94 ARISTOTLE AS A NATURALIST. 



first, and roast porcupine the second course, 

 would scarcely fail to be relished by an un- 

 prejudiced epicure in search of novelty. 



Granting, however, all the facilities of ob- 

 serving cuttle-fishes which the JEgean preemi- 

 nently affords, the account of the habits and 

 structure of these animals in the writings of 

 Aristotle must ever remain among the most 

 admirable natural- history essays ever written. If 

 we bring together all that he records of these 

 creatures in the several books of the History of 

 Animals, we cannot fail to appreciate the position 

 of the Stagyrite as the greatest of naturalists, 

 past and present, for none among them all ever 

 combined such extraordinary powers of observing 

 equally the structure of the individual and the 

 habits of the species, with the highest capacity 

 for generalization. Each fact narrated by Aris- 

 totle seems always to be told with reference 

 to some law, floating, as it were before his mind's 

 eye, and to be fixed through the determination 

 of the instance. Everything, too, is told in 

 perfect good faith ; hearsay narrations are related 

 as such, and carefully distinguished from personal 

 observations, a feature which places the natural- 

 history writings of Aristotle on a par with the 



