the back of the
female and covers her, and like the cock-sparrow consumes but very
little time in the operation. Of quadrupeds, bears perform the
operation lying prone on one another, in the same way as other
quadrupeds do while standing up; that is to say, with the belly of the
male pressed to the back of the female. Hedgehogs copulate erect,
belly to belly.

With regard to large-sized vivipara, the hind only very rarely
sustains the mounting of the stag to the full conclusion of the
operation, and the same is the case with the cow as regards the
bull, owing to the rigidity of the penis of the bull. In point of
fact, the females of these animals elicit the sperm of the male in the
act of withdrawing from underneath him; and, by the way, this
phenomenon has been observed in the case of the stag and hind,
domesticated, of course. Covering with the wolf is the same as with
the dog. Cats do not copulate with a rearward presentment on the
part of the female, but the male stands erect and the female puts
herself underneath him; and, by the way, the female cat is
peculiarly lecherous, and wheedles the male on to sexual commerce, and
caterwauls during the operation. Camels copulate with the female in
a sitting posture, and the male straddles over and covers her, not
with the hinder presentment on the female's part but like the other
quadrupeds mentioned above, and they pass the whole day long in the
operation; when thus engaged they retire to lonely spots, and none but
their keeper dare approach them. And, be it observed, the penis of the
camel is so sinewy that bow-strings are manufactured out of it.
Elephants, also, copulate in lonely places, and especially by
river-sides in their usual haunts; the female squats down, and
straddles with her legs, and the male mounts and covers her. The
seal covers like all opisthuretic animals, and in this species the
copulation extends over a lengthened time, as is the case with the dog
and bitch; and the penis in the male seal is exceptionally large.

3

Oviparous quadrupeds cover one another in the same way. That is to
say, in some cases the male mounts the female precisely as in the
viviparous animals, as is observed in both the land and the sea
tortoise. . . . And these creatures have an organ in which the ducts
converge, and with which they perform the act of copulation, as is
also observed in the toad, the frog, and all other animals of the same
group.

4

Long animals devoid of feet, like serpents and muraenae,
intertwine in coition, belly to belly. And, in fact, serpents coil
round one another so tightly as to present the appearance of a
single serpent with a pair of heads. The same mode is followed by
the saurians; that is to say, they coil round one another in the act
of coition.

5

All fishes, with the exception of the flat selachians, lie down
side by side, and copulate belly to belly. Fishes, however, that are
flat and furnished with tails-as the ray, the trygon, and the
like-copulate not only in this way, but also, where the tail from
its thinness is no impediment, by mounting of the male upon the
female, belly to back. But the rhina or angel-fish, and other like
fishes where the tail is large, copulate only by rubbing against one
another sideways, belly to belly. Some men assure us that they have
seen some of the selachia copulating hindways, dog and bitch. In the
cartilaginous species the female is larger than the male; and the same
is the case with other fishes for the most part. And among
cartilaginous fishes are included, besides those already named, the
bos, the lamia, the aetos, the narce or torpedo, the fishing-frog, and
all the galeodes or sharks and dogfish. Cartilaginous fishes, then, of
all kinds, have in many instances been observed copulating in the
way above mentioned; for, by the way, in viviparous animals the
process of copulation is of longer duration than in the ovipara.

It is the same with the dolphin and with all cetaceans; that
is to say, they come side by side, male and female, and copulate,
and the act extends over a time which is neither short nor very long.

Again, in cartilaginous fishes the male, in some species,
differs from the female in the fact that he is furnished with two
appendages hanging down from about the exit of the residuum, and
that the female is not so furnished; and this distinction between
the sexes is observed in all the species of the sharks and dog-fish.

Now neither fishes nor any animals devoid of feet are
furnished with testicles, but male serpents and male fishes have a
pair of ducts which fill with milt or sperm at the rutting season, and
discharge, in all cases, a milk-like juice. These ducts unite, as in
birds; for birds, by the way, have their testicles in their
interior, and so have all ovipara that are furnished with feet. And
this union of the ducts is so far continued and of such extension as
to enter the receptive organ in the female.

In viviparous animals furnished with feet there is outwardly one
and the same duct for the sperm and the liquid residuum; but there are
separate ducts internally, as has been observed in the differentiation
of the organs. And with such animals as are not viviparous the same
passage serves for the discharge also of the solid residuum; although,
internally, there are two passages, separate but near to one
another. And these remarks apply to both male and female; for these
animals are unprovided with a bladder except in the case of the
tortoise; and the she-tortoise, though furnished with a bladder, has
only one passage; and tortoises, by the way, belong to the ovipara.

