The Works of Sir Thomas Browne, Volume 2. Browne Thomas

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СКАЧАТЬ not kindleth the air about it. Which notwithstanding it will do, if the ambient air be impregnate with subtile inflamabilities, and such as are of quick accension; as experiment is made in a close room; upon an evaporation of spirits of wine and Camphire; as subterraneous fires do sometimes happen, and as Creusa and Alexanders boy in the bath were set on fire by Naptha.

      Lastly, The Element of air is so far from nourishing the body, that some have questioned the power of water; many conceiving it enters not the body in the power of aliment, or that from thence there proceeds a substantial supply. For beside that some creatures drink not at all; Even unto our selves, and more perfect Animals, though many ways assistent thereto, it performs no substantial nutrition, serving for refrigeration, dilution of solid aliment, and its elixation in the stomack; which from thence as a vehicle it conveys through less accessible cavities, and so in a rorid substance through the capillary cavities, into every part; which having performed, it is afterward excluded by Urine, sweat and serous separations. And this opinion surely possessed the Ancients; for when they so highly commended that water which is suddenly hot and cold, which is without all savour, the lightest, the thinnest, and which will soonest boil Beans or Pease, they had no consideration of nutrition; whereunto had they had respect, they would have surely commended gross and turbid streams, in whose confusion at least, there might be contained some nutriment; and not jejune or limped water, nearer the simplicity of its Element. Although, I confess, our clearest waters and such as seem simple unto sense, are much compounded unto reason, as may be observed in the evaporation of large quantities of water; wherein beside a terreous residence some salt is also found, as is also observable in rain water; which appearing pure and empty, is full of seminal principles, and carrieth vital atomes of plants and Animals in it, which have not perished in the great circulation of nature; A seed of plants and animals contained in rain-water. Zibavius, tom. 4. Chym.as may be discovered from several Insects generated in rain water, from the prevalent fructification of plants thereby; and (beside the real plant of Cornerius) from vegetable figurations, upon the sides of glasses, so rarely delineated in frosts.

      All which considered, severer heads will be apt enough to conceive the opinion of this Animal, not much unlike that of the Astomi, or men without mouths, in Pliny; sutable unto the relation of the Mares in Spain, and their subventaneous conceptions, from the Western wind; and in some way more unreasonable then the figment of Rabican the famous horse in Ariosto, which being conceived by flame and wind, never tasted grass, or fed on any grosser provender then air; for this way of nutrition was answerable unto the principles of his generation. Which being not airy, but gross and seminal in the Chameleon; unto its conservation there is required a solid pasture, and a food congenerous unto the principles of its nature.

      The grounds of this opinion are many; the first observed by Theophrastus, was the inflation or swelling of the body, made in this Animal upon inspiration or drawing in its breath; which people observing, have thought it to feed upon air. But this effect is rather occasioned upon the greatness of its lungs, which in this Animal are very large, and by their backward situation, afford a more observable dilation; and though their lungs be less, the like inflation is also observable in Toads, but especially in Sentortoises.

      A second is the continual hiation or holding open its mouth, which men observing, conceive the intention thereof to receive the aliment of air; but this is also occasioned by the greatness of its lungs; for repletion whereof not having a sufficient or ready supply by its nostrils; it is enforced to dilate and hold open the jaws.

      The third is the paucity of blood observed in this Animal, scarce at all to be found but in the eye, and about the heart; which defect being observed, inclined some into thoughts, that the air was a sufficient maintenance for these exanguious parts. But this defect or rather paucity of blood, is also agreeable unto many other Animals, whose solid nutriment we do not controvert; as may be observed in other sorts of Lizards, in Frogs and divers Fishes; and therefore an Horse-leech will not readily fasten upon every fish; and we do not read of much blood that was drawn from Frogs by Mice, in that famous battel of Homer.

      The last and most common ground which begat or promoted this opinion, is the long continuation hereof without any visible food, which some observing, precipitously conclude they eat not at all. It cannot be denied it is (if not the most of any) a very abstemious Animal, and such as by reason of its frigidity, paucity of blood, and latitancy in the winter (about which time the observations are often made) will long subsist without a visible sustentation. But a like condition may be also observed in many other Animals; for Lizards and Leeches, as we have made trial, will live some months without sustenance; and we have included Snails in glasses all winter, which have returned to feed again in the spring. Now these notwithstanding, are not conceived to pass all their lives without food; for so to argue is fallacious, and is moreover sufficiently convicted by experience. And therefore probably other relations are of the same verity, which are of the like affinity; as is the conceit of the Rhintace in Persia, the Canis Levis of America, and the Manucodiata or bird of Paradise in India.

      To assign a reason of this abstinence in Animals, or declare how without a supply there ensueth no destructive exhaustion, exceedeth the limits and intention of my discourse. Fortunius Licetus in his excellent Tract, de his qui diu vivunt sine alimento, hath very ingeniously attempted it; deducing the cause hereof from an equal conformity of natural heat and moisture, at least no considerable exuperancy in either; which concurring in an unactive proportion, the natural heat consumeth not the moisture (whereby ensueth no exhaustion) and the condition of natural moisture is able to resist the slender action of heat (whereby it needeth no reparation) and this is evident in Snakes, Lizards, Snails, and divers Insects latitant many months in the year; which being cold creatures, containing a weak heat in a crass or copious humidity, do long subsist without nutrition. For the activity of the agent, being not able to overmaster the resistance of the patient, there will ensue no deperdition. And upon the like grounds it is, that cold and phlegmatick bodies, and (as Hippocrates determineth) that old men will best endure fasting. Now the same harmony and stationary constitution, as it happeneth in many species, so doth it fall out sometime in Individuals. For we read of many who have lived long without aliment; and beside deceits and impostures, there may be veritable Relations of some, who without a miracle, and by peculiarity of temper, have far out fasted Elias. Which notwithstanding doth not take off the miracle; for that may be miraculously effected in one, which is naturally causable in another. Some naturally living unto an hundred; unto which age, others notwithstanding could not attain without a miracle.

      CHAPTER XXII

      Of the Ostrich

      The common opinion of the Ostrich, Struthiocamelus or Sparrow-Camel conceives that it digesteth Iron; and this is confirmed by the affirmations of many; beside swarms of others, Rhodiginus in his prelections taketh it for granted, Johannes Langius in his Epistles pleadeth experiment for it; the common picture also confirmeth it, which usually describeth this Animal with an horshoe in its mouth. Notwithstanding upon enquiry we find it very questionable, and the negative seems most reasonably entertained; whose verity indeed we do the rather desire, because hereby we shall relieve our ignorance of one occult quality; for in the list thereof it is accounted, and in that notion imperiously obtruded upon us. For my part, although I have had the sight of this Animal, I have not had the opportunity of its experiment, but have received great occasion of doubt, from learned discourses thereon.

      For Aristotle and Oppianus who have particularly treated hereof are silent in this singularity; either omitting it as dubious, or as the Comment saith, rejecting it as fabulous. Pliny speaketh generally, affirming only, the digestion is wonderful in this Animal; Ælian delivereth, that it digesteth stones without any mention of Iron; Leo Africanus, who lived in those Countries wherein they most abound, speaketh diminutively, and but half way into this assertion: Surdum ac simplex animal est, quicquid invenit, absque delectu, usque ad ferrum devorat: Fernelius in his second De abditis rerum causis, extenuates it, and Riolanus СКАЧАТЬ