Pectoralis major

“ In the pectoral, which has never been found hypertrophied, the wasting process always sets in the earliest, and advances to the greatest extent. The pectoral muscle is thus the exact antithesis of the gastrocnemius, while the deltoid more nearly resembles [p. 566] the gastrocnemius than any other muscle of the upper extremity. After the pectoral the latissimus dorsi, then the trapezius scapular muscles (including the serratus magnus) , those of the arm and fore arm, the muscles of the neck, are found more or less wasted by the time the disease is fully developed. ”

“ The scales alter their form on the ventral aspect, where they become low and very small; their external ornament consists of fine, wavy, thread-like ridges. The pectorals are of moderate size, and have their principal rays unarticulated only for about 1/3 of their length; the dorsal and anal fins are large and triangular, the dorsal being placed far back and nearly opposite the anal. The latter is slightly larger than the dorsal, but is similar to it in shape, and is not prolonged backwards in the fringe-like manner characteristic of Pygopterus. ”

“ Aurata, capite pectoreque albis, abdomine purpureo, guttis lateralibus albis, basi viridi, lateribus pedibusque cyaneis, alis fuscis basi cinereis, halteribus testaceis.
Male and Female. Head and pectus with white tomentum and hairs; mystax with a few black bristles; mouth and antennæ black; third joint of the latter linear, conical at the tip, longer than the first and the second together; thorax with cupreous-gilded tomentum; abdomen purple, green at the base, blue and with a row of white dots along each side; legs blue; wings brown, cinereous towards the base, veins black ”

“ Here the body is herring-shaped, but broader on the back: the pectorals are greatly enlarged, as are frequently the other fins also: the mouth is small, obliquely cleft; the teeth few and minute; the eyes very large and prominent. By means of the enormous development of the pectorals, these fishes are enabled to project themselves from the water, and to perform a lengthened flight through the air. They are very common
FLYING-FISH. in the tropical seas; vast shoals springing into the air almost constantly in fine weather. A straggler now and then wanders to our own shores. ”

“ We will recall at the outset that the lesser pectoral muscle in man is completely covered by the great. In animals this is not the case; the lesser pectoral being very highly developed, projects beyond the great pectoral posteriorly, and occupies to a greater or less extent the inferior surface of the abdomen.
It also consists of two parts: one anterior, which we designate by the name of sterno-prescapular; the other, posterior, bearing that of sterno-humeral. ”

“ In Man, it is by no means unfrequent to find the sternal portion divided into two or more parts; the arrangement met with in the Magot is described in the human subject by Theile; [8] and Mr. Hallett [9] mentions a very similar one as occurring in man.
The Pectoralis Minor presented the same appearance as in man; in the Gorilla, Duvernoy states that it is divided into two portions ”

“ In such cases Ayer's Cherry Pectoral is invaluable. Mrs. Emma Gedney, 159 West 128 st., New York, writes: "While in the country, last winter, my little boy, three years old, was taken ill with Croup; it seemed as if he would die from strangulation. Ayer's Cherry Pectoral was tried in small and frequent doses, and, in less than half an hour, the little patient was breathing easily. The doctor said that the Pectoral saved my darling's life." Mrs. Chas. B. Landon, Guilford, Conn., writes: "Ayer's Cherry Pectoral
Saved My Life,
and also the life of my little son. ”

“ Muscles of the Thorax. A. Breast-muscles (connecting the arm and thorax) (Fig. 65, page 109) .
The muscles connecting the arm with the sternum, corresponding to the pectoralis muscles of man, fall into a considerable [145] number of not always clearly separated bundles in the cat. We shall distinguish by name four such bundles; these might be, and frequently are, further subdivided.
M. pectoantibrachialis (Fig. 65, m) .—This is a small flat bundle about one or two centimeters wide, forming the most superficial portion of the pectoralis group.
Origin on the lateral surface of the manubrium. ”

“ The great extent and strength of the pectorals, which are nearly horizontal, show us that, in addition to their acting as oars and rudder, they are also powerful assistants in bringing the great fleshy mouth to bear upon anything discovered by the barbels. ”

