Aristotle : On the parts of animals / translated, with introduction and notes by W. Ogle.
- Aristotle
- Date:
- 1882
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Aristotle : On the parts of animals / translated, with introduction and notes by W. Ogle. Source: Wellcome Collection.
234/316 page 186
![10. The exact drift of tliis passage is not veiy evident. I take it that A. thinks it necessary to 'explain why the tongue, if it adheres to one jaw, does not adhere to 'tliat which in his view is the nobler, namely the upper (ii. 2, Note 6). His explanation is th.at in reality the tongue does adhere to the upper.jaw; but that the upper jaw has been brought into the position of the lower one, as its immobility testifies, lest the adherence of the tongue to it should interfere with deglutition. 11. Cf. iv. II, Notes 6, 7. 12. In the Cyprinoids the palate is cushioned with a thick soft vascular substance, remarkable for its great irritability. This is still commonly known in France as “langue de carpe” (Cuvier, R. An. ii. 270). 13. This is true. 14. As to the tongue of Crustacea, Cephalopods, Gasteropods, etc., c£ iv. 5, Notes 4, 6. 8. 15. What species of Gasteropod corresponds to Aristotle’s Purpura is a matter of doubt. All that we learn from the various passages in which it is mentioned is that it had a spiral shell, an operculum, and a strong tongue, which enabled it to prey on other shell-fish; that it deposited its eggs in honeydike masses; furnished a dye ;• and that there were numerous species of it, some large, some small. Probably the term includes all the various species of Murex, Buccinum, and Purpura, from which purple dye was obtainable. Of these the more important seem to have been Murex trunculus and M. brandaris. M. Boblaye found numerous heaps of shells of M. brandaris on the coast of the Morea, close to the ruins of 'ancient dyeworks. Similar evident was obtained by Wilde on the Tyrian coast for M. trunculus (cf. Woodward, Mollusca, p. 106 ; Meyer, Thierkunde, p. 183). As to the power possessed by the Purpura lapillus of perforating shells by means of its armed tongue, see Forbes and Hanley, Brit. Mollusca, iii. 385. 16. The words I have translated vaguely as gad-flies and cattle-flies are in the text .(Estri and Myopes. There are not sufficient data to determine what exact species of Diptera are meant. The general statements made about them in various passages seem to point clearly to some or other species of Tabanus such as T. bovinus, and Chrysops caccutiens ^Aubert and Wimmer); but the account given of the development of .^Estrus (H. A. v. 19) is inconsistent with this identification. 17. 'The similarity consists in the accumulation of distinct functions in one and the same part. BOOK III. (Ch. 1.) 1. As a rule the same organs which serve as weapons of defence serve also in offensive warfare; such for example is the case with the long horns of the Oryx. But, as A. says, this is not always the case. Thus the upper branches of the horns are used by some kinds of deer chiefly or exclusively for defence, while the brow antlers are used in attack. In wild boars the skin over the shoulder is specially modified to form a shield, which, like the mane of a lion, is exclusively a weapon of defence. Similar distinctions may be noticed with regard to the teetli. In such carnivora as the lion they serve indifferently for 'protection and attack ; but in the Babirusa pig' the lower tusks alone are used for offence, tlie upper ones being useless except for protcfction. In the common Wild boar exactly the reverse is tlic case ; the up]>cr tusks](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b24864249_0234.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
