ARISTOTLE'S HOMCEOMERIA. 117 



The coagulation of milk, Aristotle says, is effected both 

 by rennet and the juice of the fig.* He states incorrectly 

 that rennet is a kind of milk, and that it is obtained from 

 the third stomach of sucking animals, t 



Rennet is obtained from the fourth stomach of ruminants 

 and, in comparatively smaller quantities, from the stomachs 

 of most, if not all, mammals. Rennet is usually an infusion 

 of the dried fourth stomach of a calf, and owes its coagu- 

 lating properties to the presence of a ferment occurring in 

 the gastric juice. Aristotle believed that the hare was the 

 only animal, other than ruminants, which yielded rennet, 

 and that the rennet from the fawn was the best. I 



- H. A. iii. c. 16, s. 6. \ H. A. iii. c. 16, s. 6 ; P. A. iii. c. 15, 676a. 



\ Ibid. 



