Q. Why do persons become hoarse? A. Because of the rheum descending from the brain filling the conduit of the lights: and sometimes through imposthumes of the throat, or rheum gathering in the neck. Q. Why have the females of all living creatures the shrillest voice, the crow only excepted, and a woman a shriller and smaller voice than a man? A. By reason of the composition of the veins the vocal arteries of voice are formed, as appears by this similitude, that a small pipe sounds shriller than a great. Also in women, because the passage where the voice is formed is made narrow and strait, by reason of cold, it being the nature of cold to bind; but in men, the passage is open and wider through heat, because it is the property of heat to open and dissolve. It proceedeth in women through the moistness of the lungs, and weakness of the heat. Young and diseased men have sharp and shrill voices from the same cause. Q. Why doth the voice change in men at fourteen, and in women at twelve? A. Because then the beginning of the voice is slackened and loosened; and this is proved by the similitude of the string of an instrument let down or loosened which gives a great sound; and also because eunuchs, capons, &c. have softer and slenderer voices than others, in consequence of the absence of generating powers. Q. Why do small birds sing more and louder than great ones, as appears in the lark and nightingale? A. Because the spirits of small birds are subtle and soft, and the organ conduit strait, as appeareth in a pipe; therefore their notes following easily at desire they sing very soft. Q. Why do bees, wasps, locusts, and many other such like insects, make a noise, seeing they have no lungs, nor instruments of voice? A. Because in them there is a certain small skin, which, when struck by the air, causeth a sound. Q. Why do not fish make a sound? A. Because they have no lungs, but only gills, nor yet a heart; and therefore they need not the drawing in of the air, and by consequence they make no noise, because a noise is the percussion of the air which is drawn. _Of the Neck._ Q. Why hath a living creature a neck? A. Because the neck is the supporter of the head, and therefore the neck is in the middle between the head and the body, to the intent that by it and by its sinews, motion and sense of the body might be conveyed through all the body; and that by means of the neck, the heart, which is very hot, might be separated from the brain. Q. Why do some creatures want necks, as serpents and fishes? A. Because they want hearts, and therefore want that assistance which we have spoken of; or else they have a neck in some inward part of them, which is not distinguished outwardly. Q. Why is the neck full of bones and joints? A. That it may bear and sustain the head the better. Also, because the backbone is joined to the brain in the neck, and from thence it receives marrow, which is of the substance of the brain.