Aristotle ON THE PARTS OF ANIMALS Complete

Translated by W. Ogle.

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144 pages - You are on Page 94

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. And thus it is that, in all such animals as we are now considering, there is found what is called the jejunum; which is a part of the small gut, of the gut, that is, which comes next to the stomach. For this jejunum lies between the upper cavity which contains the yet unconcocted food and the lower cavity which holds the residual matter, which by the time it has got here has become worthless. There is a jejunum in all these animals, but it is only plainly discernible in those of large size, and this only when they have abstained from food for a certain time. For then alone can one hit on the exact period when the food lies half-way between the upper and lower cavities; a period which is very short, for the time occupied in the transition of food is but brief. In females this jejunum may occupy any part whatsoever of the upper intestine, but in males it comes just before the caecum and the lower stomach.

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