C 1 39 H 
VIII. Observations on the Structure of the Stomachs of different 
A?iimals, with a View to elucidate the Process of converting 
animal and vegetable Substances into Chyle. By Everard 
Home, Esq. F. R. S. 
Read April 30, 1807. 
The observations on the stomachs" of the porpoise, and of 
ruminating animals contained in two former communications, 
led me to believe that the fourth cavity of the ruminant’s 
stomach, while the animal is alive, is always divided, in a 
greater or less degree, into two portions, in one of which is 
included the plicated structure, in the other, the villous. In 
some genera, this division is permanent, as in the camel and 
that tribe; in others only occasional, as in the bullock, deer, 
sheep, &c. 
If this opinion should be found to be true with respect to 
animals in general, it will throw considerable light on the 
processes carried on in the stomach, and lead us to conclude, 
that the food undergoes two changes in it, the one prepara- 
tory to the other, and that it is the last of these, which forms 
the chyle. 
With a view to investigate still further this very interesting 
subject, I have been led to examine the internal structure of 
the stomachs of different animals. 
