REPTILES. 



toads which have been found inclolcd in blocks of Rone, 

 and which probably have been in a torpid ftate, nor the 

 more common iiiltances (fee L. Th. Groncvius ad Pli- 

 nium de Aquitilium Natura, p. 38.) we have the refpcc- 

 table authority of Caldcfi for the fart of tortoiies having 

 remained without food, and not in a torpid Itate, for a year 

 and a half. Blumcnbach reports of a tortoifc, which lie 

 kept for three quarters of a year, that the harnilefs crea- 

 ture never ate any thing the whole time, although every 

 thing that the houfe and garden afforded was offered to 

 him. For the lalt three months (from November to Fe- 

 bruary) he exiiibited the loweft degree of vitality, mani- 

 feffed, in addition to extremely flow locomotion, with 

 almoft clofed eye-lids, merely by the fingle fenfe of touch 

 or feeling, particularly of warmth and drafts of air. When 

 he died, the mufcles were as flefliy and frefh-coloured as in 

 the befl nouriflied tortoifes. Abbildungen, &c. No. 66. 



Redi had a land tortoife live eighteen months, a came- 

 leon eight, and vipers ten, without food. (Spallan/.ani's 

 Trafts, Introduction, p. 42.) Toads were quite lively 

 at the end of fourteen and eighteen months, incloled in 

 pots. Ibid. 



Blafius mentions, in his " Anatomia Anitnalium," that a 

 land tortoife which he kept ten months would take no food 

 during the whole time. 



Boimet, fpeaking of newts, fays, " tliele animals can 

 fupport the want of food very long. Some of mine have 

 lived two months without it. Sign. Spallanzani had re- 

 marked the fame ; and obferved, that although long de- 

 prived of nutriment, they reproduced their members 

 equally well as thofe plentifully fupplied with fuftenance." 

 (Spallanzani's TraAs, v. 2. p. 364.) Blumenbach has kept 

 falamanders eight months without taking food, or appear- 

 ing to fuffer from the want of it. (Handbuch der Natur 

 gefchichte, p. 220.) Daudin afferts that fnakes and vipers 

 may be kept for fix months without food, yet feem to lofe 

 none of their aftivity : t. i. Introd. p. 270. 



Some protei, which Dr. Schreibcrs of Vienna had 

 kept in his poffeflion for two years, had taken no food,^ 

 and were quite well. (Cuvier, Rech. fur quelques Rept. 

 douteux ; i'Anat. du Prote.) Bruce Hated that he had 

 kept the ceraftes in a bottle for two years without food, 

 and Lacepede reports, on the authority of Shaw, that a 

 Venetian apothecary kept two of thefe fading for five 

 years. (See Daudin, vol. vi. p. 186. ) This power of faff- 

 ing belongs, in a greater or lefs degree, to tlie whole order. 

 For a comparifon between the power of abffinence of warm- 

 blooded animals and reptiles (the ftate of torpidity being 

 excepted), fee Diff. Academ. Inftit. Bonon. ap Bene- 

 diiftum 14. Pont. Max. de fervor. Dei Beatificatione, 

 lib. 4. p. I. pag. 328. ; alfo Beccarius in Comm. Inftit. 

 Bonon. t. 2. p. I. pag. 223. 



No reptiles mafticate : the herbivorous amphibia gnaw off 

 the veget?i)le produftions on which they feed, but they do 

 not chew them. The llrufture of their jaws, teeth, and 

 tongue, gives them the power of fwallowing entire animals : 

 this procefs of deglutition, being often exercifed on animals 

 as broad as themfelves, and broader, is very flow, and oc- 

 cupies even hours. The cefophagus muff of courfe poffefs 

 a great power oi dilatation. In his account of the newt, 

 Bonnet fays, " that worms are feized with a fudden motion- 

 of the animal's jaws, and Iwillowed alive, with gentle Ihocks 

 of the whole body, and particularly of the anterior part. 

