have many bellies and a round Milt which thing no other horned-beast hath except a Sheep The males have harsher hairs then their females and the Lybian Goats have hair as long as womens and very rough curled which the inhabitants shear off every year and therewith the Ship-wrights make cable ropes but in Cilicia and Phrygia they shear them and make the stuffe called Zambelot and another kinde of Cloth called Mathaliaze In Arabia they make Tents of Cloth compiled of Asses and Goats hair and it seemeth that Cilicia received his name of this kinde of Cloth which is called in Latin Cilicium or else that this Cloth was first invented among them whereupon it received that denomination but among the Grammarians and Poets Lana Caprina Goats wool grew to a proverb to signifie 〈◊〉 thing of no weight or moment as it is in Horace Alter rixatur de lana saepe caprina Propugnat nugis armatus There are another sort of Goats which are called Syrian Goats and of some Mambrin Goats and most commonly Indian Goats because they are most noble in that Countrey and that in Coythae and likewise in the Region of Damiata for Mambre is a Mountain neer Hebron from whence it is probable that the word Mambrin cometh wherefore I have thought good to expresse the figure both of the greatest of that kinde as it was taken by Antonius Musa Brasovalus Physitian to the Noble Duke Hercules de Este at Ferraria by one of these Goats brought thither to be seen The lesser kinde I conjecture to be the right Mambrine or Syrian Goat although some of the late writers call it an Indian Goat the reason is because as hath been said they call all strange beasts by the names of Indians if they finde them not in their own Countrey The ears of it are large and broad as the picture describeth and such ears have the Goats of Gallia-Narbon being at the least as broad as a mans span they are of colour like wilde Goats their horns very sharp and standing not far distant one from the other and have stones like a stone Horse being in all other parts not unlike to the vulgar and common Goat Some curious herdsmen as Alcmaeon and Archelaus have delivered to the world that Goats take breath through their ears and Phyles approveth their conceit because he had seen an experiment of a Goat that his mouth and nostrils being stopped fast nevertheless he seemed not to be troubled for want of breath and for this also is alleadged the authority of Oppianus who writeth of certain Goats called Aegari that they have a certain hole or passage in the middle of their head betwixt the horns which goeth directly unto the liver and the same stopped with liquid Wax suffocateth or stifleth the beast If this be true as I would not any way extenuate the authority of the writer then it is very likely that some have without difference attributed to all kindes of Goats that which was proper to this kinde alone for the former opinion is not reasonable Nevertheless I leave every man to his own liberty of believing or refusing There is no beast that heaeeth so perfectly and so sure as a Goat for he is not only holp in this sense with his ears but also hath the Organ of hearing in part of his throat wherefore when the Egyptians describe a man which hath an excellent ear they express him by a Goat There are some kinde of Goats in Illyria which have whole hoofs like a Horse and these are only found in that Region In all other Nations of the World they are cloven footed The use of their several parts is singular and first of all to begin with their skin the people of Sardinia as saith Nymphidorus nourish Goats for their skins whereof they make them garments being dressed with the hair upon them and they affirm strange virtue in them namely that they heat their bodies in the Winter and cool them in the Summer and the hairs growing upon those skins are a cubit long therefore the man that weareth them in Winter time turneth the hairy side next to his body and so is warmed by it and in Summer the raw side and so the hair keepeth the Sun from piercing his skin and violence of heat And this also is usual in Suevia where the women wear garments of Goats hair in the Winter and also make their childrens coats thereof according to Virgils saying in Moreto Et cinctus villosae tegmine Caprae For this cause the Merchants buy them rough in those parts of Savoy neer Geneva and their choice is of the young ones which die naturally or are kild or else such as were not above two years old The Tyrians in the Persian war wore upon their backs Goat-skins In ancient time they made hereof Dipthera that was a kinde of Parchment whereon they wrote on both sides and had the name in Greek from that use which Hermolaus by a metaphorical allusion called Opistographi From the use of these in garments came the appellation of harlots to be cald Pellices and a whores bag was called Penula Scortea such a one is used by Pilgrims which go to visit the Church of Saint James of Calec and such Carriers or Foot-posts had wont to use in their journies which caused Martial to write thus Ingrediare viam coelo licet usque sereno An subitas nusquam scortea cepit aquar The Sandals which men were wont to wear on their feet in the East Countries were also made of Goats skins and there was a custome in Athens that men for honour of Bacchus did dance upon certain Bottles made of Goats skins and full of wind the which were placed in the middest of the Theatre and the dancer was to use but one leg to the intent that he might often fall from the slippery bottles and make the people sport whereunto Virgil alluded this saying Mollibus in pratis unctos saliere pro utres There is also a Ladanum tree in Carmania by the cutting of the bark whereof there issueth forth a certain gum which they take and preserve in a Goats skin their use in War wherein the Souldiers were wont to lie all Winter and therefore we read that Claudius the Emperour had given him thirty tents of Goats skins for his Souldiers attend upon the Judges and the Mariners also by these defended themselves from the violence of storms upon the Sea and so I leave this part of the beast with remembrance of that which is written in holy Scripture Heb. 11. that the people of God in ancient times did flee away from the rage of superstition being anparelled or rather meanly disguised in Goat skins being charitably holped by the beasts that were cruelly put to death by wretched men In the next place the milke of Goats cometh to be considered for that also hath been is and will be of great accouut for Butter and
alive they put them into some tub or great mortar and there kill them by bruising them to pieces afterwards they make a fire of coals in the Mountains where the VVolfs haunt putting into the same some of these fishes mixed with bloud and pieces of Mutton and so leaving it to have the savour thereof carryed every way with the winde they go and hide themselves whilest that in the mean time the VVolfs enraged with the savour of this fire seek to and fro to finde it because of the smell the fire before they come is quenched or goeth out naturally and the VVolfs by the smoak thereof especially by tasting of the flesh bloud and fish which there they finde do fall into a drowsie dead sleep which when the Hunters do perceive they come upon them and cut their throats The Armenians do poyson them with black fishes and some do take a cat pulling off her skin taking out the bowels they put into her belly the powder of Frogs this Cat is boyled a little upon coals and by a man drawn up and down in the Mountains where VVolfs do haunt now if the VVolfs do chance to meet with the train of this Cat they instantly follow after him inraged without all fear of man to attain it therefore he which draweth the Cat is accompanyed with another Hunter armed with a Gun Pistol or Cross-bow that at the appearance of the VVolf and before his approach to the train he may destroy and kill him I will not discourse of VVolf bane commonly called Aconitum in Latine wherewithall both men and beasts are intoxicated and especially VVolfs but referring the Reader to the long discourse of Conradus Gesner in his History of the VVolf I will only remember in this place an Epigram of Ausonius wherein he pleasantly relateth a story of an adulterated woman desiring to make away her jealous husband and that with speed and vehemency gave him a drink of VVolf-bane and Quick-silver mingled together either of both single are poyson but compounded are a purgation the Epigram is this that followeth Toxica zelotypo dedit uxor moecha marito Nec satis ad mortem credidit esse datum Miscuit argenti letalia pondera vivi Cogeret ut celerem vis geminata necem Dividat haec si quis faciunt discreta venenum Antidotum sumet qui sociata bibet Ergo inter sese dum noxia pocula certant Cessit letalis noxa salutiferae Protinus vacuos alvi petiere recessus Lubrica dejectis qua vita nota cibis Concerning the enemies of Wolfs there is no doubt but that such a ravening beast hath few friends for except in the time of copulation wherein they mingle sometime with Dogs and some-time with Leopards and sometime with other beasts all beasts both great and small do avoid their society and fellowship for it cannot be safe for strangers to live with them in any league or amity seeing in their extremity they devour one another for this cause in some of the inferiour beasts their hatred lasteth after death as many Authors have observed for if a Sheep skin be hanged up with a Wolfs skin the wool falleth off from it and if an instrument be stringed with strings made of both these beasts the one will give no sound in the presence of the other but of this matter we have spoken in the story of the sheep shewing the opinion of the best learned concerning the truth hereof