In the case of oviparous fishes the process of coition is less
open to observation. In point of fact, some are led by the want of
actual observation to surmise that the female becomes impregnated by
swallowing the seminal fluid of the male. And there can be no doubt
that this proceeding on the part of the female is often witnessed; for
at the rutting season the females follow the males and perform this
operation, and strike the males with their mouths under the belly, and
the males are thereby induced to part with the sperm sooner and more
plentifully. And, further, at the spawning season the males go in
pursuit of the females, and, as the female spawns, the males swallow
the eggs; and the species is continued in existence by the spawn
that survives this process. On the coast of Phoenicia they take
advantage of these instinctive propensities of the two sexes to
catch both one and the other: that is to say, by using the male of the
grey mullet as a decoy they collect and net the female, and by using
the female, the male.

The repeated observation of this phenomenon has led to the
notion that the process was equivalent to coition, but the fact is
that a similar phenomenon is observable in quadrupeds. For at the
rutting seasons both the males and the females take to running at
their genitals, and the two sexes take to smelling each other at those
parts. (With partridges, by the way, if the female gets to leeward
of the male, she becomes thereby impregnated. And often when they
happen to be in heat she is affected in this wise by the voice of
the male, or by his breathing down on her as he flies overhead; and,
by the way, both the male and the female partridge keep the mouth wide
open and protrude the tongue in the process of coition. )

The actual process of copulation on the part of oviparous fishes
is seldom accurately observed, owing to the fact that they very soon
fall aside and slip asunder. But, for all that, the process has been
observed to take place in the manner above described.

6

Molluscs, such as the octopus, the sepia, and the calamary, have
sexual intercourse all in the same way; that is to say, they unite
at the mouth, by an interlacing of their tentacles. When, then, the
octopus rests its so-called head against the ground and spreads abroad
its tentacles, the other sex fits into the outspreading of these
tentacles, and the two sexes then bring their suckers into mutual
connexion.

Some assert that the male has a kind of penis in one of his
tentacles, the one in which are the largest suckers; and they
further assert that the organ is tendinous in character, growing
attached right up to the middle of the tentacle, and that the latter
enables it to enter the nostril or funnel of the female.

Now cuttle-fish and calamaries swim about closely intertwined,
with mouths and tentacles facing one another and fitting closely
together, and swim thus in opposite directions; and they fit their
so-called nostrils into one another, and the one sex swims backwards
and the other frontwards during the operation. And the female lays its
spawn by the so-called 'blow-hole'; and, by the way, some declare that
it is at this organ that the coition really takes place.

7

Crustaceans copulate, as the crawfish, the lobster, the carid
and the like, just like the opisthuretic quadrupeds, when the one
animal turns up its tail and the other puts his tail on the other's
tail. Copulation takes place in the early spring, near to the shore;
and, in fact, the process has often been observed in the case of all
these animals. Sometimes it takes place about the time when the figs
begin to ripen. Lobsters and carids copulate in like manner.

Crabs copulate at the front parts of one another, belly to
belly, throwing their overlapping opercula to meet one another:
first the smaller crab mounts the larger at the rear; after he has
mounted, the larger one turns on one side. Now, the female differs
in no respect from the male except in the circumstance that its
operculum is larger, more elevated, and more hairy, and into this
operculum it spawns its eggs and in the same neighbourhood is the
outlet of the residuum. In the copulative process of these animals
there is no protrusion of a member from one animal into the other.

8

Insects copulate at the hinder end, and the smaller individuals
mount the larger; and the smaller individual is I I is the male. The
female pushes from underneath her sexual organ into the body of the
male above, this being the reverse of the operation observed in
other creatures; and this organ in the case of some insects appears to
be disproportionately large when compared to the size of the body, and
that too in very minute creatures; in some insects the disproportion
is not so striking. This phenomenon may be witnessed if any one will
pull asunder flies that are copulating; and, by the way, these
creatures are, under the circumstances, averse to separation; for
the intercourse of the sexes in their case is of long duration, as may
be observed with common everyday insects, such as the fly and the
cantharis. They all copulate in the manner above described, the fly,
the cantharis, the sphondyle, (the phalangium spider) any others of
the kind that copulate at all. The phalangia-that is to say, such of
the species as spin webs-perform the operation in the following way:
the female takes hold of the suspended web at the middle and gives a
pull, and the male gives a counter pull; this operation they repeat
until they are drawn in together and interlaced at the hinder ends;
for, by the way, this mode of copulation suits them in consequence
of the rotundity of their stomachs.

