moan. 5 Ww A Tt 4.720. W-8) 
when we know that the otter*, the corvorant, and 
the grebes, foon perifh, if caught under ice, or en- 
tangled in nets: and it is well known, that thofe 
animals will continue much longer under water than 
any others to whom nature hath denied that par- 
ticular ftructure of heart, neceflary for a long 
refidence beneath that element. | 
* Though entirely fatisfied in our own mind of the impofi- 
bilty of thefe relations ; yet, defirous of ftrengthening our 
opinion with fome better authority, we applied to that able 
anatomift, Mr. ¥ohn Hunter; who was fo obliging to inform 
us, that he had diffeéted many fwallows, but found-nothing 
in them different from other birds as to the organs of refpi- 
ration. That all thofe animals which he had diffected of the 
clafs that fleep during winter, fuch as lizards, frogs, &c. 
_ had a very different conformation as to thofe organs. That 
all thefe animals, he believes, do breathe in their torpid fate; 
and, as far as his experience reaches, he knows they do: and 
that therefore he efteems it a very wild opinion, that terreftrial 
animals can remain any long time under water without drown- 
ing. 
BILL 
eee 