The Ravens are in perpetual enmity with Wolfs and the antipathy of their natures is so violent that it is reported by Philes and Aelianus that if a Raven eat of the carcase of a beast which the Wolf hath killed or formerly tasted of she presently dyeth There are certain wilde Onions called Scillae and some say the Sea-Onion because the root hath the similitude of an Onion of all other things this is hateful to a Wolf and therefore the Arabians say that by treading on it his leg falleth into a cramp whereby his whole body many times endureth insufferable torments for the Cramp increaseth into Convulsions for which cause it is worthy to be observed how unspeakable the Lord is in all his works for whereas the VVolf is an enemy to the Fox and the Turtle he hath given secret instinct and knowledge both to this Beast and Fowl of the vertuous operation of this herb against the ravening VVolf for in their absence from their nests they leave this Onion in the mouth thereof as a sure gard to keep their young ones from the VVolf There are certain Eagles in Tartaria which are tamed who do of their own accord being set on by men adventure upon VVolves and so vex them with their talons that a man with no labour or difficulty may kill the beast and for this cause the VVolves greatly fear them and avoid them and thereupon came the common proverb Lupus fugit aquilam And thus much shall suffice to have spoken in general concerning their taking Now we will proceed to the other parts of their History and first of all of their carnal copulation They engender in the same manner as Dogs and Sea-calves do and therefore in the middle of their copulation they cleave together against their will It is observed that they begin to engender immediately after Christmass and this rage of their lust lasteth but twelve days whereupon there was wont to go a fabulous tale or reason that the cause why all of them conceived in the twelve days after Christmass was for that Latona so many days together wandered in the shape of a she VVolf in the Mountains Hyperborei for fear of Juno in which likeness she was brought to Delus but this fable is confuted by Plutarch rehearsing the words of Antipater in his Book of Beasts for he saith when the Oaks that bear Acorns do begin to cast their flowers or blossomes then the VVolves by eating thereof do open their wombs for where there is no plenty of Acorns there the young ones dye in the dams belly and therefore such Countries where there is no store of Oaks are freed from VVolves and this he saith is the true cause why they conceive but once a year and that only in the twelve days of Christmass for those Oaks flower but once a year namely in the Spring time at which season the VVolves bring forth their young ones For the time that they go with young and the number of whelps they agree with Dogs that is they bear their young nine weeks and bring forth many blinde whelps at a time according to the manner of those that have many claws on their feet Their legs are without Articles and therefore they are not able to go at the time of their littering and there is a vulgar opinion that a she VVolf doth never in all her life bring forth above nine at a time whereof the last which she bringeth forth in her old age is a Dog through weakness and
Wart they then set fire on it and so burn it to ashes and by this way and order the Warts are eradicated that they never after grow again Marcellus Empiricus taketh Spiders webs that are found in the Cypresse tree mixing them with other convenient remedies so giving them to a podagrical person for the asswaging of his pain Against the pain of a hollow tooth Galen in his first Book De Compos medicam secundum loca much commendeth by testimony of Archigenes the Egges of Spiders being tempered and mixed with Oleum Nardinum and so a little of it being put into the tooth In like sort Kiramides giveth Spiders egges for the curation of a Tertian Ague Whereupon we conclude with Galen in his Book to Piso that Nature as yet never brought forth any thing so vile mean and contemptible in outward shew but that it hath manifold and most excellent and necessary uses if we would shew a greater diligence and not be so squeamish as to refuse those wholesome medicines which are easie to be had and without great charges and travail acquired I will add therefore this one note before I end this discourse that Apes Marmosets or Monkies the Serpents called Lizards the Stellion which is likewise a venomous Beast like unto a Lizard having spots in his neck like unto stars Wasps and the little beast called Ichneumon Swallows Sparrows the little Titmouse and Hedge-sparrows do often feed full favourly upon Spiders Besides if the Nightingale the Prince of all singing Birds do eat any Spiders she is clean freed and healed of all diseases whatsoever In the days of Alexander the Great there dwelled in the City of Alexandria a certain young maid which from her youth up was fed and nourished only with eating of Spiders and for the same cause the King was premonished not to come neer her lest peradventure he might be infected by her poysonous breath or by the venom evaporated by her sweating Albertus likewise hath recorded in his writings that there was a certain noble young Virgin dwelling at Colen in Germany who from her tender years was fed only with Spiders And thus much we English men have known that there was one Henry Lilgrave living not many years since being Clerk of the Kitchen to the right Noble Ambrose Dudley Earl of Warwick who would search every corner for Spiders and if a man had brought him thirty or forty at one time he would have eaten them all up very greedily such was his desirous longing after them Of the STELLION THey are much deceived that confound the green Lizard or any other vulgar Lizard for because the Stellion hath a ru 〈…〉 colour and yet as Matthiolus writeth seeing Aristotle hath left recorded that there are venomous Stellions in Italy he thinketh that the little white Beast with stars on the back found about the City of Rome in the walls and ruines of old houses and is there called Tarantula is the Stellion of which he speaketh and there it liveth upon Spiders Yet that there is another and more noble kinde of Stellion 〈…〉 iently so called of the learned shall afterward appear in the succeeding discourse This Beast or Serpent is called by the Grecians Colottes Ascalobtes and Galeotes and such a one was that which Aristophanes faigneth from the side of a house eased her belly into the mouth of Socrates as he gaped when in a Moon-shine night he observed the course of the stars and motion of the Moon The reason of this Greek name Ascalabotes is taken from Ascalos a circle because it appeareth on the back full of such circles like stars as writeth Perottus Howbeit that seemeth to be a faigned Etymologie and therefore I rather take it that Ascala signifieth impurity and that by reason of the uncleannesse of this beast it was called Ascalabates or as Suidas deriveth it of Colobates because by the help and dexterity of the fingers it climbeth up the walls even as Rats and Mice or as Kiramides will have it from Calos signifying a piece of wood because it climbeth upon wood and trees And for the same reason it is called Galeotes because it climbeth like a Weasil but at this day it is vulgarly called among the Grecians Liakoni although some are also of opinion that it is also known among them by the words Thamiamithos and Psammamythe Among the vulgar Hebrews it is sometimes called Letaah and sometimes Semmamit as Munster writeth The Arabians call it Sarnabraus and Senabras a Stellion of the Gardens And peradventure Guarill Guasemabras Alurel and Gnases And Sylvaticus also useth Epithets for a Stellion And the general Arabian word for such creeping biting things is Vasga which is also rendered a Dragon of the house In stead of Colotes Albertus hath Arcolus The Germans English and French have no words for this Serpent except the Latine word and therefore I was justly constrained to call it a Stellion in imitation of the Latine word As I have shewed some difference about the name so it now ensueth that I should do the like about the nature and place of their abode First of all therefore I must put a difference betwixt the Italian Stellion or Tarentula and the Thracian or Grecian for the stellion of the Ancients is proper to Grecia For they say this Stellion is full of Lentile spots or speckles making a sharp or shrill shrieking noise and is good to be eaten but the other in Italy are not so Also they say in Sicilia that their Stellions inflict a deadly biting but those in Italy cause no great harm by their teeth They are covered with a skin like a shell or thick bark and about their backs there are many little shining spots like eyes from whence they have their names streaming like stars or drops of bright and clear water according to this verse of Ovid Aptumque colori Nomen habet variis Stellatus corpora guttis Which may be Englished thus And like his spotted hiew so is his name The body starred over like drops of rain It moveth but slowly the back and tail being much broader then is the back and tail of a Lizard but the Italian Tarentulaes are white and in quantity like the smallest Lizards and the other Grecian Lizards called at this day among them Haconi is of bright silver colour and are very harmful and angry whereas the other are not so but so meek and gentle as a man may put his fingers into the mouth of it without danger One reason of their white bright shining colour is because they want bloud and therefore it was an error in Sylvaticus to say that they had bloud The teeth of this Serpent are very small and crooked and whensoever they bite they stick fast in the wound and are not pulled forth again except with violence The tail is not very long and yet when by any chance it is broken bitten or cut off then it groweth again They live in houses and neer unto the dores
