Chap. X.] OPINIONS OF THEOPHRASTUS. 
345 
in Aeistotle's treatise De Respirations 1 , where he 
mentions the strange discovery of living fish found be- 
neath the surface of the soil, " tS)v iydvtav ol ttoXKol 
%(OGlV SV f§ <yj), a/CLV7]TL^OVT£9 fJLSVTOl, KCLL svpto-fcovTcu OpVT- 
to/jlspoi ; " and in his History of Animals he conjectures 
that in ponds periodically dried the ova of the fish so 
buried" become vivified at the change of the season. 2 
Herodotus had previously hazarded a similar theory to 
account for the sudden appearance of fry in the Egyptian 
marshes on the rising of the Nile ; but the cases are not 
parallel. Theophrastus, the friend and pupil of Aris- 
totle, gave importance to the subject by devoting to it 
his essay Uspl rrjs tcov l%0vcov sv &pa> hLajxovrjS, De 
Piscibus in sicco degentibus. In this, after adverting 
to the fish called exocostus, from its habit of going on 
shore to sleep, " airo rr}9 kolttjs" he instances the small 
fish {I'xpvha), that leave the rivers of India to wander 
like frogs on the land ; and likewise a species found 
near Babylon, which, when the Euphrates runs low, 
leave the dry channels in search of food, "moving 
themselves along by means of their fins and tail." He 
proceeds to state that at Heraclea Pontica there are 
places in which fish are dug out of the earth, " bpvKTol 
to)v lyQvcov? and he accounts for their being found 
under such circumstances by the subsidence of the 
rivers, "when the water being evaporated the fish 
gradually descend beneath the soil in search of mois- 
ture ; and the surface becoming hard they are preserved 
in the damp clay below it, in a state of torpor, but are 
capable of vigorous movements when disturbed." " In 
this manner, too," adds Theophrastus, " the buried fish 
1 Chap. ix. 
Lib. vi. ch. 15, 16, 17. 
