BOOK IX 



I. We have indicated the nature of the species that Zooim 

 we have designated land animals, as living in some 5^^///" 

 kind of association with men. Of the remaining kinds animais. 

 it is agreed that birds are the smallest. We will 

 therefore first speak of the creatures of the seas. 

 rivers and ponds. 



There are however a considerable number of these Remarkabu 

 that are larger even than land animals. The Ip^lel 

 obvious cause of this is the lavish nature of Hquid. 

 Birds, which Hve hovering in the air, are in a difFerent 

 condition. But in the sea, lying so widely outspread 

 and so yielding and productive of nutriment, because 

 the element receives generative causes from above 

 and is always producing ofFspring, a great many 

 actual monstrosities are found, the seeds and first 

 principles intertwining and interfolding with each 

 other now in one way and now in another, now by the 

 action of the wind and now by that of the waves, so 

 ratifying the common opinion that everything born 

 in any department of nature exists also in the sea, 

 as well as a number of things never found elsewhere. 

 Indeed we may reaHze that it contains Hkenesses of 

 things and not of animals only, when we examine the 

 grape, the sword-fish, the saw-fish, and the cucumber- 

 fish, the last resembHng a real cucumber both in 

 colour and scent ; which makes it less surprising that 

 in cockle-sheHs that are so tiny there are horses' 

 heads projecting. 



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