Grashoppers are alwaies provided with food in great variety It is reported by Antonius Altomarinus in his Book de Manna that the Grashoppers do suck the juice out of the bark and leaves of the Ash-tree or Elm chiefly the which we call Manna but yet it is more likely that they suck it off from herbs or out of them as the Butter-flies do both because they are alwaies found to be empty within and for that they are not perceived to void any thing unless it be when they have taken in a little more dew then ordinary they cast out of their bodies the superfluity thereof as the Countreymen have observed The body is fastned to the head by a very short neck or rather none at all indeed the shoulders are spotted with green and black the breast is of a bright green well towards white out of which come three feet and shanks on each side of a leek colour the belly in the bigger sort is two fingers in length and one in breadth the inner part of the belly resembles a target ending in a sharp point and is compassed about with an hem having twelve or thirteen joynts in it within appear certain incisures of the same colour with the belly the males that is the least of the two have the end of their tail forked the females on the other side whole their back is blackish with seven or eight green lines or incisures drawn athwart the same the wings very curious of a silver colour and painted with dusky spots and specks very trim the outermost twice as long as the innermost and more various the dark brown is more rarely seen which Ludovicus Armacus a very diligent Chirurgeon brought from Guinea and gave to Pennius also Mr. White a rare Painter gave him another brought forth from Virginie it was all of an ash-colour it may be it was that the Greeks call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but it was like the former in proportion it hath both its wings silver coloured but not at all spotted and the former green ones were Those that live in quicksets are most green and big those that are found in oats or corn or grasse are of divers colours according to the place where they be and are far lesse then the rest Amongst the Grashoppers the females are silent the males do in a manner loath venery neither are drawn unto it but by many enticements of the female But our women have more tongue by far than men and the men behave themselves more lasciviously than women What is to be added further The Grashoppers of all other Insects seem to be without passion but the perturbations of our mindes do carry us on so headlong that upon every slight cause yea none at all we wax hot with anger pine away with grief burn with envy and jealousie Now for the musick which the Grashoppers make amongst all the Insects there is none like it accounted so sweet amongst the Ancients that they equalled it to the sound of the Harp as Pollux writeth and it may be Lucretius therefore called Grashoppers Teretes When Timon Sillographus would commend the eloquence of Plato he compared it to the musick of the Grashoppers his words are these Plato sings sweetly and as well as the Grashoppers They begin to sing in the heat of the day even at what time the reapers would otherwise leave work wheâ—efore those laborious chanters get them up into trees and there fill the ears of the labourers and passengeâ—s with their melodious noise For as musick is a kinde refreshment and recreation to the fainting spirits and tired brain so the unaffected notes and layes of the Grashoppers and the earnestness of their contention in singing doth serve as a spur to provoke men to endure labour and doth not only invite the reapers to gather the fruits but detains thâ—m in their work Of the strife between Eunomus of Locris and Aristo of Rhegium two Harpers and Eunomus getting the better by reason of a Grashopper flying to his harp and sitting upon it and supplying the place of his broken string read Antigonus Mirabilium narrat l. 1. Strabo Geograph l. 6. Of which contention also Solinus makes mention and indeed the Ancients by the Grashopper understand Musick and therefore they painted the Grashopper sitting upon Eunomus Harp as the known Hieroglyphick of the Muses as Strabo Phlegeton and Pausanias give us to understand With the Athenians it was the symbole of Antiquity and Nobility and to that end as now the Spaniard doth the golden Fleece so they wear golden Grashoppers embroydered on their Hair from whence they were called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Author of the Anthologies saith further in his third Book that the Ancients had the Grashopper in such veneration that they made a monument for it in the Promontory of Taenarus in the Countrey of Laconia and engraved a very elegant Elogy thereupon in its praise to which Orus Apollo Hieroglyph 2. doth subscribe In a word there is none to whom the musick of the Grashopper can seem harsh or unpleasant but is either not well at ease in his minde or his body and so can be no competent judge of musical strains The Grecians had them in such estimation that they kept them in Cages to please their ears with them Now to adde something concerning the manner how they make this noise and then to proceed to their original and death This stridulous and obstreperous noise they make some think to be caused one way and some another Pierius thinks it is formed in the snout or promuscis Proclus Diadichus by the rubbing together of their wings 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to say The Grashopper sings by frequent clapping of its wings together and so it makes a noise And the same thinks Hesiod But that they sing not with their mouth all men know as neither by the rubbing of their wings together as the Locust doth but by the reverberation of a little membrame under the flabells so they call those two coverings behinde the hinder thighs cleaving to the belly or as Aristotle describes it in brief They make this noise by reason of the air striking against the membrane under the midriffe for by that means it being distended or remitted and forced up and down there breaketh forth a stridulous sound such as the boyes make with their reed or oaten pipes which have a thin skin which being pressed down shaken or intended it must make a sound And this is the reason why the female Grashoppers sing not at all because they want that space between the thighs where this thin membrane growes in the males and causeth this sound Others make the females to be more cold by far than the males and that they make the cause of their silence But forasmuch as Eunuchs old men and old women make most noise and greater than young persons that are more hot therefore frigidity cannot be the cause Add further if we
reins if it be given in a glyster and likewise the fat of a Dog and a Badger mingled together do loosen contracted sinews The ashes of a Badger is found to help the bleeding of the stomach and the same sod and drunk preventeth danger by the biting of a mad Dog and Brunfelsius affirmeth that if the bloud of a Badger be instilled into the horns of Cattel with salt it keepeth them from the murrain and the same dryed and beat to powder doth wonderfully help the Leprosie The brain sod with oil easeth all aches the liver taken out of water helpeth swellings in the mouth and some affirm that if one wear soles made of Badgers skins in their shooes it giveth great ease unto the Gowt The biting of this beast is venemous because it feedeth upon all venemous meats which creep upon the earth although Arnoldus be of a contrary judgement and of this beast I can report no other thing worth the noting save that the Noble family of the Taxons in Ferraria took their name from this creature Of the BEAR A Bear is called in the Hebrew Dob and plurally Dubim of the Arabians Dubbe of the Chaldeons Duba Aldub and Daboube of the Grecians Arctos of some Dasyllis because of the roughness of his hair of other Beiros and Monios signifying a solitary Bear The Latins call him Vrsur which some conjecture to be tanquam orsus signifying that it is but begun to be framed in the dams belly and perfected after the littering thereof The Italians call it Orso so also the Spaniards the French Ours the Germans Bear and Beer the Bohemians Nedwed the Polonians Vuluver and the attributes of this beast are many among Authors both Greek and Latin as Aemonian Bears armed filthy deformed cruel dreadful fierce greedy Calydonian Erymanthean bloudy heavy night ranging Lybican menacing Numidian Ossean head-long ravening rigid and terrible Bear all which serve to set forth the nature hereof as shall be afterward in particular discoursed First therefore concerning several kinds of Bears it is observed that there is in general two a greater and a lesser and these lesser are more apt to clime trees then the other neither do they ever grow to so great a stature as the other Besides there are Bears which are called Amphibia because they live both on the Land and in the Sea hunting and catching fish like an Otter or Beaver and these are white coloured In the Ocean Islands towards the North there are Bears of a great stature fierce and cruel who with their fore-feet do break up the the hardest congealed Ice on the Sea or other great Waters and draw out of those holes great abundance of fishes and so in other frozen Seas are many such like having black claws living for the most part upon the Seas except tempestuous weather drive them to the Land In the Eastern parts of India there is a beast in proportion of body very like a Bear yet indued with no other quality of