OF SELBORNE 33 



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 for- 

 mation 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. 1 Mr. Ray 

 observed that, at Malta, the owners slit up the nostrils of such 

 asses as were hard worked : for they, being naturally strait 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 perfection, in hunters and running horses. 



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

 had some notion that stags have four spiracula : 



'pives, iritrupes irvonr}ffi 5tauA.oi." 

 " Quadrifidae nares, quadruplices ad respirationem canales." 



Opp., Cyn., Lib. ii., L 181. 



Writers, copying from one another, make Aristotle say that 

 goats breathe at their ears ; whereas he asserts just the contrary : 

 " AA.K/AOI<OV yct/o OVK aXrjOrj Aeyei, <a^tevos (tva.Trvf.iv ras aiyas Kara 

 "TO. ami". " Alcmceon does not advance what is true, when he 

 "avers that goats breathe through their ears." History of 

 Animals, Book I., chap. xi. 



1 In answer to this account, Mr. Pennant sent me the following curious and 

 pertinent reply. " I was much surprised to find in the antelope something ana- 

 logous to what you mention as so remarkable in deer. This animal also has a 

 " long slit beneath each eye, which can be opened and shut at pleasure. On holding 

 " an orange to one, the creature made as much use of those orifices as of his nostrils, 

 "applying them to the fruit, and seeming to smell it through them," 



