Rumination in Fish. 191 



are the Cyprinoids (carp, tench, bream), caught after they 

 have fed voraciously on ground-bait previously laid in their 

 feeding-haunts to insure the angler good sport." 



It is curious to observe that Aristotle, many hundred years 

 ago, recorded the existence of a ruminating fish. " The fish 

 known by the name of scarus," he says, "is the only one 

 which appears to ruminate like quadrupeds." What the 

 scarus probably denotes I shall consider by and by. The 

 idea of a ruminating fish appeared to the commentators so 

 absurd that they put down the statement of Aristotle as a 

 simple myth ; and even Mr. Gr. H. Lewes, in one of his 

 instructive works,* citing this amongst Aristotle's " examples 

 of careless observation and rash generalization," utterly dis- 

 credits the possession of ruminating properties in a fish. He 

 says, "If true, the fact must be one difficult of observation, 

 since fish will not exhibit their ruminating propensities out of 

 the water, and in the water it could hardly have been watched. 

 Is it true ?" In a foot note, Mr. Lewes adds, " Milne Edwards 

 states it without misgiving in his Lecons sur la Physiologie et 

 VAnat, comparee, 1861, vi. 290, referring to Owen's Lectures 

 on the Vertebrata as his authority. In a private note, Professor 

 Owen informs me that the Scarus named by Aristotle has not 

 been identified, but that ( the carp, by a rotatory motion of 

 the gullet, brings the vegetable food-contents of the stomach 

 successively within the sphere of the action of the strong 

 pharyngeal grinding teeth, whence the pulp is returned to the 

 stomach fitted for passing the pylorus'" (pp. 282, 283). 

 Now we naturally wish to ascertain how Professor Owen has 

 convinced himself of this fact, which at first sight appears 

 difficult of verification. The professor tells us, " A carp in 

 this predicament [after having fed voraciously on ground-bait] 

 laid open, shows well and long the peristaltic movements of 

 the alimentary canal ; and the successive regurgitations of the 

 gastric contents produce actions of the pharyngeal jaws as the 

 half-bruised grains came into contact with them, and excite 

 the singular tumefaction and subsidence of the irritable palate, 

 as portions of the regurgitated food are pressed upon it. The 

 shortness and width of the oesophagus, the masticatory mecha- 

 nism at its commencement, and its direct terminal continuation 

 with the cardiac portion of the stomach, relate to the combi- 

 nation of an act analogous to rumination, with the ordinary 

 processes of digestion, in all fishes possessing these conca- 

 tenated and peculiar structures. "f 



In a communication with which he has kindly favoured 



* Aristotle, a Chapter from the History of Science. London : Smith, Elder, 

 and Co. 1864. 



t The Anatomy of Vertebrates, vol. i. p. 419. 



