ON GENERATION. 219 



all this amid the din of dogs, and men, and horns, and sur- 

 rounded by an unknown and gloomy wood. We should not, 

 therefore, be greatly surprised when we see those who have 

 experience telling by what hen each particular egg in a number 

 has been laid. I wish there were some equally ready way from 

 the child of knowing the true father. 



The principal difference between eggs, however, is their 

 fecundity or barrenness the distinction of fruitful eggs from 

 hypenemic, adventitious, or wind eggs. Those eggs are called 

 hypenemic, (as if the progeny of the wind,) that are produced 

 without the concourse of the male, and are unfit for setting ; 

 although Varro 1 declares that the mares, in Lusitania, conceive 

 by the wind. For zephyrus was held a fertilizing wind, whence 

 its name, as if it were frujj^epo'e, or life bringing. So that 

 Virgil says : 



And Zephyrus, with wanning breath resolves 

 The bosom of the ground, and melting rains 

 Are poured o'er all, and every field brings forth. 



Hence the ancients, when with this wind blowing in the spring 

 season, they saw their hens begin laying, without the concur- 

 rence of the cock, conceived that zephyrus, or the west wind, 

 was the author of their fecundity. There are also what are 

 called addle, and dog-day eggs, produced by interrupted incu- 

 bation, and so called because eggs often rot in the dog-days, 

 being deserted by the hens in consequence of the excessive 

 heat ; and also because at this season of the year thunder is 

 frequent ; and Aristotle 2 asserts that eggs die if it thunders 

 whilst the hen is sitting. 



Those eggs are regarded as prolific, which, no unfavorable 

 circumstances intervening, under the influence of a gentle heat, 

 produce chicks. And this they will do, not merely through the 

 incubation of the mother, but of any other bird, if it be but of 

 sufficient size to cherish and cover them, or by a gentle tem- 

 perature obtained in any way whatever. " Eggs are hatched 

 with the same celerity," says Aristotle, 3 " spontaneously in the 

 ground, as by incubation. Wherefore in Egypt, it is the custom 



1 De Re Rust. lib. ii, cap. 1. 



2 Hist. Anim. lib. vi, cap. 2 ; Plin. Hist. Nat. lib. x, cap. 54. 3 Ibid. 