that kind being neither so wild nor ravenous nor strong and it is called a Formicarian Bear for God hath so provided that whereas that Countrey is abundantly annoyed with the Emmets or Ants that beast doth so prey and feed upon them that by the strength and vertuous humor of his tongue the silly poor Inhabitans are exceedingly relieved from their grievous and dangerous numbers Bears are bred in many Countreys as in the Helvetian Alpine region where they are so strong and full of courage that they can tear in pieces both Oxen and Horses for which cause the Inhabitants study by all means to take them Likewise there are Bears in Persia which do raven beyond all measure and all other so also the Bears of Numidia which are of a more elegant form and composition then the residue Profuit ergo nihil misero quod cominus ursos Figebat Numidas Albena nudus arena And whereas Pliny affirmeth that there are no Bears in Africk he mistook that Countrey for Creet and so some say that in that Island be no Wolves Vipers or other such venemous creatures whereof the Poets give a vain reason because Jupiter was born there but we know also that there be no Bears bred in England In the Countrey of Arabia from the Promontory Dira to the South are Bears which live upon eating of flesh being of a yellowish colour which do far excel all other Bears both in activity or swiftness and in quantity of body Among the Roxolani and Lituanians are Bears which being tamed are presents for Princes Aristotle in his wonders reporteth that there are white Bears in Misia which being eagerly hunted do send forth such a breath that putrifieth immediately the flesh of the Dogs and whatsoever other beast cometh within the favour thereof it maketh the flesh of them not fit to be eaten but if either men or dogs approach or come nigh them they vomit forth such abundance of phlegm that either the hunters are thereby choked or blinded Thracia also breedeth white Bears and the King of Aethiopia in his Hebrew Epistle which he wrote to the Bishop of Rome affirmeth that there are Bears in his Countrey In Muscovia are Bears both of a Snow white yellow and dusky colour and it hath been seen that the Noble womens Chariots drawn by six Horses have been covered with the skins of white Bears from the pastern to the head and as all other creatures do bring forth some white and some black so also do Bears who in general do breed and bring forth their young in all cold Countreys some of a dusky and some of a brown black colour A Bear is of a most venereous and lustful disposition for night and day the females with most ardent inflamed desires do provoke the males to copulation and for this cause at that time they are most fierce and angry Philippus Cosseus of Constance did most confidently tell me that in the Mountains of Savoy a Bear carryed a young maid into his den by violence where in venereous manner he had the carnal use of her body and while he kept her in his den he daily went forth and brought her home the best Apples and other fruits he could get presenting them unto her for her meat in very amorous sort but always when he went to forrage he rouled a huge great stone upon the mouth of his den that the Virgin should not escape away at length her parents with long search found their little Daughter in the Bears den who delivered her from that savage and beastual captivity The time of their copulation is in the beginning of Winter although sometime in Summer but such young ones seldom live yet most commonly in February or January The manner of their copulation is like to a mans the male moving himself upon the belly of the female which lyeth on the earth flat upon the back and either embraceth
other with their fore-feet they remain very long time in that act inasmuch as if they were very fat at their first entrance they disjoin not themselves again till they be made lean Immediately after they have conceived they betake themselves to their dens where they without meat grow very fat especially the males only by sucking their fore-feet When they enter into their den they convey themselves in backwards that so they may put out their foot-steps from the sight of the hunters The males give great honor to the females great with young during the time of their secresie so that although they lie together in one cave yet do they part it by a division or small ditch in the midst neither of them touching the other The nature of all of them is to avoid cold and therefore in the Winter time do they hide themselves chusing rather to suffer famine then cold lying for the most part three or four months together and never see the light whereby their guts grow so empty that they are almost closed up and stick together When they first enter into their den they betake themselves to quiet and rest sleeping without any awaking for the first fourteen dayes so that it is thought an easie stroke cannot awake them But how long the females go with young is not certain some affirm three months others but thirty dayes which is more probable for wild beasts do not couple themselves being with young except a Hare and a Linx and the Bears being as is already said very lustful to the intent that they may no longer want the company of their males do violently cast their Whelps and so presently after delivery do after the manner of Conies betake themselves to their lust and nourishing their young ones both together and this is certain that they never come out of their caves till their young ones be thirty dayes old at the least and Pliny precisely affirmeth that they litter the thirtyeth day after their conception and for this cause a Bear bringeth forth the least whelp of all other great beasts for their whelps at their first littering are no bigger then rats nor longer then ones finger And whereas it hath been believed and received that the whelps of Bears at their first littering are without all form and fashion and nothing but a little congealed blood like a lump of flesh which afterwards the old one frameth with her tongue to her own likeness as Pliny Solinus Aelianus Orus Oppianus and Ovid have reported yet is the truth most evidently otherwise as by the eye-witness of Joachimus Rhetious and other is disproved only it is littered blind without eyes naked without hair and the hinder legs not perfect the fore-feet folded up like a fist and other members deformed by reason of the immoderate humor or moystness in them which also is one cause why the Womb of the Bear cannot retain the seed to the perfection of her young ones They bring forth sometimes two and never above five which the old Bear daily keepeth close to her brest so warming them with the heat of her body and the breath of her mouth till they be thirty days old at what time they come abroad being in the beginning of May which is the third Month from the Spring The old ones being almost dazled with long darkness coming into light again seem to stagger and reel to and fro and then for the straightness of their guts by reason of their long fasting do eat the hearb Arum commonly called in English Wake-Robbin or Calves-foot being of very sharp and tart taste which enlargeth their guts and so being recovered they remain all the time their young are with them more fierce and cruel then at other times And concerning the same Arum called also Dracunculus and Oryse there is a pleasant vulgar tale whereby some have conceived that Bears eat this herb before their lying secret and by vertue thereof without meat or sense of cold they pass away the whole Winter in sleep There was a certain Cow-herd in the Mountains of Helvetia which coming down a hill with a great Caldron on his back he saw a Bear eating of a root which he had pulled up with his feet the Cow-herd stood still till the Bear was gone and afterward came to the place where the beast had eaten the same and finding more of the same root did likewise eat it he had no sooner tasted thereof but he had such a desire to sleep that he could not contain himself but he must needs lie down in the way and their fell asleep having covered his head with the Caldron to keep himself from the vehemency of the told and their slept all the Winter time without harm and never rose again till the Spring time Which fable if a man will believe then doubtless this hearb may cause the Bears to be sleepers not for fourteen days but for fourscore days together The ordinary food of Bears is fish for the Water-bear and others will eat fruits Apples Grapes Leaves and Pease and will break into Bee-hives sucking out the Hony Likewise Bees Snayls and Emmets and flesh if it be lean or ready to putrifie but if a Bear do chance to kill a Swine or a Bull or Sheep he eateth them presently whereas other Beasts eat not hearbs if they eat flesh likewise they drink water but not like other beasts neither sucking it or lapping it but as it were even biting at it Some affirm that Bears do wax or grow as long as they live that there have been seen some of them five cubits long yea I my self saw a Bears skin of that length and broader then an Oxes skin The head of a Bear is his weakest part as the hand of a Lyon is the strongest for by a small blow on his head he hath often been strucken dead the bones of the head being very thin and tender yea more tender then the beak of a Parrot The mouth of a Bear is like a Hogs mouth but longer being armed with teeth on both sides like a saw and standing deep in his mouth they have very thick lips for which cause he cannot easily or hastily with his teeth break asunder the hunters nets except with his fore-feet His neck is short like a Tygers and a Lyonâ— apt to bend downwards to his meat his belly is very large being uniform and next to it the intrals as in a Wolf It hath also four speans to her Paps The genital of a Bear after his death waxeth as hard as horn his knees and elbows are like to an Apes for which cause they are not swift or nimble his feet are like hands and in them and his loins is his greatest strength by reason whereof he sometimes setteth himself upright upon his hinder legs the pastern of his leg being fleshy like a Cammels which maketh them unfit for travel they have
