.214 Notes, ill. 14. 



with the imperfection of the oral instruments as comminutors of the food " (Owen). It is 

 especially wide in the cormorant and other fishing birds, A. {//. A,, ii. 17, 30) gives as ' 

 examples several species of crows, with which he appears (//. A. viii. 3, 15) to have 

 classed thfe cormorant. . ' • 



10. Alluding to the prmentriculus or glandular stomach. This exists in all birds, but 

 is much larger and more glandular when there is no crop, than when such is present. 

 Doubtless in such cases it supplies the absence of the crop {Cuvier, Lemons, ■ iii. 408), and . 

 acts as a storehouse of food. • 



11.' The example given in the H. A. (ii. 17, 31) is a bird which Aubert and Wimmer 

 identify with Falcq tinmmculus. They point out that in all the diurnal birds of prey 

 there is a peculiarity, thus described by Meckel (7>. Gen, (TAnat. Comp. viii. 314) :. 

 "L'estomac folHculeux d'une ampleur peu considerable forme subitement une saillie* 

 allongee, qui est separee par une etranglement, superieurement de I'oesophage, et 

 inferieurement de I'estomac musculaire; " 



12. The gizzard is strong and muscular in graminivorous. birds.; but thin and mem- 

 jbranous in the carnivorous species. • • 



13. In the Greek text, instead of oesophagus .(trTiJ^uaxos) we have crop (irp6\ofiof). This 

 must be an error ; for the presence of a crop is one of the very provisions which A. has 

 just enumerated, and which he says are wanting in the long-legged marsh-birds, i.e. the 

 Grallatores. I'have therefore substituted oesophagus for crop ; which is in harmony with 

 the parallel passage in the Hisi. An. (ii. 17, 32)^ vi-here it is said th9,t these birds have 

 a long oesophagus to match their long neck. . 



In the typical waders there is fto crop ; neither is the stomach fleshy, but has thin 

 walls, as ir> piscivorous birds generally. The "dilatation of the oesophagus before it 

 enters the stomach," i.e. the froventriculus, would also seem to A. to be absent ; for 

 it forms one single cavity with the thin-walled gizzard ; at least such is the case in the 

 heron {Cuvier, Lefons, iii. 410). 



• 14. As A, here points out the direct correspondence between the nature of the food 

 and the structure of the digestive organs in the case of birds, 9p also does he elsewhere 

 ('^- 5> 59) point it out in the case of insects. 



15. Cf. iii. I, Note 7. Rumination is regarded- by A% as an atonement for deficient 

 mastication owing to want of teeth. Whether the pa*-rot-fish ruminates I do not know ; 

 but A. is wrong, in saying that ho other. fish does so. There are several species, especially 

 of the carp tribe, in which a sort of rumination occurs. Cf. Owen, Comp. Anat. ii. 236. 



• 16. Cf. iii, I, Note«9. ' ' , 



17. Because, as he says elsewhere (iii. i, 10), the water constantly required for their 

 gill function enters in at the mouth, and would interfere with the process. 



18. Cf. iii. 3, Note 2. . 



19. The Cestreus is doubtless some species of Mugil, a tribe of which our grey mullet 



• is a familiar example. What species is meant is uncertain ; the Mediterranean containing 

 at least five. In all these Mugilidse the stomach has much the character of a true 

 muscular gizzard. " Of all the fish I have seen the mullet is the most complete instance 



. .of this (the grinding) structure'; its strong muscular stomach being evidently adapted, 

 like the gizzard, of birds, to the two offices of mastication and digestiori." — John Hutiier. 



20. A. seems here to admit that digestion' is in part due to putrefaction, a doctrine 

 held by Pleistonicus. Cf. ii.' 2,- Note 3. 



21. In most .osseous fishes, though not in all, there are a variable number of coecal 

 appendages close behind the pylorus, which have been erroneously held to be the 

 homologues of the pancreas. Their use is not known with certainty. The Selachia are 



