De sollertia animalium

PHAEDIMUS. Then again the care of the young is shared by both parents: the males do not eat their own young, but stand by the spawn to guard the eggs, as Aristotle[*](Historia Animal. ix. 37 (621 a 21 ff.); cf. Herodotus, ii. 93.) relates. Some follow the female and sprinkle the eggs gradually with milt, for otherwise

the spawn will not grow, but remains imperfect and undeveloped. In particular the wrasse[*](The phycis is almost certainly one of the wrasses, probably in particular Crenilabrus pavo C.V. See Mair, L.C.L. Oppian, p. liii; Thompson, Glossary, pp. 276-278; Andrews, Journal of The Washington Academy of Sciences, xxxix (1949), pp. 12-14.) makes a sort of nest of seaweed, envelops the spawn in it, and shelters it from the waves.

The affection of the dogfish[*](Cf. Mor. 494 c; 730 e; Thompson on Aristotle, Historia Animal. vi. 10 (565 a 22 ff., b 2 ff.); Glossary, pp. 39-42; Mair on Oppian, Hal. i. 734.) for its young is not inferior in warmth and kindliness to that of any of the tamest animals; for they lay the egg, then sustain and carry the newlyhatehed young, not without, but within themselves, as if from a second birth. When the young grow larger, the parents let them out and teach them to swim close by; then again they collect them through their mouths and allow their bodies to be used as dwelling-places, affording at once room and board and sanctuary until the young become strong enough to shift for themselves.[*](Aristotle (Historia Animal. 565 b 24) reports that some dogfish brought forth their young by the mouth and took them therein again. Athenaeus (vii. 294 e) says that the dogfish took the young just hatched into its mouth and emitted them again. Plutarch has a somewhat garbled version of this presumed process, blended with data on the parental care of dolphins (cf. Plin. N.H. ix. 21) (Andrews).)

Wonderful also is the care of the tortoise for the birth and preservation of her young. To bear them she comes out of the sea to the shore near at hand; but since she is unable to incubate the eggs or to remain on dry land for long, she deposits them on the strand and heaps over them the smoothest and softest part of the sand. When she has buried and concealed them securely,[*](Cf. Pliny, Nat. Hist. ix. 37; contrast the forgetful lizard (x. 187).) some say that she scratches and scribbles the place with her feet, making it easy

for her to recognize; others affirm that it is because she has been turned on her back by the male that she leaves peculiar marks and impressions about the place. But what is more remarkable than this, she waits for the fortieth day[*](Cf. Aelian, Varia Hist. i. 6.) (for that is the number required to develop and hatch out the eggs) and then approaches. And each tortoise recognizes her own treasure and opens it more joyously and eagerly than a man does a deposit of gold.