sharp claws but a very small tail as all other long haired creatures have They are exceeding full of fat or lard-grease which some use superstitiously beaten with Oyl wherewith they anoynt their Grape-sickles when they go to vintage perswading themselves that if no body know thereof their tender Vine-branches shall never be consumed by Caterpillers Other attribute this to the vertue of Bears blood and Theophrastus affirmeth that if Bears grease be kept in a vessel at such time as the Bears lie secret it will either fill it up or cause it to run over The flesh of Bears is unfit for meat yet some use to eat it after it hath been twice sod other eat it baked in pasties but the truth is it is better for medicine then for food Theophrastus likewise affirmeth that at the time when Bears lie secret their dead flesh encreaseth which is kept in houses but Bears fore-feet are held for a very delicate and well tasted food full of sweetness and much used by the German Princes The skins of Bears are used in the far Northern regions for garments in the Winter time which they make so artificially covering themselves with them from the crown of the head to the feet that as Munster affirmed some men deceived with that appearance deemed the people of Lapponia to be hairy all over The souldiers of the Moors wear garments made of Lyons Pardals and Bears skins and sleep upon them and so it is reported of Herodotus Megarensis the Musitian who in the day time wore a Lyons skin and in the night lay in a Bears skin The constitution of the body of a Bear is beyond measure phlegmatique because he fasteth in the Winter time so long without meat His voyce is fierce and fearful in his rage but in the night time mournful being given much to ravening If a Bear do eat of Mandragoras he presently dyeth except he meet with Emmets by licking of whom he recovereth so likewise if he be sick of a Surfeit A Bear is much subject to blindness of the eyes and for that cause they desire the Hives of Bees not only for the Hony but by the stinging of the Bees their eyes are cured It hath not been seen that a female Bear was taken great with young which cometh to pass by reason that they go to their Deâ—â— so soon as they are conceived and come not out thence till they have littered And because of the fierceness of this beast they are seldom taken alive except they be very young so that some are killed in the Mountains by poyson the Countrey being so steep and rocky that Hunters cannot follow them some taken in ditches of the earth and other gins Oppianus relateth that near Tygris and Armenia the Inhabitants use this stratagem to take Bears The people go often to the Woods to find the Den of the Bear following a Leam-hound whose nature is so soon as he windeth the Beast to bark whereby his leader discovereth the prey and so draweth off the Hound with the leam then come the people in great multitude and compassing him about with long nets placing certain men men at each end then tye they a long rope to one side of the net as high from the ground as the small of a mans belly whereunto are fastned divers plumes and feathers of Vultures Swans and other resplendent coloured birds which with the wind make a noise or hissing turning over and glistering on the other side of the net they build four little hovels of green boughs wherein they lay four men covered all over with green leaves then all being prepared they sound their Trumpets and wind their Horns at the noise whereof the Bear ariseth and in his fearful rage runneth to and fro as if he saw fire the young men armed make unto him the Bear looking round about taketh the plainest way toward the rope hung full of feathers which being stirred and haled by them that hold it maketh the Bear much affraid with the ratling and hissing thereof and so flying from that side half mad runneth into the nets where the Keepers entrap him so cunningly that he seldom escapeth When a Bear is set upon by an armed man he standeth upright and taketh the man betwixt his fore-feet but he being covered all over with iron plates can receive no harm and then may easily with a sharp knife or dagger pierce through the heart of the beast If a she Bear having young ones be hunted she driveth her whelps before her untill they be wearied and then if she be not prevented she climbeth upon a tree carrying one of her young in her mouth and the other on her back A Bear will not willingly fight with a man but being hurt by a man he gnasheth his teeth and licketh his fore-feet and it is reported by an Ambassador of Poland that when the Sarmatians find a Bear they inclose the whole Wood by a multitude of people standing not above a cubit one from another then cut they down the outmost trees so that they raise a wall of wood to hem in the Bears this being effected they raise the Bear having certain forks in their hands made for that purpose and when the Bear approacheth they with those forks fall upon him one keeping his head another one leg another his body and so with force muzzle him and tie his legs leading him away The Rhaetians use this policy to take Wolves and Bears they raise up great posts and cross them with a long beam laded with heavy weights unto the which beam they fasten a cord with meat therein whereunto the beast coming and biting at the meat pulleth down the beam upon her own pate The Inhabitants of Helvetia hunt them with mastiff Dogs because they should not kill their Cattel left at large in the field in the day time They likewise shoot them with guns giving a good sum of money to them that can bring them a slain Bear The Sarmatians use to take Bears by this sleight under those trees wherein Bees breed they plant a great many of sharp pointed stakes putting one hard into the hole wherein the Bees go in and out whereunto the Bear climbing and coming to pull it forth to the end that he may come to the Hony and being angry that the stake sticketh so fast in the hole with violence plucketh it forth with both her fore-feet whereby she looseth her hold and falleth down upon the picked stakes whereupon she dieth if they that watch for her come not to take her off There was reported by Demetrius Ambassador at Rome from the King of Musco that a neighbour of his going to seek Hony fell into a hollow tree up to the brest in Hony where he lay two days being not heard by any man to complain at length came a great Bear to this Hony and putting his head into the tree the poor man took hold thereof whereat the Bear suddenly
affrighted drew the man out of that deadly danger and so ran away for fear of a worse creature But if there be no tree wherein Bees do breed neer to the place where the Bear abideth then they use to anoynt some hollow place of a tree with Hony whereinto Bees will enter and make Hony-combes and when the Bear findeth them she is killed as aforesaid In Norway they use to saw the tree almost asunder so that when the beast climbeth it she falleth down upon piked stakes laid underneath to kill her And some make a hollow place in a tree wherein they put a great pot of water having anoynted it with Hony at the bottom whereof are fastened certain hooks bending downward leaving an easie passage for the Bear to thrust in her head to get the Hony but impossible to pull it forth again alone because the hooks take hold on her skin this pot they binde fast to a tree whereby the Bear is taken alive and blindefolded and though her strength break the cord or chain wherewith the pot is fastened yet can she not escape or hurt any body in the taking by reason her head is fastened in the pot To conclude other make ditches or pits under Apple-trees laying upon their mouth rotten sticks which they cover with earth and strow upon it herbs and when the Bear cometh to the Apple-tree she falleth into the pit and is taken The herb Wolfeban or Libardine is poison to Foxes Wolves Dogs and Bears and to all beasts that are littered blinde as the Alpine Rhaetians affirm There is one kinde of this called Cyclamine which the Valdensians call Tora and with the juyce thereof they poyson their darts whereof I have credibly received this story That a certain Valdensian seeing a wilde Bear having a dart poysoned herewith did cast it at the Bear being far from him and lightly wounded her it being no sooner done but the Bear ran to and fro in a wonderful perplexity through the woods unto a very sharp cliffe of a rock where the man saw her draw her last breath as soon as the poyson had entered to her heart as he afterward found by opening of her body The like is reported of Hen-bane another herb But there is a certain black fish in Armenia full of poyson with the powder whereof they poyson Figs and cast them in those places where wilde beasts are most plentiful which they eat and so are killed Concerning the industry or natural disposition of a Bear it is certain that they are very hardly tamed and not to be trusted though they seem never so tame for which cause there is a story of Diana in Lysias that there was a certain Bear made so tame that it went up and down among men and would feed with them taking meat at their hands giving no occasion to fear or mistrust her cruelty on a day a young maid playing with the Bear lasciviously did so provoke it that he tore her in pieces the Virgins brethren seeing the murther with their darts slew