Chap. 75.] 
THE PEOPEETIES OF THE GALL. 
69 
Some few men are without it, and such persons enjoy robust 
health and a long life. There are some authors who say that 
the gall exists in the horse, not in the liver, but in the paunch, 
and that in the stag it is situate either in the tail or the 
intestines ; and that hence it is, that those parts are so bitter 
that dogs will not touch them. The gall, in fact, is nothing 
else but the worst parts of the blood purged off, and for this 
reason it is that it is so bitter : at all events, it is a well-known 
fact, that no animal has a liver unless it has blood as well. 
The liver receives the blood from the heart, to which it is 
united, and then disperses it in the veins. 
CHAP, 75. THE PEOPEETIES OF THE GALL. 
When the gall is black, it is productive of madness in man, 
and if it is wholly expelled death will ensue. Hence it is, too, 
that the word bile" has been employed by us to characterize 
a harsh, embittered disposition; so powerful are the effects 
of this secretion, when it extends its influence to the mind. 
In addition to this, when it is dispersed over the whole of 
the body, it deprives the eyes, even, of their natural colour ; 
and when ejected, will tarnish copper vessels even, rendering 
everything black with which it comes in contact ; so that no 
one ought to be surprised that it is the gall which constitutes 
the venom of serpents. Those animals of Pontus which feed 
on wormwood have no gall : in the raven, the quail, and the 
pheasant, the gall-bladder is united to the renal parts, and, on 
one side only, to the intestines. In many animals, again, it 
is united only to the intestines, the pigeon, the hawk, and the 
murena, for example. In some few birds it is situate in the 
liver ; but it is in serpents and fishes that it is the largest in 
proportion. With the greater part of birds, it extends all along 
throughout the intestines, as i]i the hawk and the kite. In 
some other birds, also, it is situate in the breast as well : the 
gall, too, of the sea-calf is celebrated for its application to many 
purposes. From the gall of the bull a colour is extracted like 
that of gold. The aruspices have consecrated the gall to ISTep- 
tune and tTie influence of water. The Emperor Augustus 
found a double gall in a victim which he was sacrificing on 
the day of his victory at Actium. 
