Aristotle

“ No mollusc or crustacean can produce any natural voice or sound. Fishes can produce no voice, for they have no lungs, nor windpipe and pharynx; but they emit certain inarticulate sounds and squeaks, which is what is called their 'voice', as the lyra or gurnard, and the sciaena (for these fishes make a grunting kind of noise) and the caprus or boar-fish in the river Achelous, and the chalcis and the cuckoo-fish; for the chalcis makes a sort piping sound, and the cuckoo-fish makes a sound greatly like the cry of the cuckoo, and is nicknamed from the circumstance. ”

“ The same difference in size of the sexes is found in fishes, as, for instance, in the smaller cartilaginous fishes, in the greater part of the gregarious species, and in all that live in and about rocks. The fact that the female is longer-lived than the male is inferred from the fact that female fishes are caught older than males. Furthermore, in all animals the upper and front parts are better, stronger, and more thoroughly equipped in the male than in the female, whereas in the female those parts are the better that may be termed hinder-parts or underparts. ”

“ Insects, for instance, have no voice and no language, but they can emit sound by internal air or wind, though not by the emission of air or wind; for no insects are capable of respiration. But some of them make a humming noise, like the bee and the other winged insects; and others are said to sing, as the cicada. And all these latter insects make their special noises by means of the membrane that is underneath the 'hypozoma'-those insects, that is to say, whose body is thus divided; as for instance, one species of cicada, which makes the sound by means of the friction of the air. ”

“ Experienced fishermen affirm, some that they have at times seen in the sea animals like sticks, black, rounded, and of the same thickness throughout; others that they have seen creatures resembling shields, red in colour, and furnished with fins packed close together; and others that they have seen creatures resembling the male organ in shape and size, with a pair of fins in the place of the testicles, and they aver that on one occasion a creature of this description was brought up on the end of a nightline. ”

“ All insects have eyes, but no other organ of sense discernible, except that some insects have a kind of a tongue corresponding to a similar organ common to all testaceans; and by this organ such insects taste and imbibe their food. In some insects this organ is soft; in other insects it is firm; as it is, by the way, in the purple-fish, among testaceans. In the horsefly and the gadfly this organ is hard, and indeed it is hard in most insects. ”

“ With regard to sex, some animals are divided into male and female, but others are not so divided but can only be said in a comparative way to bring forth young and to be pregnant. In animals that live confined to one spot there is no duality of sex; nor is there such, in fact, in any testaceans. In molluscs and in crustaceans we find male and female: and, indeed, in all animals furnished with feet, biped or quadruped ”

“ When people rest duality of sex in the eel on the assertion that the head of the male is bigger and longer, and the head of the female smaller and more snubbed, they are taking diversity of species for diversity of sex.
There are certain fish that are nicknamed the epitragiae, or capon-fish, and, by the way, fish of this description are found in fresh water, as the carp and the balagrus. This sort of fish never has either roe or milt; but they are hard and fat all over, and are furnished with a small gut; and these fish are regarded as of super-excellent quality. ”

“ There is no doubt but that fishes have the sense of taste, for a great number of them delight in special flavours; and fishes freely take the hook if it be baited with a piece of flesh from a tunny or from any fat fish, obviously enjoying the taste and the eating of food of this kind. Fishes have no visible organs for hearing or for smell; for what might appear to indicate an organ for smell in the region of the nostril has no communication with the brain. ”

“ Again, some insects have antennae in front of their eyes, as the butterfly and the horned beetle. Such of them as have the power of jumping have the hinder legs the longer; and these long hind-legs whereby they jump bend backwards like the hind-legs of quadrupeds. All insects have the belly different from the back; as, in fact, is the case with all animals. The flesh of an insect's body is neither shell-like nor is it like the internal substance of shell-covered animals, nor is it like flesh in the ordinary sense of the term ”