“ Generally speaking, neither the pectoral nor the ventral fins are of any material use during swift progressive motion; they rather serve to balance the body, or to aid its gentler movements while in a state of comparative repose. In flying fishes, as they are called, the pectoral fins are of such great length and expansion as to support these creatures in the air ”

“ The family of Pediculate Pectorals is so named from the fishes of which it is composed bearing their pectoral fins on a species of arm which forms a prolongation of the carp bone; it includes the Frog-fish, remarkable for the excessive circumference of the head and shoulders as compared with the rest of the body, the immense opening of a jaw, armed with pointed teeth, and the cutaneous jagged stripes of various lengths with which it bristles at many points. Its skin is soft, smooth, and without scales or other asperities ”

“ The peccari is very frequently met in the western mountains of America, and often in herds of a hundred head. It has a handsome, silver-grey, long-haired skin, an enormous head for its size with tremendous tusks, and is remarkable for its extraordinary courage. If disturbed, it will attack a man as soon as a horse or a tiger, and is very dangerous through its agility, strength, and tusks five inches long. I have known a hunter to be attacked by a herd, and forced to take shelter up a tree, where he remained the whole night till the herd retired. ”

“ This family, {279}Dicotylidae, contains but one genus, Dicotyles, with at most two species. The name of the animal is connected with the dorsal gland; the animal thus appeared to possess two navels. The Peccaries, exclusively confined to the New World, differ from the Old-World Pigs in one or more important characters. They have only three toes on the hind-feet, and the stomach is complicated. Though the Peccaries have but small tusks they hunt in packs and are very dangerous animals to meet with. They owe, too, their safety from many foes to their sociable habits. ”

“ In juveniles (Fig. 20) the pectoroabdominal seam contains no ligamentous tissue and is like the other interlaminal seams of the plastron. A lateral apex of the pectoral lamina projects upward behind the axillary scale on each side, in the position occupied by the apical scale of adults. Examination of a large series of specimens revealed that the apical scale of adults becomes separated from the lateral apex of the pectoral lamina at approximately the time when the hinge becomes functional as such. ”

“ Viridis, capite cyaneo, facie pectoreque subargenteis, antennis pedibus halteribusque nigris, abdomine cyanescente-viridi, alis cinereis.
Male. Bright green; head blue; its fore part and the pectus somewhat silvery; antennæ black; arista hardly longer than the thorax; abdomen bluish green; legs black; wings grey; veins black; fore branch of the cubital vein forming a much rounded right angle, from whence it is straight to its tip; discal transverse vein straight, parted by half its length from the border, and by less than its length from the fork of the cubital; halteres black. ”

“ In size, however, there is a great difference between the two: the white-lipped peccary weighing 100 pounds, or nearly twice the weight of the collared species. The former, too, is proportionably stouter in build, and altogether a stronger and fiercer animal; for although fierceness is not a characteristic of their nature, like other animals of the hog family, when, roused, they exhibit a ferocity and fearlessness equalling that of the true carnivora. ”

“ The true Perches (Percina) have two distinct dorsal fins, with the membrane which connects the rays semi-transparent and nearly colourless. The pectorals and ventrals are obtuse, or somewhat rounded; the former contain each five soft rays; the latter are placed beneath the pectorals. The form of the body is oblong; the scales are comparatively large; the mouth is wide, and furnished with short and small teeth much crowded, without any larger pointed teeth, resembling canines, at the sides. ”

“ The pectoral fin is of considerable but not excessive size; its principal rays are, like those of Oxygnathus and Rhadinichthys, unarticulated till towards their terminations; the ventral is rather small. The anal commences rather remote from the caudal; it is high and acuminate in front ”

“ Sub-Order 12. Pediculati.
Air-bladder without open duct. Opercle large, hidden under the skin; supraoccipital in contact with the frontals, separating the parietals. Pectoral arch suspended from the skull; no mesocoracoid. No ribs, no epipleurals. Ventral fins jugular. Gill-opening reduced to a foramen situated in or near the axil, more or less posterior to the base of the pectoral. Body naked or covered with spines or bony tubercles. ”

