n swallow it in considerable
quantities. The hair thus swallowed gradually accumulates in the
stomach, where it is formed into smooth round balls, which, in time,
become invested with a hardish brown crust, composed, apparently, of
inspissated mucilage, that, by continual friction from the coats of the
stomach, becomes hard and glossy. It is generally in the paunch that
these hair-balls are found. They vary in weight from a few ounces to six
or seven pounds. Mr. Walton, author of an 'Account of the Peruvian
Sheep,' makes mention of one that he had in his possession which weighed
eight pounds and a quarter. This hair-ball had been taken from a cow
that fed on the Pampas of Buenos Ayres. It was of a flat circular shape,
and measured two feet eleven inches and a half in circumference; two
feet eight inches round the flat part; nine inches diameter also in the
flat part; eleven inches diameter in the cross part; and, on immersing
it in water, it displaced upwards of eight quarts, which made its bulk
correspond to 462 cubic inches. The digestive functions are sometimes
seriously impaired by these concretions; a loss of appetite ensues, and
general debility.

In the Museum of Daniel Crosthwaite, there is a very extraordinary ball
of hair, taken from a fatted calf only seven weeks old. The ball of
hair, when taken out of the animal's stomach, and full of moisture,
weighed eleven ounces. The calf was fatted by Daniel Thwaite, of Dale
Head Hall, within six miles of Keswick; and slaughtered by John Fisher,
butcher, Keswick. The calf was a particularly healthy animal.

Before closing this brief sketch of the digestive apparatus of the ox,
it may not be uninteresting to quote some of the quaint speculations of
Nathaniel Grew on this subject, from his 'Comparative Anatomy of
Stomachs and Guts.'

He says: "The _voluntary_ motion of the stomach is that only which
accompanies rumination. That it is truly voluntary, is clear, from the
command that ruminating animals have of that action. For this purpose it
is, that the muscules of their venters are so thick and strong; and have
several duplicatures, as the bases of those muscules, whereupon the
stress of their motion lies. By means whereof they are able with ease to
rowl and tumble any part of the meat from one cell of the same venter to
another; or from one venter to another; or from thence into the gullet,
whensoever they are minded to do it; so that the ejectment of the meat,
in r