the Bear whereupon followed a great pestilence through all that region and when they consulted with the Oracle the paynim God gave answer that the plague could not cease untill they dedicated some Virgins unto Diana for the Bears sake that was slain which some interpreting that they should sacrifice them Embarus upon condition the Priesthood might remain in his family slew his only daughter to end the pestilence and for this cause the Virgins were after dedicated to Diana before their marriage when they were betwixt ten and fifteen year old which was performed in the month of January otherwise they could not be marryed Yet Bears are tamed for labours and especially for sports among the Roxolani and Lybians being taught to draw water with wheels out of the deepest wels likewise stones upon sleds to the building of walls A Prince of Lituania nourished a Bear very tenderly feeding her from his table with his own hand for he had used her to be familiar in his Court and to come into his own chamber when he listed so that she would go abroad into the fields and woods returning home again of her own accord and would with her hand or foot rub the Kings chamber door to have it opened when she was hungry it being locked it happened that certain young Noble-men conspired the death of this Prince and came to his chamber door rubbing it after the custom of the Bear the King not doubting any evill and supposing it had been his Bear opened the door and they presently slew him There is a fable of a certain wilde Bear of huge stature which terrified all them that looked upon her the which Pythagoras sent for and kept to himself very familiarly using to stroke and milk her at the length when he was weary of her he whispered in her ear and bound her with an oath that being departed she should never more harm any living thing which saith the fable she observed to her dying day These Bears care not for any thing that is dead and therefore if a man can hold his breath as if he were dead they will not harm him which gave occasion to Esope to fable of two companions and sworn friends who travelling together met with a Bear whereat they being amazed one of them ran away and gat up into a tree the other fell down and countetfeited himself dead unto whom the Bear came and smelt at his nostrils and ears for breath but perceiving none departed without hurting him soon after the other friend came down from the tree and merrily asked his companion what the Bear said in his ear Marry quoth he she warn'd me that I should never trust such a fugitive friend as thou art which didst forsake me in my greatest necessity thus far Esop They will bury one another being dead as Tzetzes affirmeth and it is received in many Nations that children have been nursed by Bears Paris thrown out of the City was nourished by a Bear There is in France a Noble house of the Vrsons whose first founder is reported to have been certain years together nourished by a Bear and for that cause was called Vâ—son and some affirm that Arcesius was so being deceived by the name of his mother who was called Arctos a Bear as among the Latines was Vâ—sula And it is reported in the year of our Lord 1274. that the Concubine of Pope Nicholas being with childe as was supposed brought forth a young Bear which she did not by any unlawful copulation with such a beast but only with the most holy Pope and conceived such a creature by strength of imagination lying in his Palace where she saw the pictures of many Bears so that the holy Father being first put in good hope of a son and afterward seeing this monster like himself Rev. 13. for anger and shame defaced all his pictures of those beasts There is a mountain
and the gall is profitable for many things but especially being turned into a glew it helpeth the falling evill The genitals of a Beaver are called by the Physitians Castoreum and therefore we will in this discourse use that word for expressing the nature qualities remedies and miraculous operation thereof wherefore they must be very warily and skilfully taken forth for there is in a little skin compassing them about a certain sweet humor called Humor Melleus and with that they must be cut out the utter skin being cut asunder to make the more easie entrance and the Apothecaries use to take all the fat about them which they put into the oil of the Castoreum and sell it unto fisher-men to make bait for fishes The females have stones or Castoreum as well as the males but very small ones Now you must take great heed to the choise of your Beaver and then to the stones which must grow from one root conjoyned otherwise they are not precious and the beast must neither be a young one nor one very old but in the mean betwixt both being in vigor and perfection of strength The Beavers of Spain yeeld not such virtuous Castoreum as they of Pontus and therefore if it be possible take a Pontique Beaver next one of Gallatia and lastly of Africk Some do corrupt them putting into their skin Gum and Ammoniack with blood other take the reins of the beast and so make the Castoreum very big which in it self is but small This beast hath two bladders which I remember not are in any other living creature and you must beware that none of these be joyned to the Castoreum You may know if it be mingled with Ammoniack by the tast for although the colour be like yet is the savour different Platearius sheweth that some adulterate Castoreum by taking off his skin or some cod newly taken forth of another beast filling it with bloud sinews and the powder of Castoreum that so it may not want his strong smell or favour other fill it with earth and bloud other with bloud rosen gum sinews and pepper to make it tast sharp but this is a falsification discernible and of this sort is the Castoreum which is sold in Venice as Brasovala affirmeth and the most of them sold at this day are bigger then the true Castoreum for the just weight of the right stones is not above twelve ounces and a half one of them being bigger then the other being six fingers breadth long and four in breadth Now the substance contained in the bag is yellowish solid like wax and sticking like glew not sharp and cracking betwixt the teeth as the counterfeit is These stones are of a strong and stinking savour such as is not in any other but not rotten and sharp as Grammarians affirm yer I have smelled of it dryed which was not unpleasant and things once seasoned with the savour thereof will ever tast of it although they have not touched it but lie covered with it in the same box or pot and therefore the Castoreum of Persia is counterfeit which hath no such smell for if a man smell to the right Castoreum it will draw bloud out of his nose After it is taken forth from the beast it must be hung up in some place to be dryed in the shadow and when it is dry it is soft and white it will continue it strength six years and some say seven the Persians affirm that their Castoreum will hold his virtue ten years which is as false as the matter they speak of is counterfeit Archigenes wrote a whole book of the virtue of this Castoreum whereunto they may resort that require an exact and full declaration of all his medicinal operations it shall only be our purpose to touch some general heads and not to enter into a particular discovery thereof Being so dryed as is declared it must be warily used for it falleth out herein as in other medicinal subjects that ignorance turneth a curing herb or substance into a venemous and destructive quality therefore we will first of all set down the dangers to be avoided and afterward some particular cures that come by the right use of it Therefore it must be understood that there is poyson in it not naturally but by accident as may be in any other good and wholesome matter and that especially in the smell or savour thereof whereunto if a woman with childe do smell it will kill the childe unborn and cause abortment for a womans womb is like a creature nourished with good favours and destroyed with evill therefore burning of feathers shoo-soles woollen clothes pitch Galbanum gum onions and garlick is noysom to them It may be corrupted not only as is before declared but also if it be shut up close without vent into pure aire when it is hanged up to be dryed or if the bag be kept moist so that it cannot dry and it is true as Avicen saith that if it be used being so corrupted it killeth within a dayes space driving one into madness making the sick person continually to hold forth his tongue and infecting him with a Fever by inflaming the body loosing the continuity of the parts through sharp vapors arising from the stomach and for a proof that it will inflame if you take a little of it mingled with oil and rub upon any part of the body or upon your nail you shall feel it But there is also a remedy for it being corrupted namely Asses milk mingled with some sharp syrup of Citron or if need require drink a dram of Philons Antidote at the most or take butter and sweet water which will cause vomit and vomit therewith so long as you feel the savour of the stone and afterward take syrup of Limmons or Citrons and some affirm upon experience that two penny weight of Coriander-seed scorched in the fire is a present remedy for this evill And it is most strange that seeing it is in greatest strength when the favour is hottest which is very displeasing to a mans nature in outward appearance yet doth it never harm a man taken inwardly being pure and rightly compounded if the person be without a Fever for in that case only it doth hurt inwardly otherwise apply it to a moist body lacking refrigeration or to a cold body wanting excalfaction or to a cold and moist body you shall perceive an evident commodity thereby if there be no Fever and yet it hath profited many where the Fever hath not been over hot as in Extasies and Lethargies ministred with white Pepper and Melicrate and with Rose cakes laid to the neck or head The same virtues it hath being outwardly applyed and mingled with oil if the bodies be in any heat and purely without oil if the body be cold for in heating it holdeth the third degree and in drying the second The manner how it is to be administred is in drink for the most part the sweet liquor
