1. The milk that is produced before the seventh month is useless; but as soon as the child is alive the milk becomes good. At first it is salt, like that of sheep. Most women during pregnancy are affected by wine, and if they drink it they become faint and feeble. The beginning and the ending of the reproductive power in both sexes is marked in the male by the emission of the semen, in the female by the catamenia. They are not, however, fertile when these first occur, nor while they are still small and weak. The period of the commencement of these signs has been mentioned. In women the catamenia usually cease at forty; but if they pass over this age, they go on to fifty; and some have even produced children at that period, but none later than this period.
2. The reproductive function in men usually continues active till they are sixty years old; if they pass beyond this period, till they are seventy; and some men have had children at seventy years old. It frequently happens that, when marriages are unfruitful, both men and women become pregnant, if the marriage is dissolved and they marry again. The same thing takes place respecting the birth of male and female children. For sometimes only children of one sex are produced by a marriage; and if this is dissolved, and the parents marry again, children of the other sex are produced. These things also vary with the age of the parents; for some when young have female children, and when older males, though the contrary sometimes takes place.
3. The same is the case with the whole of the reproductive function. For some persons have no children when they are young, but have them afterwards; others have children at first, but none afterwards; and there are some women who conceive with difficulty, but when they have conceived bear children; others conceive easily, but the fœtus never comes to maturity. There are also both men and women who only produce children of one sex, as the story goes of Hercules, who had but one daughter in seventy-two children. Those who have been barren, and either after great care, or from any other cause, at last conceive, more frequently bear a daughter than a son. It often happens also that men who have engendered become impotent, and subsequently return to their former condition.
4. Maimed parents produce maimed children; and so also lame and blind parents produce lame and blind children; and, on the whole, children are often born with anything contrary to nature, or any mark which their parents may have, such as tumours and wounds. Such marks have often been handed down for three generations; as if a person had a mark on their arm which was not seen in the son, but the grandson exhibited a dark confused spot on the same place. The circumstances, however, are rare; and sound children are generally produced from lame parents; nor is there any complete certainty in these matters; and children resemble their parents or their grandparents, and sometimes they resemble neither. This is handed down for many generations; as in Sicily, a woman cohabited with an Ethiopian, her daughter was not black, but her daughter's child was so.
5. For the most part the girls resemble their mother, and the boys their father; though the contrary is often the case, and the females resemble their father, and the males their mother, and the different parts of the body resemble either parents. Twins have sometimes no resemblance to each other, but they are generally much alike; and one woman cohabited with a man, and conceived seven days after parturition, when she bore a child as like her former as if they had been twins. Some women, as well as other creatures, produce young resembling themselves, others bear those which resemble the male, as the horse called Dicæa in Pharsalia.
Chapter VII.
1. The seminal fluid in its emission is preceded by wind. The manner of its emission exhibits this; for nothing is expelled to a great distance without pneumatic force. If the seminal fluid is taken up by the uterus and retained there, it becomes inclosed in a membrane. For if it is expelled before it becomes articulated, it appears like an ovum inclosed in a membrane, but without any shell, and the membrane is full of veins. All animals, whether furnished with fins, feet, or wings, whether viviparous or oviparous, are produced in the same manner, except that the umbilicus in viviparous animals is turned towards the uterus, and in others to the ovum; and in some cases both ways, as in a certain kind of fish. Some of them are surrounded by a membrane, others by a chorion. First of all, the fœtus is contained within the last envelope. Then there is another membrane over this, which is in part united to the matrix and is partly separate, and contains water. Between these is a watery or sanguineous fluid, which in women is called prophorus.
2. All animals that have a navel increase by the navel; and in those which have acetabula the navel is united to the acetabulum; and in those which have a smooth uterus the navel is united to the uterus upon a vein. The position of all quadrupeds in the uterus is stretched out; that of fishes is on the side; bipeds, as birds, are folded together. The human fœtus lies folded up with its nose between its knees and its eyes upon them, and its ears turned outwards. All animals are alike in having the head placed upwards at first. As they grow, the head turns round, and the birth of all animals is naturally with the head forwards: for even in those that are folded together the presentation of the feet is unnatural. The embryo of quadrupeds contains excrementitious matter, as soon as it is matured, both fluid and solid. The latter is contained in the extreme parts of the intestine, the former in the bladder.
3. If animals have acetabula in the uterus, these acetabula always become smaller as the fœtus grows, and at last disappear. The umbilical cord is a covering for veins, of which the origin is in the uterus. In those creatures which have acetabula it originates in them; in those that have not acetabula it originates in the vein. In the larger animals, such as the fœtus of oxen, there are four veins; in smaller animals, two; in very small animals, as in birds, there is but one. Two veins reach the fœtus through the liver, from that part called the gates of the liver, towards the great vein; and two go to the aorta, where it is divided into two parts; and there are membranes round each pair of veins, and the umbilical cord surrounds these membranes like a covering. As the fœtus increases, these veins diminish. The embryo, as it grows, advances into the viscera, where its movements are manifest. Sometimes it remains rolled up near the pudendum.