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Aristotle - On The Parts Of Animals
Atec Февраль 16 2008 20:01:06
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. Thus is it in those animals
which, owing either to their large size, or to the heat of the parts
concerned, require more nutriment, and consume more fodder than the
rest.
Neither is it without a purpose, that, just as a narrower gut
succeeds to the upper stomach, so also does the residual food, when
its goodness is thoroughly exhausted, pass from the colon and the
ample space of the lower stomach into a narrower channel and into
the spiral coil. For so nature can regulate her expenditure and
prevent the excremental residue from being discharged all at once.
In all such animals, however, as have to be comparatively moderate
in their alimentation, the lower stomach presents no wide and roomy
spaces, though their gut is not straight, but has a number of
convolutions. For amplitude of space causes desire for ample food, and
straightness of the intestine causes quick return of appetite. And
thus it is that all animals whose food receptacles are either simple
or spacious are of gluttonous habits, the latter eating enormously
at a meal, the former making meals at short intervals.
Again, since the food in the upper stomach, having just been
swallowed, must of necessity be quite fresh, while that which has
reached the lower stomach must have had its juices exhausted and
resemble dung, it follows of necessity that there must also be some
intermediate part, in which the change may be effected, and where
the food will be neither perfectly fresh nor yet dung
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