So much for the modes of sexual intercourse in all animals; but,
with regard to the same phenomenon, there are definite laws followed
as regards the season of the year and the age of the animal.

Animals in general seem naturally disposed to this intercourse
at about the same period of the year, and that is when winter is
changing into summer. And this is the season of spring, in which
almost all things that fly or walk or swim take to pairing. Some
animals pair and breed in autumn also and in winter, as is the case
with certain aquatic animals and certain birds. Man pairs and breeds
at all seasons, as is the case also with domesticated animals, owing
to the shelter and good feeding they enjoy: that is to say, with those
whose period of gestation is also comparatively brief, as the sow
and the bitch, and with those birds that breed frequently. Many
animals time the season of intercourse with a view to the right
nurture subsequently of their young.
In the human species, the male is
more under sexual excitement in winter, and the female in summer.

With birds the far greater part, as has been said, pair and
breed during the spring and early summer, with the exception of the
halcyon.

The halcyon breeds at the season of the winter solstice.
Accordingly, when this season is marked with calm weather, the name of
'halcyon days' is given to the seven days preceding, and to as many
following, the solstice; as Simonides the poet says:

God lulls for fourteen days the winds to sleep

In winter; and this temperate interlude

Men call the Holy Season, when the deep

Cradles the mother Halcyon and her brood.

And these days are calm, when southerly winds prevail at the
solstice, northerly ones having been the accompaniment of the Pleiads.
The halcyon is said to take seven days for building her nest, and
the other seven for laying and hatching her eggs. In our country there
are not always halcyon days about the time of the winter solstice, but
in the Sicilian seas this season of calm is almost periodical. The
bird lays about five eggs.

9

(The aithyia, or diver, and the larus, or gull, lay their eggs
on rocks bordering on the sea, two or three at a time; but the gull
lays in the summer, and the diver at the beginning of spring, just
after the winter solstice, and it broods over its eggs as birds do
in general. And neither of these birds resorts to a hiding-place. )

The halcyon is the most rarely seen of all birds. It is seen
only about the time of the setting of the Pleiads and the winter
solstice. When ships are lying at anchor in the roads, it will hover
about a vessel and then disappear in a moment, and Stesichorus in
one of his poems alludes to this peculiarity. The nightingale also
breeds at the beginning of summer, and lays five or six eggs; from
autumn until spring it retires to a hiding-place.

Insects copulate and breed in winter also, that is when the
weather is fine and south winds prevail; such, I mean, as do not
hibernate, as the fly and the ant. The greater part of wild animals
bring forth once and once only in the year, except in the case of
animals like the hare, where the female can become superfoetally
impregnated.

In like manner the great majority of fishes breed only once a
year, like the shoal-fishes (or, in other words, such as are caught in
nets), the tunny, the pelamys, the grey mullet, the chalcis, the
mackerel, the sciaena, the psetta and the like, with the exception
of the labrax or basse; for this fish (alone amongst those
mentioned) breeds twice a year, and the second brood is the weaker
of the two. The trichias and the rock-fishes breed twice a year; the
red mullet breeds thrice a year, and is exceptional in this respect.
This conclusion in regard to the red mullet is inferred from the
spawn; for the spawn of the fish may be seen in certain places at
three different times of the year. The scorpaena breeds twice a
year. The sargue breeds twice, in the spring and in the autumn. The
saupe breeds once a year only, in the autumn. The female tunny
breeds only once a year, but owing to the fact that the fish in some
cases spawn early and in others late, it looks as though the fish bred
twice over. The first spawning takes place in December before the
solstice, and the latter spawning in the spring. The male tunny
differs from the female in being unprovided with the fin beneath the
belly which is called aphareus.

10

Of cartilaginous fishes, the rhina or angelfish is the only one
that breeds twice; for it breeds at the beginning of autumn, and at
the setting of the Pleiads: and, of the two seasons, it is in better
condition in the autumn. It engenders at a birth seven or eight young.
Certain of the dog-fishes, for example the spotted dog, seem to
breed twice a month, and this results from the circumstance that the
eggs do not all reach maturity at the same time.

