50 NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 



LETTER XIV. 



SELBORNE, March i2th, 1768. 



DEAR SIR, If some curious gentleman would procure the head 

 of a fallow-deer, and have it dissected, he would find it furnished 

 with two spiracula, or breathing places, besides the nostrils ; pro- 

 bably analogous to the puncta lachrymalia in the human head. 

 When deer are thirsty they plunge their noses, like some horses, 

 very deep under water, while in the act of drinking, and continue 

 them in that situation for a considerable time : but, to obviate any 

 inconveniency, they can open two vents, one at the inner corner 

 of each eye, having a communication with the nose. Here seems 

 to be an extraordinary provision of nature worthy our attention ; 

 and which has not, that I know of, been noticed by any naturalist. 

 For it looks as if these creatures would not be suffocated, though 

 both their mouths and nostrils were stopped. This curious forma- 

 tion of the head may be of singular service to beasts of chase, by 

 affording them free respiration : and no doubt these additional 

 nostrils are thrown open when they are hard run. Mr. Ray ob- 

 served that at Malta, the owners slit up the nostrils of such asses 

 as were hard worked : for they, being naturally straight or small, 

 did not admit air sufficient to serve them when they travelled, or 

 laboured, in that hot climate. And we know that grooms, and 

 gentlemen of the turf, think large nostrils necessary, and a perfec- 

 tion, in hunters and running horses. 



Oppian, the Greek poet, by the following line, seems to have 

 had some notion that stags have four spiracula : 



" lerpadv/j-ot pives, iriovpes cDvot^ot 8iav\ot. " 

 " Quadrifidse nares, quadruplices ad respirationem canales." 



OFF. CYN. Lib. ii. 1. 181. 



Writers, copying from one another, make Aristotle say that 

 goats breathe at their ears ; whereas he asserts just the con- 

 trary : " AX/c/Aatcoi/ yap OVK aX.r)Or] Aeyei, <a/xevos avairvew ras euyas 



