Copy 1, Volume 1

Tracts on the natural history of animals and vegetables / Translated from the original Italian by John Graham Dalyell, with physiological illustrations by the translator.

  • Spallanzani, Lazzaro, 1729-1799
Date:
1803
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Tracts on the natural history of animals and vegetables / Translated from the original Italian by John Graham Dalyell, with physiological illustrations by the translator. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    180/442 (page 84)
    $4 ANIMALCULA OF INFUSIONS. &§& lethargic in winter; fo much the more, as he learns from M. Adanfon, that common fwallows con{tantly appear in Senegal during autumn, and difappear in {pring : and he conceives the Euro- pean fwallows, and thofe fubje& to lethargy, of different fpecies, though they have hitherto been efteemed the fame. 7 Neither are fome wanting in the immenfe tribe of fifhes on which cold produces a fimilar effeat. Tench, if we may credit Pechlin, as quoted by Hal- ler, are of this defcription(1). In the beginning of winter, he has obferved them bury themfelves in the mud, juft as we have feen many reptiles and infects do in the earth. Speaking in gene- ral terms, fifhes are a clafs of animals enjoying the privilege of preferving action and vivacity,. however cold the atmofphere may be, not only ~ _becauie fluid water can never acquire a great portion of cold, but becaufe they may retire ftill — deeper and deeper whatever is the cold it ac- quires (2). 2 Whence (1) Ad PraeleStion. Boerhaav. T. 4. Haller, Phyfiol. : T 35. | . (z} The poffibility of filhes becoming torpid has been ~ doubted. A few experiments hick I have made on fe« : veral fmall fifhes feemed to indicate torpor. When ex- ; pofed to confiderable cold, though lefs than freezing, they: ‘ . fank motionlefs to the bottom of a veflel, and immediate. _