Some fishes breed at all seasons, as the muraena. This animal
lays a great number of eggs at a time; and the young when hatched
are very small but grow with great rapidity, like the young of the
hippurus, for these fishes from being diminutive at the outset grow
with exceptional rapidity to an exceptional size. (Be it observed that
the muraena breeds at all seasons, but the hippurus only in the
spring. The smyrus differs from the smyraena; for the muraena is
mottled and weakly, whereas the smyrus is strong and of one uniform
colour, and the colour resembles that of the pine-tree, and the animal
has teeth inside and out. They say that in this case, as in other
similar ones, the one is the male, and the other the female, of a
single species. They come out on to the land, and are frequently
caught. ) Fishes, then, as a general rule, attain their full growth
with great rapidity, but this is especially the case, among small
fishes, with the coracine or crow-fish: it spawns, by the way, near
the shore, in weedy and tangled spots. The orphus also, or
sea-perch, is small at first, and rapidly attains a great size. The
pelamys and the tunny breed in the Euxine, and nowhere else. The
cestreus or mullet, the chrysophrys or gilt-head, and the labrax or
basse, breed best where rivers run into the sea. The orcys or
large-sized tunny, the scorpis, and many other species spawn in the
open sea.

11

Fish for the most part breed some time or other during the three
months between the middle of March and the middle of June. Some few
breed in autumn: as, for instance, the saupe and the sargus, and
such others of this sort as breed shortly before the autumn equinox;
likewise the electric ray and the angel-fish. Other fishes breed
both in winter and in summer, as was previously observed: as, for
instance, in winter-time the basse, the grey mullet, and the belone or
pipe-fish; and in summer-time, from the middle of June to the middle
of July, the female tunny, about the time of the summer solstice;
and the tunny lays a sac-like enclosure in which are contained a
number of small eggs. The ryades or shoal-fishes breed in summer.

Of the grey mullets, the chelon begins to be in roe between
the middle of November and the middle of December; as also the sargue,
and the smyxon or myxon, and the cephalus; and their period of
gestation is thirty days. And, by the way, some of the grey mullet
species are not produced from copulation, but grow spontaneously
from mud and sand.

As a general rule, then, fishes are in roe in the spring-time;
while some, as has been said, are so in summer, in autumn, or in
winter. But whereas the impregnation in the spring-time follows a
general law, impregnation in the other seasons does not follow the
same rule either throughout or within the limits of one genus; and,
further, conception in these variant seasons is not so prolific.
And, indeed, we must bear this in mind, that just as with plants and
quadrupeds diversity of locality has much to do not only with
general physical health but also with the comparative frequency of
sexual intercourse and generation, so also with regard to fishes
locality of itself has much to do not only in regard to the size and
vigour of the creature, but also in regard to its parturition and
its copulations, causing the same species to breed oftener in one
place and seldomer in another.

12

The molluscs also breed in spring. Of the marine molluscs one of
the first to breed is the sepia. It spawns at all times of the day and
its period of gestation is fifteen days. After the female has laid her
eggs, the male comes and discharges the milt over the eggs, and the
eggs thereupon harden. And the two sexes of this animal go about in
pairs, side by side; and the male is more mottled and more black on
the back than the female.

The octopus pairs in winter and breeds in spring, lying hidden
for about two months. Its spawn is shaped like a vine-tendril, and
resembles the fruit of the white poplar; the creature is
extraordinarily prolific, for the number of individuals that come from
the spawn is something incalculable. The male differs from the
female in the fact that its head is longer, and that the organ
called by the fishermen its penis, in the tentacle, is white. The
female, after laying her eggs, broods over them, and in consequence
gets out of condition, by reason of not going in quest of food
during the hatching period.

The purple murex breeds about springtime, and the ceryx at the
close of the winter. And, as a general rule, the testaceans are
found to be furnished with their so-called eggs in spring-time and
in autumn, with the exception of the edible urchin; for this animal
has the so-called eggs in most abundance in these seasons, but at no
season is unfurnished with them; and it is furnished with them in
especial abundance in warm weather or when a full moon is in the
sky. Only, by the way, these remarks do not apply to the sea-urchin
found in the Pyrrhaean Straits, for this urchin is at its best for
table purposes in the winter; and these urchins are small but full
of eggs.