“ Female. Reddish. Head black, white behind and about the eyes and on the grooves of the face; antennæ black, reddish at the base, third joint slender, linear, very long, arista bare, rather stout; thorax with three whitish stripes; pectus with a more distinct oblique white band on each side; metathorax whitish; abdomen æneous, pubescent, finely punctured, reddish and slightly contracted towards the base, with two white bands, the second widely interrupted; oviduct long, lanceolate; legs piceous ”

“ The professor had had a long talk with the Indian regarding the game in the vicinity, and Cubara had [254] told him where they were likely to find a number of peccaries, a wild animal common to many parts of Venezuela and one much sought after by the natives for food. The peccary is not unlike a wild hog in general appearance, and when full grown weighs from fifty to sixty pounds. They are very fierce when attacked and have short tusks which are as sharp as daggers. ”

“ The fins in this genus of fishes are very small and feeble. Some of them have a pair of excessively minute pectorals, an almost invisible anal, and a tiny fan for a caudal. All have a short delicate dorsal, and several have no other fin than this, of which section the Worm Pipe is an example. Yet, according to the Swedish naturalist, Fries, the young of this species possess at their birth both caudal and pectorals, the former extending far up on the body, both on the dorsal and ventral edges. All these are in after life absorbed [Pg 210] except sufficient to form the permanent dorsal. ”

“ A little sand at this stage is useful to rub the fingers in, to prevent them slipping, when pulling out small pieces of flesh. The pectoral fins are, of all, the most awkwardly situated to skin out, coming, as they do, at the bottom of the pectoral process, and they must be left with their bones attached, and the flesh be scraped away from between the two fins, and underneath each one, until nothing remains. ”

“ The obtusely or acutely lobate pectoral fins articulate with the pectoral girdle by a single basal endoskeletal element. Nostrils on the ventral surface of the snout. Two dorsal fins and an anal fin. Dermal bones of the ethmoid region often fused with one another and with the premaxillae in front and the frontals behind to form a continuous rostral shield. Infra-dentary bones may be present. ”

“ But the struggle was too exciting for her, and the flying insects seemed to increase. Moths of every description—large brown moths, small, delicate white millers—whirled about her, while the irritating hum of the mosquito kept on more than ever. Mr. Peterkin and the rest of the family came in to inquire about the trouble. It was discovered that each of the little boys had been standing in the opening of a wire door for some time, watching to see when Elizabeth Eliza would have made her preparations and would begin to write. ”

“ The Pecopteris (Fig. 4, P. heterophylla) or comb-fern, is so called from its stiff thick leaflets being in some species arranged along the stalk like the teeth along the centre of a comb. Of all the plants of the coal-measures this is the one that approaches most closely to living nature. It appears to be almost identical with the pteris, of which one species is well known as the bracken of our hill-sides. Dr. Hooker figures together a frond of a New Zealand species (P. esculenta) and a fossil frond from the Newcastle pits. ”

“ The herd keeps together in a close throng, the males in advance, each mother having her young behind her. The noise made by the animals can be heard a long distance, not only on account of the dull, hoarse sounds which they make, but still more by reason of the cracking of the dead branches which they break in their impetuous progress.
Both day and night the Peccaries search for food. They eat all kinds of arboreal fruit and roots, and their teeth are so strong that they can easily open the hardest of palm seeds. They often do great mischief to the crops. ”

“ This family contains the genera Crenatula, Perna, Malleus, Avicula, Meleagrina.
4. Pectinides (plates, fig. 171 to 178) . The Pectinides are generally regular or nearly so, with the shell solid; the greater part of them are auriculated at the dorsal margin, and generally characterized by ribs radiating from the umbones. The genera are Pedum, Lima, Plagiostoma, Pecten, Plicatula, Spondylus, Podopsis.
5. Ostracea (plates, fig. 180 to 192) . The shells of this family are irregular, generally attached and foliaceous. They compose the genera Gryphæa, Ostræa, Vulsella, Placuna, Anomia. ”