Note s — BOOK IV.
Reading edition
Observare est quod Quadrupedes, qui oculos in terram pronos, ac pendulos gerunt, Musculum peculiarem habent, quo Oculi globus suspenditur——Hoc Musculo Bos, Equus, Ovis, Lepus, Porcus, &c. præditi sunt: hoc etiam Canis instruitur, sed alio modo conformatum habet. Willis de An. Brut. p. 1. c. 15.
Of this Opinion also was Bartholine Anat. l. 3. c. 8. and divers other eminent Anatomists.
But Dr. Briggs is of Opinion that the Adnata, and the other Muscles sufficiently answer all those Ends ascribed to that Muscle by former Anatomists, and thinks Probabiliùs itaque esse hunc Musculum nervi Optici actionem (per vices) confirmare, nè à prono Brutorum incessu & copioso affluxu humorum debilitetur, Ophthal. c. 2. §. 2.
The Musculus Suspensorius being in the Porpess, as well as Brutes, Dr. Tyson thinks the Use of it is not to suspend the Bulk of the Eye; but rather by its equal Contraction of the Sclerotis, to render the Ball of the Eye more or less Spherical, and so fitter for Vision. Tyson’s Anat. of the Porpess, p. 39.