Snails are found by observations to become in all cases
impregnated about the same season.

13

(Of birds the wild species, as has been stated, as a general
rule pair and breed only once a year. The swallow, however, and the
blackbird breed twice. With regard to the blackbird, however, its
first brood is killed by inclemency of weather (for it is the earliest
of all birds to breed), but the second brood it usually succeeds in
rearing.

Birds that are domesticated or that are capable of domestication
breed frequently, just as the common pigeon breeds all through the
summer, and as is seen in the barn-door hen; for the barn-door cock
and hen have intercourse, and the hen breeds, at all seasons alike:
excepting by the way, during the days about the winter solstice.

Of the pigeon family there are many diversities; for the peristera
or common pigeon is not identical with the peleias or rock-pigeon.
In other words, the rock-pigeon is smaller than the common pigeon, and
is less easily domesticated; it is also black, and small, red-footed
and rough-footed; and in consequence of these peculiarities it is
neglected by the pigeon-fancier. The largest of all the pigeon species
is the phatta or ring-dove; and the next in size is the oenas or
stock-dove; and the stock-dove is a little larger than the common
pigeon. The smallest of all the species is the turtle-dove. Pigeons
breed and hatch at all seasons, if they are furnished with a sunny
place and all requisites; unless they are so furnished, they breed
only in the summer. The spring brood is the best, or the autumn brood.
At all events, without doubt, the produce of the hot season, the
summer brood, is the poorest of the three. )

14

Further, animals differ from one another in regard to the time
of life that is best adapted for sexual intercourse.

To begin with, in most animals the secretion of the seminal
fluid and its generative capacity are not phenomena simultaneously
manifested, but manifested successively. Thus, in all animals, the
earliest secretion of sperm is unfruitful, or if it be fruitful the
issue is comparatively poor and small. And this phenomenon is
especially observable in man, in viviparous quadrupeds, and in
birds; for in the case of man and the quadruped the offspring is
smaller, and in the case of the bird, the egg.

For animals that copulate, of one and the same species, the
age for maturity is in most species tolerably uniform, unless it
occurs prematurely by reason of abnormality, or is postponed by
physical injury.

In man, then, maturity is indicated by a change of the tone of
voice, by an increase in size and an alteration in appearance of the
sexual organs, as also in an increase of size and alteration in
appearance of the breasts; and above all, in the hair-growth at the
pubes. Man begins to possess seminal fluid about the age of
fourteen, and becomes generatively capable at about the age of
twenty-one years.

In other animals there is no hair-growth at the pubes (for
some animals have no hair at all, and others have none on the belly,
or less on the belly than on the back), but still, in some animals the
change of voice is quite obvious; and in some animals other organs
give indication of the commencing secretion of the sperm and the onset
of generative capacity. As a general rule the female is
sharper-toned in voice than the male, and the young animal than the
elder; for, by the way, the stag has a much deeper-toned bay than
the hind. Moreover, the male cries chiefly at rutting time, and the
female under terror and alarm; and the cry of the female is short, and
that of the male prolonged. With dogs also, as they grow old, the tone
of the bark gets deeper.

There is a difference observable also in the neighings of
horses. That is to say, the female foal has a thin small neigh, and
the male foal a small neigh, yet bigger and deeper-toned than that
of the female, and a louder one as time goes on. And when the young
male and female are two years old and take to breeding, the neighing
of the stallion becomes loud and deep, and that of the mare louder and
shriller than heretofore; and this change goes on until they reach the
age of about twenty years; and after this time the neighing in both
sexes becomes weaker and weaker.

As a rule, then, as was stated, the voice of the male differs
from the voice of the female, in animals where the voice admits of a
continuous and prolonged sound, in the fact that the note in the
male voice is more deep and bass; not, however, in all animals, for
the contrary holds good in the case of some, as for instance in
kine: for here the cow has a deeper note than the bull, and the calves
a deeper note than the cattle. And we can thus understand the change
of voice in animals that undergo gelding; for male animals that
undergo this process assume the characters of the female.

