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The volume assembles an encyclopedic survey of the known world and its living inhabitants, moving from detailed regional geography and descriptions of seas, rivers, islands, and peoples to extended treatments of humanity, its generation, anatomy, and the origins and inventions of arts. Subsequent books catalog terrestrial animals—their habits, capture, and uses—followed by comprehensive observations on fish and marine creatures, their sizes and behaviors. Accounts mix naturalistic description, reported marvels, medicinal uses derived from animals, and travel and secondhand reports, organized as topical chapters intended as a practical compendium of natural and human phenomena.
There are the same characteristics in the hæmatopous3060 also, a bird of much smaller size, although standing as high on the legs. It is a native of Egypt, and has three toes on each foot; flies3061 forming its principal food. If brought to Italy, it survives for a few days only.