1882.] Animals and their Diet.. 585 
and the relative weight of the stomach and its appendages 
smallest. 
Another point of difference between animal and vegetable 
matters is that the former require less preparation before 
they can be assimilated. Hence we find that the teeth of 
the dog or cat, besides their aCtion in seizing and killing the 
prey, need merely to tear it into lumps of a convenient size 
for swallowing. When this is once done digestion is not 
difficult. Vegetable food, on the other hand, requires to be 
ground to a pulp, so that the saliva and the gastric and 
pancreatic secretions may aCt upon its smallest particles. 
Hence true molar teeth are required, destined not to cut, 
but to pulverise. We see an approach to this structure 
even in the bears. But for the poorest kinds of vegetable 
food this arrangement is not sufficient ; the leaves and 
stalks eaten, consisting as they do largely of cellulose, — 
which man cannot digest at all, — have to go through that 
double preparation commonly known as chewing the cud. 
We may now venture to assign a reason why it is easier 
for a phytophagous animal to turn zoophagous, than for a 
zoophagous creature to become phytophagous. A lion, or 
even an ape or a man, could not take into his stomach so 
much grass as would afford him sufficient nourishment. 
Not having the teeth of the ox or the sheep, and not being 
able to ruminate, he would fail to digest the grass in any 
degree even approaching to perfection, and he would soon 
perish from hunger, as not a few men have done who in 
times of famine have tried to support themselves upon 
grass and leaves. 
But an ape, a rat, or a swine experiences no difficulty in 
digesting animal food. 
Man approaches at least as near— probably nearer — to 
the pure zoophagous type as do the rodents and the swine. 
He has three kinds of teeth completely covered with 
enamel ; his digestive apparatus weighs less in proportion 
to his entire body than does that of the swine, thus pointing 
to a more concentrated diet. Hence we should be inclined 
to consider that man is at least as naturally and originally 
omnivorous as the Rodents or the Suidse. It has been 
contended that his “ carnivorous practices have not yet 
changed his nature.” Why should they more than has 
been the case in other omnivorous forms ? If sharp nails, 
projecting canines, and a rough tongue would have given 
man any advantage in the struggle for existence, doubtless 
they would have been evolved. But these points do not in 
the least tell upon his power to assimilate animal matter. 
VOL. IV. (THIRD SERIES). 2 Q 