The following are the ages at which various animals become
capacitated for sexual commerce. The ewe and the she-goat are sexually
mature when one year old, and this statement is made more
confidently in respect to the she-goat than to the ewe; the ram and
the he-goat are sexually mature at the same age. The progeny of very
young individuals among these animals differs from that of other
males: for the males improve in the course of the second year, when
they become fully mature. The boar and the sow are capable of
intercourse when eight months old, and the female brings forth when
one year old, the difference corresponding to her period of gestation.
The boar is capable of generation when eight months old, but, with a
sire under a year in age, the litter is apt to be a poor one. The
ages, however, are not invariable; now and then the boar and the sow
are capable of intercourse when four months old, and are capable of
producing a litter which can be reared when six months old; but at
times the boar begins to be capable of intercourse when ten months. He
continues sexually mature until he is three years old. The dog and the
bitch are, as a rule, sexually capable and sexually receptive when a
year old, and sometimes when eight months old; but the priority in
date is more common with the dog than with the bitch. The period of
gestation with the bitch is sixty days, or sixty-one, or sixty-two, or
sixty-three at the utmost; the period is never under sixty days, or,
if it is, the litter comes to no good. The bitch, after delivering a
litter, submits to the male in six months, but not before. The horse
and the mare are, at the earliest, sexually capable and sexually
mature when two years old; the issue, however, of parents of this
age is small and poor. As a general rule these animals are sexually
capable when three years old, and they grow better for breeding
purposes until they reach twenty years. The stallion is sexually
capable up to the age of thirty-three years, and the mare up to forty,
so that, in point of fact, the animals are sexually capable all
their lives long; for the stallion, as a rule, lives for about
thirty-five years, and the mare for a little over forty; although,
by the way, a horse has known to live to the age of seventy-five.
The ass and the she-ass are sexually capable when thirty months old;
but, as a rule, they are not generatively mature until they are
three years old, or three years and a half. An instance has been known
of a she-ass bearing and bringing forth a foal when only a year old. A
cow has been known to calve when only a year old, and the calf grew as
big as might be expected, but no more. So much for the dates in time
at which these animals attain to generative capacity.

In the human species, the male is generative, at the longest, up
to seventy years, and the female up to fifty; but such extended
periods are rare. As a rule, the male is generative up to the age of
sixty-five, and to the age of forty-five the female is capable of
conception.

The ewe bears up to eight years, and, if she be carefully
tended, up to eleven years; in fact, the ram and the ewe are
sexually capable pretty well all their lives long. He-goats, if they
be fat, are more or less unserviceable for breeding; and this, by
the way, is the reason why country folk say of a vine when it stops
bearing that it is 'running the goat'. However, if an over-fat he-goat
be thinned down, he becomes sexually capable and generative.

Rams single out the oldest ewes for copulation, and show no
regard for the young ones. And, as has been stated, the issue of the
younger ewes is poorer than that of the older ones.

The boar is good for breeding purposes until he is three years
of age; but after that age his issue deteriorates, for after that
age his vigour is on the decline. The boar is most capable after a
good feed, and with the first sow it mounts; if poorly fed or put to
many females, the copulation is abbreviated, and the litter is
comparatively poor. The first litter of the sow is the fewest in
number; at the second litter she is at her prime. The animal, as it
grows old, continues to breed, but the sexual desire abates. When they
reach fifteen years, they become unproductive, and are getting old. If
a sow be highly fed, it is all the more eager for sexual commerce,
whether old or young; but, if it be over-fattened in pregnancy, it
gives the less milk after parturition. With regard to the age of the
parents, the litter is the best when they are in their prime; but with
regard to the seasons of the year, the litter is the best that comes
at the beginning of winter; and the summer litter the poorest,
consisting as it usually does of animals small and thin and flaccid.
The boar, if it be well fed, is sexually capable at all hours, night
and day; but otherwise is peculiarly salacious early in the morning.
As it grows old the sexual passion dies away, as we have already
remarked. Very often a boar, when more or less impotent from age or
debility, finding itself unable to accomplish the sexual commerce with
due speed, and growing fatigued with the standing posture, will roll
the sow over on the ground, and the pair will conclude the operation
side by side of one another. The sow is sure of conception if it drops
its lugs in rutting time; if the ears do not thus drop, it may have to
rut a second time before impregnation takes place.

Bitches do not submit to the male throughout their lives, but
only until they reach a certain maturity of years. As a general
rule, they are sexually receptive and conceptive until they are twelve
years old; although, by the way, cases have been known where dogs
and bitches have been respectively procreative and conceptive to the
ages of eighteen and even of twenty years. But, as a rule, age
diminishes the capability of generation and of conception with these
animals as with all others.

