It is the liver therefore that alone
has this provision. In conclusion, wherever we see bile we must take
it to be excremental. For to suppose that it has one character in this
part, another in that, would be as great an absurdity as to suppose
mucus or the dejections of the stomach to vary in character
according to locality and not to be excremental wherever found.
3
So much then of the gall-bladder, and of the reasons why some
animals have one, while others have not. We have still to speak of the
mesentery and the omentum; for these are associated with the parts
already described and contained in the same cavity. The omentum, then,
is a membrane containing fat; the fat being suet or lard, according as
the fat of the animal generally is of the former or latter
description. What kinds of animals are so distinguished has been
already set forth in an earlier part of this treatise. This
membrane, alike in animals that have a single and in those that have a
multiple stomach, grows from the middle of that organ, along a line
which is marked on it like a seam. Thus attached, it covers the rest
of the stomach and the greater part of the bowels, and this alike in
all sanguineous animals, whether they live on land or in water. Now
the development of this part into such a form as has been described is
the result of necessity.
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