518 HISTORY OF 



are but sniall, and tbeir intestines short ; but in these, whose 

 pasture is coarse, and where much must be accumulated before 

 any quantity of nourishment can be obtained, their stomachs are 

 large and numerous, and their intestines long and muscular. The 

 bowels of a ruminating animal may be considered as an elabora 

 tory, with vessels in it, fitted for various transmutations. Tt 

 requires a long and tedious process before grass can be trans- 

 muted into flesh ; and for this purpose, nature, in general, has 

 furnished such animals as feed upon grass with four stomachs, 

 through which the food successively passes and undergoes the 

 proper separations.' 



Of the four stomachs with which ruminant animals are fur- 

 nished, the first is called the paunch, which receives the food 

 after it has been slightly chewed ; the second is called the honey- 

 comb, and is properly nothing more than a continuation of the 

 former ; these two, which are very capacious, the animal fills as 

 fast as it can, and then lies down to ruminate ; which msy be 

 properly considered as a kind of vomiting without effort or pain. 

 The two stomachs above mentioned being filled with as much as 

 they can contain, and the grass, which was slightly chewed, be- 

 ginning to swell with the heat of the situation, it dilates the 

 stomachs, and these again contract upon their contents. The 

 aliment, thus squeezed, has but two passages to escape at ; one into 

 the third stomach, which is very narrow ; and the other back, by 

 the gullet, into the mouth, which is wider. The greatest quan- 

 tity, therefore, is driven back, through the largest aperture, into 

 the mouth to be chewed a second time ; while a small part, and 

 that only the most liquid, is driven into the third stomach, 

 through the orifice which is so small. The food which is dri- 

 ven to the mouth, and chewed a second time, is thus rendered 

 more soft and moist, and becomes at last liquid enough to pass 

 into the conduit that goes to the third stomach, where it under- 

 goes a still farther comminution. In this stomach, which is 

 called the manifold, from the number of its leaves, all which 



1 All quadrupeds that cliew the cud have suet instead of the soft fat of 

 other animals ; and they have the awkward habit of rising-, when in a re- 

 cumbent posture, upon their hind legs first. A cow, when she rises from the 

 ground, places herself on the fore-knees, and then lifts up the whole hinder 

 parts. A horse springs up first on his fore- legs, and then raises up his hin- 

 der parts. This may be owing to the dittereut conformation of the stcmach. 



