Aristotle's History of Animals In Ten Books · Aristotle
CHAPTER I.
1. We have hitherto treated of sanguineous animals, the parts possessed by all as well as those which are peculiar to each class, and of their heterogeneous and homogeneous, their external and internal parts. We are now about to treat of ex-sanguineous animals. There are many classes of these, first of all the mollusca.[99] These are ex-sanguineous animals, which have their fleshy parts external, and their hard parts internal, like sanguineous animals, as the whole tribe of cuttle-fish. Next the malacostraca, these are animals which have their hard parts external, and their interior parts soft and fleshy; their hard parts are rather liable to contusion than brittle, as the class of carabi and cancri. [99] The Cephalopoda. 2. Another class is that of the testacea. These are animals which have their internal parts fleshy, and their external parts hard, brittle, and fragile, but not liable to contusion. Snails and oysters are instances of this class. 3. The fourth class is that of insects, which includes many dissimilar forms. Insects are animals which, as their name signifies, are insected either in their lower or upper part, or in both; they have neither distinct flesh nor bone, but something between both, for their body is equally hard internally and externally. There are apterous insects, as the julus and scolopendra; and winged, as the bee, cockchafer, and wasp; and in some kinds there are both winged and apterous insects; ants, for example, are both winged and apterous, and so is the glowworm.
4. These are the parts of animals of the class mollusca (malacia); first the feet, as they are called, next to these the head, continuous with them; the third part is the abdomen, which contains the viscera. Some persons, speaking incorrectly, call this the head. The fins are placed in a circle round this abdomen. It happens in many of the malacia that the head is placed between the feet and the abdomen. 5. All the polypi, except one kind, have eight feet, with a double row of suckers. The sepia,[100] teuthis,[101] and teuthos[102] possess as a characteristic part two long proboscidiform members, which have rough suckers at their extremities, with which they seize their food and bring it to their mouth; and when a storm arises they weather it out, fastening these members upon a rock, like an anchor. They swim by means of the fin-like members which are attached to the abdomen. There are suckers upon all their feet. [100] Sepia officinalis. [101] Loligo vulgaris (_Owen_). [102] Loligo media (_Owen_). 6. The polypus[103] uses its tentacula both as feet and hands, for it brings its food to its mouth with the two that are above the mouth, and it uses the last of its tentacula, which is the sharpest of all, in the act of coition; this is the only one which is at all white, and it is divided at the extremity, it is placed upon the back; and the smooth part, in front of which are the acetabula, is called the back. In front of the abdomen, and above the tentacula, they have a hollow tube, by which they eject the sea-water which they have received into the abdomen, if any enters through the mouth. This part varies in position, and is sometimes on the right side, sometimes on the left, and by this its ink is ejected.
12. There are some appearances of hair[105] in their bodies; the sepia, teuthis, and teuthos, have a hard part upon the forward part of the body; the one is called sepium (the bone of the cuttle-fish), the other xiphus (the pen of the loligo). These two are different; for that of the sepia is strong and wide, partaking of the nature of spine and bone, and it contains a spongy, friable substance; but the pen of the teuthis is thin, and cartilaginous. In their form also they correspond with the differences of the animals themselves. The polypus has no hard internal part, but a portion of cartilage round the head, which becomes hard as they grow old. [105] Probably the branchia. 13. The females also differ from the males, for the latter have a passage beneath the œsophagus, extending from the brain to the lowest part of the body. That part to which it reaches is like a teat. In the female there are two such organs, which are placed above. In both sexes, some small red bodies are placed under these. The polypus has one capsule of eggs, which is uneven on the surface; it is large; internally it is all of a white colour, and smooth. The multitude of the ova is so great as to fill a vessel larger than the head of the polypus.
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