The female of the camel is opisthuretic, and submits to the male
in the way above described; and the season for copulation in Arabia is
about the month of October. Its period of gestation is twelve
months; and it is never delivered of more than one foal at a time. The
female becomes sexually receptive and the male sexually capable at the
age of three years. After parturition, an interval of a year elapses
before the female is again receptive to the male.

The female elephant becomes sexually receptive when ten years
old at the youngest, and when fifteen at the oldest; and the male is
sexually capable when five years old, or six. The season for
intercourse is spring. The male allows an interval of three years to
elapse after commerce with a female: and, after it has once
impregnated a female, it has no intercourse with her again. The period
of gestation with the female is two years; and only one young animal
is produced at a time, in other words it is uniparous. And the
embryo is the size of a calf two or three months old.

15

So much for the copulations of such animals as copulate.

We now proceed to treat of generation both with respect to
copulating and non-copulating animals, and we shall commence with
discussing the subject of generation in the case of the testaceans.

The testacean is almost the only genus that throughout all its
species is non-copulative.

The porphyrae, or purple murices, gather together to some one
place in the spring-time, and deposit the so-called 'honeycomb'.
This substance resembles the comb, only that it is not so neat and
delicate; and looks as though a number of husks of white chick-peas
were all stuck together. But none of these structures has any open
passage, and the porphyra does not grow out of them, but these and all
other testaceans grow out of mud and decaying matter. The substance,
is, in fact, an excretion of the porphyra and the ceryx; for it is
deposited by the ceryx as well. Such, then, of the testaceans as
deposit the honeycomb are generated spontaneously like all other
testaceans, but they certainly come in greater abundance in places
where their congeners have been living previously. At the commencement
of the process of depositing the honeycomb, they throw off a
slippery mucus, and of this the husklike formations are composed.
These formations, then, all melt and deposit their contents on the
ground, and at this spot there are found on the ground a number of
minute porphyrae, and porphyrae are caught at times with these
animalculae upon them, some of which are too small to be
differentiated in form. If the porphyrae are caught before producing
this honey-comb, they sometimes go through the process in
fishing-creels, not here and there in the baskets, but gathering to
some one spot all together, just as they do in the sea; and owing to
the narrowness of their new quarters they cluster together like a
bunch of grapes.

There are many species of the purple murex; and some are
large, as those found off Sigeum and Lectum; others are small, as
those found in the Euripus, and on the coast of Caria. And those
that are found in bays are large and rough; in most of them the
peculiar bloom from which their name is derived is dark to
blackness, in others it is reddish and small in size; some of the
large ones weigh upwards of a mina apiece. But the specimens that
are found along the coast and on the rocks are small-sized, and the
bloom in their case is of a reddish hue. Further, as a general rule,
in northern waters the bloom is blackish, and in southern waters of
a reddish hue. The murex is caught in the spring-time when engaged
in the construction of the honeycomb; but it is not caught at any time
about the rising of the dog-star, for at that period it does not feed,
but conceals itself and burrows. The bloom of the animal is situated
between the mecon (or quasi-liver) and the neck, and the co-attachment
of these is an intimate one. In colour it looks like a white membrane,
and this is what people extract; and if it be removed and squeezed
it stains your hand with the colour of the bloom. There is a kind of
vein that runs through it, and this quasi-vein would appear to be in
itself the bloom. And the qualities, by the way, of this organ are
astringent. It is after the murex has constructed the honeycomb that
the bloom is at its worst. Small specimens they break in pieces,
shells and all, for it is no easy matter to extract the organ; but
in dealing with the larger ones they first strip off the shell and
then abstract the bloom. For this purpose the neck and mecon are
separated, for the bloom lies in between them, above the so-called
stomach; hence the necessity of separating them in abstracting the
bloom. Fishermen are anxious always to break the animal in pieces
while it is yet alive, for, if it die before the process is completed,
it vomits out the bloom; and for this reason the fishermen keep the
animals in creels, until they have collected a sufficient number and
can attend to them at their leisure. Fishermen in past times used
not to lower creels or attach them to the bait, so that very often the
animal got dropped off in the pulling up; at present, however, they
always attach a basket, so that if the animal fall off it is not lost.
The animal is more inclined to slip off the bait if it be full inside;
if it be empty it is difficult to shake it off. Such are the phenomena
connected with the porphyra or murex.

