LEPUS VARIABILIS. 205 



there is a tendon on each side, as there is in the gizzard of fowls 1 . 

 Along the great curvature, for about 3 inches in length, there is a ten- 

 dinous line where the epiploon is attached, in its course of attachment 

 round the great curvature. There are two venae cavae superiores and a 

 double apex to the heart, but the right one is very faint. The kidneys 

 and capsulae renales are the same as in the common hare. 



The faeces are knotted as in the common hare. The food in the 

 stomach was very well masticated, and consisted entirely of short bits 

 of twigs with their bark, and the faeces in the rectum were exactly the 

 same ; so that nothing had been digested but the juice. 



In another white hare, given me by Sir Joseph Banks, the stomach 

 was short and made a very quick turn : the insertion of the oeso- 

 phagus was nearer the great curve than the pylorus ; towards which, 

 where the middle tendon is, there was a faint stricture. For about an 

 inch and a half of the stomach, close to the pylorus, the coats were 

 much thicker than anywhere else. There were stones in the stomach. 

 The duodenum passes in the same direction with the pylorus for 

 aboivt half an inch, and from the right of this part the gut is con- 

 tinued down the right side, adhering first to the third turn of the colon 

 by a narrow mesentery ; it then leaves that and continues its course 

 down the right side to the lower part of the belly, being convoluted ; 

 it then passes up again, between which fold there is a pretty broad 

 mesentery, joins the third turn of the colon, and passes across the body 

 behind the mesentery ; when it comes out on the left side and forms the 

 jejunum. The ileum is joined by the caecum, and they pass on together 

 to the colon. Towards the termination of the ileum it lies between 

 the caecum and colon, joined to both by a mesentery, and just before it 

 enters the colon it dilates into a bag. 



The caecum at its beginning is attached to the ileum as above 

 described, passing along on the outside of that gut, making a consider- 

 able curve. The colon makes a quick turn upon itself at the beginning, 

 having hardly any length of mesentery ; then passes a little way along 

 with the ileum as before mentioned ; becomes small and makes a fold 

 upon itself, having at this fold two bands ; it then makes another fold 

 upon itself, which are but faint on the beginning of the colon, where the 

 two bands are lost: it joins the descending part of the duodenum, in 

 whose curve it lies ; passes to the right behind the stomach, adhering to 

 it : also to the duodenum as it crosses the body to the left behind the 

 mesentery, and then forms the rectum 2 . 



1 [Hunt. Prep. No. 544.] 



2 [Home, Coinp. Anat. i., p. 454, where the notes abstracted are referred to the 

 common hare, and follow those taken from Hunter's anatomy of that species.] 