“ The sea-nettle appears to be devoid altogether of excretion, and in this respect it resembles a plant.
Of sea-nettles there are two species, the lesser and more edible, and the large hard ones, such as are found in the neighbourhood of Chalcis. In winter time their flesh is firm, and accordingly they are sought after as articles of food, but in summer weather they are worthless, for they become thin and watery, and if you catch at them they break at once into bits, and cannot be taken off the rocks entire; and being oppressed by the heat they tend to slip back into the crevices of the rocks. ”

“ In the crawfish the male differs from the female: in the female the first foot is bifurcate, in the male it is undivided; the belly-fins in the female are large and overlapping on the neck, while in the male they are smaller and do not overlap; and, further, on the last feet of the male there are spur-like projections, large and sharp, which projections in the female are small and smooth. Both male and female have two antennae in front of the eyes, large and rough, and other antennae underneath, small and smooth. ”

“ Furthermore, it would appear that not only do men dream, but horses also, and dogs, and oxen; aye, and sheep, and goats, and all viviparous quadrupeds; and dogs show their dreaming by barking in their sleep. With regard to oviparous animals we cannot be sure that they dream, but most undoubtedly they sleep. And the same may be said of water animals, such as fishes, molluscs, crustaceans, to wit crawfish and the like. These animals sleep without doubt, although their sleep is of very short duration. ”

“ The body in general and the region of the thorax in particular are smooth, not rough as in the crawfish; but on the large claws the outer portion has larger spines. There is no apparent difference between the male and female, for they both have one claw, whichever it may be, larger than the other, and neither male nor female is ever found with both claws of the same size.
All crustaceans take in water close by the mouth. The crab discharges it, closing up, as it does so, a small portion of the same, and the crawfish discharges it by way of the gills ”

“ Consequently, animals that have no tongue at all or that have a tongue not freely detached, have neither voice nor language; although, by the way, they may be enabled to make noises or sounds by other organs than the tongue. ”

“ All urchins are supplied with eggs, but in some of the species the eggs are exceedingly small and unfit for food. Singularly enough, the urchin has what we may call its head and mouth down below, and a place for the issue of the residuum up above; (and this same property is common to all stromboids and to limpets) . For the food on which the creature lives lies down below; consequently the mouth has a position well adapted for getting at the food, and the excretion is above, near to the back of the shell. ”

“ Thus, as a rule, fishes will not touch a bait that is not fresh, neither are they all caught by one and the same bait, but they are severally caught by baits suited to their several likings, and these baits they distinguish by their sense of smell; and, by the way, some fishes are attracted by malodorous baits, as the saupe, for instance, is attracted by excrement. Again, a number of fishes live in caves; and accordingly fishermen, when they want to entice them out, smear the mouth of a cave with strong-smelling pickles, and the fish are Soon attracted to the smell. ”

“ Wherefore they have nor spine, nor bone, nor sepia-bone, nor enveloping shell; but their body by its hardness is its own protection and requires no extraneous support. However, insects have a skin; but the skin is exceedingly thin. These and such-like are the external organs of insects.
Internally, next after the mouth, comes a gut, in the majority of cases straight and simple down to the outlet of the residuum: but in a few cases the gut is coiled. No insect is provided with any viscera, or is supplied with fat; and these statements apply to all animals devoid of blood. ”

“ In some cases, the male and the female utter the same note; in other cases, different notes. The smaller birds are more vocal and given to chirping than the larger ones; but in the pairing season every species of bird becomes particularly vocal. Some of them call when fighting, as the quail, others cry or crow when challenging to combat, as the partridge, or when victorious, as the barn-door cock. In some cases cock-birds and hens sing alike, as is observed in the nightingale, only that the hen stops singing when brooding or rearing her young; in other birds, the cocks sing more than the hens ”

