108 PHYSIOLOGY AT THE FARM. 



membrane of the csecum is smooth, except at the place where 

 the gut is contracted, and there longitudinal duplicatures are 

 seen. From that place, also, to its lower extremity, the 

 mucous membrane is thicker and more glandular. In the 

 colon the mucous membrane is smooth and without dupli- 

 catures. Towards the lower part of the rectum, the walls 

 of which are altogether thicker than those of the colon, the 

 mucous membrane shows parallel longitudinal duplicatures, 

 and towards the fundament they become circular and con- 

 centric. 



The small intestines correspond in the ox very closely to 

 their condition in most mammals ; as to the great intestines, 

 the caecum, as in all ruminants, differs from its state in vege- 

 table-feeders in general, by being moderate in size and free 

 from dilatation. There is no vermiform appendix in the ox. 

 The colon is not of great magnitude, though of considerable 

 length. 



The cavity of the great omentum is very large in animals 

 resembling the ox. It encloses the four stomachs, the duo- 

 denum, and the pancreas. Its two interior laminae adhere to 

 the whole surface of the first and second stomachs, while the 

 two outer laminae are detached from the paunch at the middle 

 line between its two faces, and are prolonged behind beyond 

 that stomach without finally becoming contiguous. This omen- 

 tum, moreover, appears to be suspended from the whole pos- 

 terior border of the fourth stomach. The latter also gives 

 attachment by its right border to an appendix of the great 

 omentum, forming in its front a triangular cul-de-sac, the su- 

 perior lamina of which passes on the duodenum, and proceeds 

 to become confounded with the corresponding lamina of the 

 omentum. The third stomach is enveloped entirely in the 

 layers of this appendix, which serve for its suspension. 



The free part of the great omentum contains in the ox, as 