The same phenomena are manifested by the ceryx or trumpet-shell;
and the seasons are the same in which the phenomena are observable.
Both animals, also, the murex and the ceryx, have their opercula
similarly situated-and, in fact, all the stromboids, and this is
congenital with them all; and they feed by protruding the so-called
tongue underneath the operculum. The tongue of the murex is bigger
than one's finger, and by means of it, it feeds, and perforates
conchylia and the shells of its own kind. Both the murex and the ceryx
are long lived. The murex lives for about six years; and the yearly
increase is indicated by a distinct interval in the spiral convolution
of the shell.

The mussel also constructs a honeycomb.

With regard to the limnostreae, or lagoon oysters, wherever you
have slimy mud there you are sure to find them beginning to grow.
Cockles and clams and razor-fishes and scallops row spontaneously in
sandy places. The pinna grows straight up from its tuft of anchoring
fibres in sandy and slimy places; these creatures have inside them a
parasite nicknamed the pinna-guard, in some cases a small carid and in
other cases a little crab; if the pinna be deprived of this
pinna-guard it soon dies.

As a general rule, then, all testaceans grow by spontaneous
generation in mud, differing from one another according to the
differences of the material; oysters growing in slime, and cockles and
the other testaceans above mentioned on sandy bottoms; and in the
hollows of the rocks the ascidian and the barnacle, and common
sorts, such as the limpet and the nerites. All these animals grow with
great rapidity, especially the murex and the scallop; for the murex
and the scallop attain their full growth in a year. In some of the
testaceans white crabs are found, very diminutive in size; they are
most numerous in the trough shaped mussel. In the pinna also is
found the so-called pinna-guard. They are found also in the scallop
and in the oyster; these parasites never appear to grow in size.
Fishermen declare that the parasite is congenital with the larger
animal. (Scallops burrow for a time in the sand, like the murex. )

(Shell-fish, then, grow in the way above mentioned; and some
of them grow in shallow water, some on the sea-shore, some in rocky
places, some on hard and stony ground, and some in sandy places. ) Some
shift about from place to place, others remain permanent on one
spot. Of those that keep to one spot the pinnae are rooted to the
ground; the razor-fish and the clam keep to the same locality, but are
not so rooted; but still, if forcibly removed they die.

(The star-fish is naturally so warm that whatever it lays hold
of is found, when suddenly taken away from the animal, to have
undergone a process like boiling. Fishermen say that the star-fish
is a great pest in the Strait of Pyrrha. In shape it resembles a
star as seen in an ordinary drawing. The so-called 'lungs' are
generated spontaneously. The shells that painters use are a good
deal thicker, and the bloom is outside the shell on the surface. These
creatures are mostly found on the coast of Caria. )

The hermit-crab grows spontaneously out of soil and slime, and
finds its way into untenanted shells. As it grows it shifts to a
larger shell, as for instance into the shell of the nerites, or of the
strombus or the like, and very often into the shell of the small
ceryx. After entering new shell, it carries it about, and begins again
to feed, and, by and by, as it grows, it shifts again into another
larger one.

16

Moreover, the animals that are unfurnished with shells grow
spontaneously, like the testaceans, as, for instance, the
sea-nettles and the sponges in rocky caves.

Of the sea-nettle, or sea-anemone, there are two species; and of
these one species lives in hollows and never loosens its hold upon the
rocks, and the other lives on smooth flat reefs, free and detached,
and shifts its position from time to time. (Limpets also detach
themselves, and shift from place to place. )

In the chambered cavities of sponges pinna-guards or parasites are
found. And over the chambers there is a kind of spider's web, by the
opening and closing of which they catch mute fishes; that is to say,
they open the web to let the fish get in, and close it again to entrap
them.

Of sponges there are three species; the first is of loose porous
texture, the second is close textured, the third, which is nicknamed
'the sponge of Achilles', is exceptionally fine and close-textured and
strong. This sponge is used as a lining to helmets and greaves, for
the purpose of deadening the sound of the blow; and this is a very
scarce species. Of the close textured sponges such as are particularly
hard and rough are nicknamed 'goats'.

Sponges grow spontaneously either attached to a rock or on
sea-beaches, and they get their nutriment in slime: a proof of this
statement is the fact that when they are first secured they are
found to be full of slime. This is characteristic of all living
creatures that get their nutriment by close local attachment. And,
by the way, the close-textured sponges are weaker than the more openly
porous ones because their attachment extends over a smaller area.