runneth into the water wherein he covereth himself all over except his mouth to cool the heat of his blood for this beast can neither endure outward cold nor inward heat for which cause they breed not but in hot Countries and being at liberty are seldom from the waters They are very tame so that children may ride on their backs but on a sodain they will run into the waters and so many times indanger the childrens lives Their love to their young ones is very great they alway give milk from their copulation to their Calving neither will they suffer a Calf of another kinde whom they discern by their smell to suck their milk but beat it away if it be put unto them wherefore their keepers do in such case anoynt the Calf with Bugils excrement and then she will admit her suckling They are very strong and will draw more at once then two Horses wheresore they are tamed for service and will draw Waggons and Plows and carry burdens also but they are not very fit for Carts yet when they do draw they carry also great burthens or loads tyed to their backs with ropes and wantyghtes At the first setting forward they bend their legs very much but afterward they go upright and being over-loden they will fall to the earth from which they cannot be raised by any stripes untill their load or carriage be lessened There is no great account made of their hides although they be very thick Solinus reporteth that the old Britons made Boats of Osier twigs or reeds covering them round with Bugils skins and sayled in them and the Inhabitants of the Kingdom of Caraiani make them bucklers and shields of Bugils skins which they use in Wars the flesh is not good for meat which caused Baptista Fiera to make this Poem Bubalus hine abeat neve intret prandia nostra Non edat hunc quisquam sub juga semper eat For they ingender melancholy and have no good taste being raw they are not unpleasant to behold but sod or rosted they shew a deformed substance The milk of this beast maketh very hard Cheese which tasteth like earth The medicines made of this beast are not many with the horns or hoofs they make rings to wear against the Cramp and it hath been believed but without reason that if a man or woman wear rings made of the horns or hoofs of a Bugil in the time of carnal copulation that they will naturally fly off from their fingers whereas this secret was wont to be attributed to rings of Chrysolytes or Smaragde stones To conclude some teach husbandmen to burn the horns or dung of their Bugils on the windy side of their corn and plants to keep them from Cankers and blasting and thus much of the vulgar Bugil called Bubalus Recentiorum whose beginning in this part of the world is unknown although in Italy and other parts of Europe they are now bred and fostered Of the African BUGIL This creature of African Bugil must be understood to be a wilde beast and not of a tame kinde although Bellonius expresseth not so much Leo in his description of Asrick relateth a discourse of a certain beast called Laut or Daut who is less then an Oxe but of more elegant feature in his legs white horns and black nails which is so swift that no beast can out-run it except a Barbary Horse it is taken most easily in the Summer time with the skin whereof they make targets and shields which cannot be pierced by any weapon except Gunshot for which cause they sell them very dear which is conjectured to be the Bugil that Bellonius describeth although it be not just of the same colour which may vary in this beast as well as in any other and I have a certain Manuscript without the Authors name that affirmeth there be Bugils in Lybia in likeness resembling a Hart and an Oxe but much lesser and that these beasts are never taken asleep which causeth an opinion that they never sleep and that there is another Bugil beyond the Aâ—pes neer the River Rhene which is very fierce and of a white colour There is a horn in the Town-house of Argentine four Roman cubits long which is conjectured to be the horn of some Vrus or rather as I think of some Bugil it hath hung there at the least two or three generations and by scraping it I found it to be a horn although I forgat to measure the compass thereof yet because antiquity thought it worthy to be reserved in so honourable a place for a monument of some strange beast I have also thought good to mention it in this discourse as when Philip King of Macedon did with a dart kill a wilde Bull at the foot of the Mountain Orbelus and consecrated the horns thereof in the Temple of Hercules which were fifteen yards or paces long for posterity to behold Of the BULL ABull is the husband of a Cow and ring-leader of the herd for which cause Homâ—r compareth Agamemnon the great Emperor of the Graecian Army to a Bull reserved only for procreation and is sometimes indifferently called an Oxe as Oxen are likewise of Authors taken for Bulls Virg. Pingue Jolum primis extemplo mensibus anni Fortes invertant boves The Hebrews call him Tor or Taur which the Chaldes call Abir for a strong Oxe so the Arabians Taur the Graecians Tauros the Latines Taurus the Italians Tauro the French Taureau the Germans ein Stier ein Vuucherstier das Vucher ein Mummelstier ein Hogen and ein Bollen the Illyrians Vul and Iunecz by all which several appellations it is evident that the name Taurus in Latine is not derived from Tanouros the stretching out the tayl nor from Gauros signifying proud but from the Hebrew Tor which signifieth great upon which occasion the Graecians called all large great and violent things by the name of Taurol and that word Taurus among the Latines hath given denomination to Men Stars Mountains Rivers Trees Ships and many other things which caused Ioachimus Camerarius to make thereof this aenigmatical riddle Moechus eram regis sed lignea membra sequebar Et Cilicum mens sum sed mons sum nomine solo Et vehor in coelo sed in ipsis ambulo terris That is in divers senses Taurus was a Kings Pander the root of a tree a Mountain in Cilicia a Bull a Mountain in name a Star or sign in heaven and a River upon the earth so also we read of Statilius Taurus and Pomponius Vitulus two Romans It was the custom in those days to give the names of beasts to their children especially among the Troglodytae and that Adulterer which ravished Europa was Taurus the King of Crete or as some say a King that came in a Ship whose Ensign and name was the Bull and other affirm that it was Iupiter in the likeness of a Bull because he had so defloured Ceres
to him that loveth all his creatures and will require at mans hand an account of the life and blood of brute beasts Of the CALF A Calf is a young or late enixed Bull or Cow which is called in Hebrew Egel or Par and some-times Ben-bakar the son of an Oxe Yet Rabbi Solomon and Abraham Ezra expound Egel for a Calf of one year old The Sarazens of that word call a Calf Hesel The Graecians Moschos whereof is derived Moscharios but at this day they call him Mouskari or Moschare The Italians Vitello the French Veau the Spaniards Ternera of Teneritudo signifying tenderness and sometimes Bezeron and Vezerro the Germans Ein Kalb the Flemmings Kalf and the Latines Vitulus of the old word Vitulor signifying to be wanton for Calves are exceedingly given to sport and wantonness or as other suppose from the Greek word Italous came Vitulus and therefore the Latines do not alway take Vitulus for a young or new foaled beast but sometime for a Cow as Virgil Eclog. Ego hanc vitulam ne forte recuses Bis venit ad mulctram binos alit ubere soetus Depono And this word like the Greek Moschos signifieth male and female whereunto by divers Authors both Greek and Latine are added divers Epithites by way of explication both of the condition inclination and use of this young beast calling it wilde ripe for the temples unarmed weak sucklings tender wandring unhorned and such like And because the Poets faign that Io was turned into a Cow and that the violet herb was assigned by Iupiter for her meat they derive Viola a Violet from Vitula a Calf by a kinde of Graecian imitation It is also certain that the honor of this young beast have given denomination to some men as Pomponius Vitulus and Vitulus Niger Turamius and Vitellius was derived from this stem or theam although he were an Emperour The like may be said of Moschos in Greek signifying a Calf for there was one Moschus a Sophist that drank nothing but water and there was another Moschus a Grammarian of Syracuse whom Athenaeus doth record was a familiar of Aristarchus and also of another a Poet of the Bucolicks and this serveth to shew us that the love our Ancestors bare unto Cattel appeared in taking upon them their names and were not ashamed in those elder times wherein wisdom and invention was most pregnable to glory in their herds from which they received maintenance But to the purpose that which is said of the several parts of an Oxe and a Cow belongeth also to a Calf for their Anatomy differeth not because they are conceived and generated by them and in them and also their birth and other such things concerning that must be inquired in the discourse of a Cow It is reported by an obscure Author that if the hoof of a Calf be not absolved or finished in the Dams belly before the time of Calving it will dye And also it must be observed