76 plint's NATURAL HISTORY. [Book IX. 



jaw only, and pastern bones on the feet, produce tallow or 

 suet. Those, on the other hand, which are cloven-footed, or 

 have the feet divided into toes, and are without horns, have 

 simple fat only. This fat becomes hard, and when quite 

 cold turns brittle, and is always found at the extremity of the 

 flesh ; while, on the other hand, the fat which lies between the 

 skin and the flesh forms a kind of liquid juice. Some animals 

 naturally do not become fat, such as the hare and the par- 

 tridge, for instance. All fat animals, male as well as female, 

 are mostly barren ; and those which are remarkably fat become 

 old the soonest. All animals have a certain degree of fatness 

 in the eyes. The fat in all animals is devoid of sensation, 

 having neither arteries nor veins. "With the greater part of 

 animals, fatness is productive of insensibility ; so much so, 

 indeed, that it has been said, that living swine have been 

 gnawed even by mice. 5 It has been even asserted that the fat 

 was drawn off from the body of a son of L. Apronius, a man of 

 consular rank, and that he was thus relieved of a burden which 

 precluded him from moving. 



CHAP. 86. THE MARROW : ANIMALS WHICH HAVE NO MARROW. 



The marrow seems also to be formed of a similar material ; 

 in the young it is of a reddish colour, but it is white in the 

 aged. It is only found in those bones which are hollow, and 

 not in the tibia? of horses or dogs ; for which reason it is, that 

 when the tibia is broken, the bone will not reunite, a process 

 which is effected 6 by the flow of the marrow. The marrow is 

 of a greasy nature in those animals which have fat, and suetty 

 in those with horns. It is full of nerves, and is found only in 

 the vertebral column 7 in those animals which have no bones, 

 fishes, for instance. The bear has no marrow; and the 

 lion has a little only in some few bones of the thighs and 

 the brachia, which are of such extraordinary hardness that 

 sparks may be emitted therefrom, as though from a flint-st®ne. 



5 Varro, De Re Rust. B. ii. c. 4, says that he saw an instance of this in 

 Arcadia. 



6 This is not the case. 



1 There is no similarity whatever between the spinal marrow and that 

 which is found in the other bones. 



