We must
decide whether the monstrous animal is one or is composed of several
grown together by considering the vital principle; thus, if the
heart is a part of such a kind then that which has one heart will be
one animal, the multiplied parts being mere outgrowths, but those
which have more than one heart will be two animals grown together
through their embryos having been confused.
It also often happens even in many animals that do not seem to be
defective and whose growth is now complete, that some of their
passages may have grown together or others may have been diverted from
the normal course. Thus in some women before now the os uteri has
remained closed, so that when the time for the catamenia has arrived
pain has attacked them, till either the passage has burst open of
its own accord or the physicians have removed the impediment; some
such cases have ended in death if the rupture has been made too
violently or if it has been impossible to make it at all. In some boys
on the other hand the end of the penis has not coincided with the
end of the passage where the urine is voided, but the passage has
ended below, so that they crouch sitting to void it, and if the testes
are drawn up they appear from a distance to have both male and
female generative organs. The passage of the solid food also has
been closed before now in sheep and some other animals; there was a
cow in Perinthus which passed fine matter, as if it were sifted,
through the bladder, and when the anus was cut open it quickly
closed up again nor could they succeed in keeping it open.
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