Page:The Works of William Harvey (part 1 of 2).djvu/281

 lying over against each other, the superior of the two covering and concealing the inferior, which is puckered together. The superior labium, or velabrum, as it is called, arises from the root of the rump, and as the upper eyelid covers the eye, so does this cover the three orifices of the pudenda, viz. the anus, the uterus, and the ureters, which lie concealed under the velabrum as under a kind of prepuce ; very much as in the pudenda of the woman we have the orifice of the vulva and the meatus urinarius concealed between the labia and the nymphae. So that without the use of the knife, or a somewhat forcible retraction of the velabrum in the fowl, neither the orifice by which the faeces pass from the intestines, nor that by which the urine issues from the ureters, nor yet that by which the egg escapes from the uterus, can be perceived. And as the two excrementitious discharges (the urine and the faeces) are expelled together as from a common cloaca, the velabrum being raised at the time, and the respective outlets exposed; so, during intercourse, the hen on the approach of the cock uncovers the vulva, and prepares for his reception, a circumstance observed by Fabricius in the turkey hen when she is eager for the male. I have myself ob- served a female ostrich, when her attendant gently scratched her back, which seemed to excite the sexual appetite, to lie down on the ground, lift up the velabrum, and exhibit and protrude the vulva, seeing which the male, straightway inflamed with a like cestrum, mounted, one foot being kept firm on the ground, the other set upon the back of the prostrate female ; the immense penis (you might imagine it a neat's tongue !) vibrated backwards and forwards, and the process of intercourse was accompanied with much ado in murmuring and noise the heads of the creatures being at the same time frequently thrust out and retracted and other indications of enjoyment. Nor is it peculiar to birds, but common to animals at large, that, wagging the tail and protruding the genital parts, they prepare for the access of the male. And, indeed, the tail in the majority of animals has almost the same office as the ve- labrum in the common fowl; unless it were raised or drawn aside, it would interfere with the discharge of the faeces and the access of the male.

In the female red-deer, fallow-deer, roe, and others of the more temperate animals, there is a corresponding protection to