 The prey is always fwallowed without maffication : the mi- 

 nute teeth, which are not employed in chewing, ferve to 

 prevent the efcape of the animal, which twiils itfelf about 

 moff aftively. Long worms are devoured entire, notvnth- 



ftanding all their exertions to efcape. Tiiey twine round 

 the neck of the newt like a fcrpeiit : every moment they 

 become flaorter, and gradually difap'pear. Thus have I 

 feen a newt fwallow a worm more than fix inches long in 

 lefs than five minutes. A large worm, feized by llic middle, 

 is feldom Iwallowcd in the fame ])ofition, bccaufe it is too 

 large, if doubled in the moutii, and the newt gradually 

 fhakes it out, until it can feizc one of the extremities - 

 which being accomplilhied, the worm is fooii devoured. 

 However, I have obferved a large one fwallow a worm 

 taken by the middle, without feizing an extremity ; but a 

 quarter of an hour was occupied in the meal. The fuc- 

 ccflive motions of deglutition are very feiiiible ; it is per- 

 formed by repeated (hocks. Though they have flexible 

 jointed fingers, they make no ufe of the hand, either to 

 feize their prey, convey it to tlie mouth, or retain it there." 

 Spallanzani's Trails, v. 2. p. 364. 



The length and eap.icity of this tube, and its large com- 

 munication with the (tomach, are well fuitcd to the nature 

 of fcrpcnts. The prey, always fwallowed without maffi- 

 cation, is often too long to pafs entirely into the llomach : 

 it remains in the cefophagus until room is made for it. 

 Travellers have even alferted that one end of an animal 

 iometimes hangs out of a ferpent's mouth, while the other 

 is in the ftomach. 



As there is no maffication in this clafs, nor any provi- 

 fion like the gizzard of birds, for comminuting the food 

 when fwallowed, the procefs of digeftion muff be effected 

 by the aftion of the itomach alone on the prey fwallowed 

 entire. The juices of the organ are fully adequate to this 

 effeift ; and the procefs has been demonffrated by experi- 

 ment in feveral genera by Spallanzani. He inclofed food 

 in tubes, and conveyed them into the ffomach of the frog, 

 the newt, and different ferpents ; and always found that 

 it was diflblved in a longer or fliorter time : it thus appears 

 that the effential nature of digeffion is the fame as in the 

 warm-blooded animals : but the procefs exhibits fome modi- 

 fications, as the different nature and habits of the animals 

 would naturally lead us to expeft. The chief difference is 

 that the folution requires a confiderably longer time than in 

 warm-blooded animals. The flefh in the tubes, conveyed 

 into the ffomachs of frogs, was not completely diffolved 

 until the third and even the fifth day. (Dill'ertations, v. i. 

 p. 102.) Yet although the gaftric liquor of frogs adls 

 fo flowly, it is capable in time of diffolving even bone : 

 Spallanzani met with a moufe in the ftomach of a frog ; 

 all the foft parts of the limbs were gone, fo as to have 

 only the naked bones, which were confiderably wafted, and 

 converted into a femi-gelatinous fubftance. (Ibid. p. 102.) 

 Earth-worms enclofed in tubes were converted into a whitilh 

 pulp in thirty hours, in the Itomach of the water newt ; 

 p. 104. He found numerous finall white worms in the 

 itumachs of three-fourths of all the newts he examined, 

 from five or fix in number to a hundred and more. Thefe 

 were fo delicate that they would not bear even flight pref- 

 fure ; and thus afford a proof that nothing like trituration 

 can go OH in the ftomach, but that digeftion is fimply folu- 

 tion by the gaftric liquor ; p. 104 — III. In ferpents the 

 procefs occupied from two to five days. The tibise of 

 trogs vvere almoft completely diflolved in five days; § 118 

 — 122. As the animals fwallo\Ted by ferpents often lie iii 

 part in the cefophagus, a quettion arifes, whether they 

 undergo any digeftion in that tube, or whether this func- 

 tion be the exclufive attribute of the ftomach. A viper, 

 fays Charas (Defcrip. Anat. de la Vipere,) vomited a lizard, 

 which had been fwallowed twelve days before. All the 

 front of the body, which had been in the ftomach, had 



merely 



