Buffon's Natural History, Volume 03 (of 10): Containing a Theory of the Earth, a General History of Man, of the Brute Creation, and of Vegetables, Minerals, &c. &c.Buffon, Georges Louis Leclerc, comte de
History
Buffon's Natural History, Volume 03 (of 10): Containing a Theory of the Earth, a General History of Man, of the Brute Creation, and of Vegetables, Minerals, &c. &c.
Buffon, Georges Louis Leclerc, comte de
Natural history
After having finished his experiments on sows, Valisnieri repeated
those of Malpighius on the testicles of cows, and found that all he had
said was conformable to truth; only Valisnieri owns that he has never
been able to find the egg which Malpighius thought he had seen once or
twice in the internal cavity of glandular bodies. Valisnieri proceeded
in his experiments upon a variety of other animals to discover this
egg, but in vain; nevertheless his prejudice for that system induced
him, contrary to his experience, to admit the existence of eggs, which
neither he nor any other man ever did or ever will see. It is scarcely
possible to make a greater number of experiments, or better than he has
done. He observes, as something particular to a ewe, that there are
never more glandular substances in the testicles than foetuses in
the matrix. In young ewes, which have never been with the male, there
is but one glandular substance in each testicle, which when worn away,
another is found; and if a ewe has only one foetus in her matrix,
there is but one glandular substance in the testicles; if there are
two foetuses there will be two glandular substances. This substance
occupies the greatest part of the testicles; after it disappears
another is formed for the purpose of another generation.
In the testicles of a she-ass he perceived vesicles the size of small
cherries, which evidently prove they are not eggs, since, being of that
size, they could not enter into the horns of the matrix, which are too
narrow in this animal for their reception.
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