“ But the fact that insects sleep may be very well seen in the case of common every-day creatures; for not only do they rest at night-time from dimness of vision (and, by the way, all hard-eyed creatures see but indistinctly) , but even if a lighted candle be presented they continue sleeping quite as soundly.
Of all animals man is most given to dreaming. Children and infants do not dream, but in most cases dreaming comes on at the age of four or five years. Instances have been known of full-grown men and women that have never dreamed at all ”

“ In the neighbourhood of Torone there are sea-urchins of a white colour, shells, spines, eggs and all, and that are longer than the ordinary sea-urchin. The spine in this species is not large nor strong, but rather limp; and the black formations in connexion with the mouth are more than usually numerous, and communicate with the external duct, but not with one another; in point of fact, the animal is in a manner divided up by them. The edible urchin moves with greatest freedom and most often ”

“ Voice and sound are different from one another; and language differs from voice and sound. The fact is that no animal can give utterance to voice except by the action of the pharynx, and consequently such animals as are devoid of lung have no voice ”

“ Further, when fishermen see a shoal of fish feeding at a distance, disporting themselves in calm bright weather on the surface of the water, if they are anxious to descry the size of the fish and to learn what kind of a fish it is, they may succeed in coming upon the shoal whilst yet basking at the surface if they sail up without the slightest noise, but if any man make a noise previously, the shoal will be seen to scurry away in alarm. ”

“ All other animals may, with very few exceptions, be comprehended within four genera: to wit, molluscs, crustaceans, testaceans, and insects. Of these four genera, the mollusc, the crustacean, and the insect have all the senses: at all events, they have sight, smell, and taste. As for insects, both winged and wingless, they can detect the presence of scented objects afar off, as for instance bees and snipes detect the presence of honey at a distance; and do so recognizing it by smell. Many insects are killed by the smell of brimstone ”

“ Vocal sounds are characterized chiefly by their pitch, whether high or low, and the kinds of sound capable of being produced are identical within the limits of one and the same species; but articulate sound, that one might reasonably designate 'language', differs both in various animals, and also in the same species according to diversity of locality; as for instance, some partridges cackle, and some make a shrill twittering noise. Of little birds, some sing a different note from the parent birds, if they have been removed from the nest and have heard other birds singing ”

“ Furthermore, when fishermen are laying bait for neritae, they always get to leeward of them, and never speak a word while so engaged, under the firm impression that the animal can smell and hear; and they assure us that, if any one speaks aloud, the creature makes efforts to escape. With regard to testaceans, of the walking or creeping species the urchin appears to have the least developed sense of smell ”

“ All insects when cut in two continue to live, excepting such as are naturally cold by nature, or such as from their minute size chill rapidly; though, by the way, wasps notwithstanding their small size continue living after severance. In conjunction with the middle portion either the head or the stomach can live, but the head cannot live by itself. Insects that are long in shape and many-footed can live for a long while after being cut in twain, and the severed portions can move in either direction, backwards or forwards ”

“ In all molluscs the head is found to be between the feet and the belly. All molluscs are furnished with eight feet, and in all cases these feet are severally furnished with a double row of suckers, with the exception of one single species of poulpe or octopus. The sepia, the small calamary and the large calamary have an exceptional organ in a pair of long arms or tentacles, having at their extremities a portion rendered rough by the presence of two rows of suckers ”

“ With regard to the sleeping and waking of animals, all creatures that are red-blooded and provided with legs give sensible proof that they go to sleep and that they waken up from sleep; for, as a matter of fact, all animals that are furnished with eyelids shut them up when they go to sleep. ”

“ It apprehends and retains objects by means of the under-surface of its arms, and the membrane in between its feet is kept at full tension; if the animal get on to the sand it can no longer retain its hold.
There is a difference between the octopus and the other molluscs above mentioned: the body of the octopus is small, and his feet are long, whereas in the others the body is large and the feet short; so short, in fact, that they cannot walk on them. Compared with one another, the teuthis, or calamary, is long-shaped, and the sepia flat-shaped ”