that the same diseases which do infest and harm an Oxe do also befall Calves to their extreme perill but they are to be cured by the same fore-named remedies And above the residue these young beasts are troubled with worms which are ingendered by crudity but their cure is to keep them fasting till they have well digested their meat and then take lupines half sod and half raw beaten together and let the juyce thereof be poured down his throat otherwise take dry figs and fitches beaten together with Santonica called Lavender-cotten and so put it down the calves throat as aforesaid or else the fat of a Calf and Marrube with the joyce of Leeks will certainly kill these Evils It is the manner to regard what Calves you will keep and what you will make of and kill either for sacrifice as in an ancient time or private use and to mark and name those that are to be reserved for breed and labour according to these verses Post partum curant vitulus traducitur omnis Et quos aut pecori malunt submittere habendo Continuoque notas nomina gentis inurunt Aut aris servare sacris aut scindere terram Et campum horrentem fractis invertere glebis And all these things are to be performed immediately after their weaning and then in the next place you must regard to geld the males which is to be performed in Iune or as Magus saith in May or at the farthest let them not be above a year old for else they will grow very deformed and small but if you lib them after two years old they will prove stubborn and intractable wherefore it is better to geld them while they be young ones which is to be performed not with any knife or iron instrument because it will draw much blood and indanger the beast through pain but rather with a cloven reed or stick pressing it together by little and little but if it happen that one of a year or two years old be to be libbed then you must use a sharp knife after you have pressed the stones into the cods and cut them out at one stroke and for stanching of the blood let the cod and the ends of the veins be seared with an hot iron and so the wound is cured as soon as it is made And now the time for the effecting hereof is best in the wane of the Moon either in the Spring or Autumn but it is good to leave as many of the veins and nerves of the virile member untouched and whole as may be that so he may not lose any condition of a male except the power of generation And if the wound be overmuch given to bleed lay upon it ashes with the spume of silver which is apt to stanch blood in all green wounds and that day let him not drink and eat but a very little meat for three days after give him green tops or grass soft and easie to chew and at the third days end anoint the wound with liquid pitch ashes and a little Oyl which will soon cure the scar and keep the flies from stinging or harming it If at any time a Cow cast her Calf you may put unto her another Calf that hath not suckt enough from his own Dam and they useâ— in some Countries to give their Calves Wheat-bran and Barly-meal and tender meat especially regarding that they drink morning and evening Let them not lye together in the night with their Dam but asunder untill their sucking time and then immediately separate them again unless the Cow be well fed when the Calf sucketh her ordinary food will yeeld no great tribute of Milk and for this cause you must begin to give the Calf green meat betimes Afterward being weaned you may suffer those young ones to feed with their Dams in the Autumn which were calved in the Spring Then in the next place you must regard the taming of the beast being ready for labour
time of their lust commonly called cat-wralling they are wilde and fierce especially the males who at that time except they be gelded will not keep the house at which time they have a peculiar direful voice The manner of their copulation is this the female lyeth down and the male standeth and their females are above measure desirous of procreation for which cause they provoke the male and if he yeeld not to their lust they beat and claw him but it is only for love of young and not for lust the male is most libidinous and therefore seeing the female will never more engender with him during the time her young ones suck he killeth and eateth them if he meet with them to provoke the female to copulation with him again for when she is deprived of her young she seeketh out the male of her own accord for which the female most warily keepeth them from his sight During the time of copulation the female continually cryeth whereof the Writers give a double cause one because she is pinched with the talons or clawes of the male in the time of his lustful rage and the other because his seed is so fiery hot that it almost burneth the females place of conception When they have littered or as we commonly say kittened they rage against Dogs and will suffer none to come neer their young ones The best to keep are such as are littered in March they go with young fifty daies and the females live not above six or seven years the males live longer especially if they be gelt or libbed the reason of their short life is their ravening of meat which corrupteth within them They cannot abide the savour of ointments but fall mad thereby they are sometimes infected with the falling evill but are cured with Gobium It is needless to spend any time about her loving nature to man how she flattereth by rubbing her skin against ones Legs she whurleth with her voice having as many tunes as turnes for she hath one voice to beg and to complain another to testifie her delight and pleasure another among her own kind by flattering by hissing by puffing by spitting in so much as some have thought that they have a peculiar intelligible language among themselves Therefore how she beggeth playeth leapeth looketh catcheth tosseth with her foot riseth up to strings held over her head sometimes creeping sometimes lying on the back playing with one foot sometime on the belly snatching now with mouth and anon with foot apprehending greedily any thing save the hand of a man with divers such gestical actions it is needless to stand upon in so much as Coelius was wont to say that being free from his Studies and more urgent weighty affaires he was not ashamed to play and sport himself with his Cat and verily it may well be called an idle mans pastime As this beast hath been familiarly nourished of many so have they payed dear for their love being requited with the losse of their health and sometime of their life for their friendship and worthily because they which love any beast in a high measure have so much the lesse charity unto man Therefore it must be considered what harmes and perils come unto men by this beast It is most certain that the breath and savour of Cats consume the radical humour and destoy the lungs and therefore they which keep their Cats with them in their beds have the air corrupted and fall into severall Hecticks and Consumptions There was a certain company of Munks much given to nourish and play with Cats whereby they were so infected that within a short space none of them were able either to say read pray or sing in all the Monastery and therefore also they are dangerous in the time of Pestilence for they are not only apt to bring home venemous infection but to poison a man with very looking upon him wherefore there is in some men a natural dislike and abhorring of Cats their natures being so composed that not only when they see them but being neer them and unseen and hid of purpose they fall into passions frettings sweatings pulling off their hats and trembling fearfully as I have known many in Germany the reason whereof is because the constellation which threatneth their bodies which is peculiar to every man worketh by the presence and offence of these creatures and therefore they have cryed out to take away the Cats The like may be said of the flesh of Cats which can seldom be free from poison by reason of their daily food eating Rats and Mice Wrens and other birds which feed on poison and above all the brain of a Cat is most venomous for it being above measure dry stoppeth the animal spirits that they cannot passe into the ventricle by reason whereof memory faileth and the infected person falleth into a Phrenzie The cure whereof may be this take of the water of sweet Marjoram with Terra lemnia the weight of a groat mingled together and drink it twice in a month putting good store of spices into all your meat to recreate the spirits withall let him drink pure Wine wherein put the seed of Diamoschu But a Cat doth as much harm with her venemous teeth therefore to cure her biting they prescribe a good diet sometime taking Hony Turpentine and Oil of Roses melt together and laid to the wound with Centory sometime they wash the would with the urine of a man and lay to it the brains of some other beast and pure Wine mingled both together The hair also of a Cat being eaten unawares stoppeth the Artery and causeth Suffocation and I have heard that when a childe hath gotten the hair of a Cat into his mouth it hath so cloven and stuck to the place that it could not be gotten off again and hath in that place bred either the wens or the Kings evill To conclude this point it appeareth that this is a dangerous beast and that therefore as for necessity we are constrained to nourish them for the suppressing of small vermine so with a wary and discreet eye we must avoid their harms making more account of their use then of their persons In Spain and Gallia Narbon they eat Cats but first of all take away their head and tail and hang the prepared flesh a night or two in the open cold air to exhalt the savour and poison of it finding the flesh thereof to be almost as sweet as a Cony It must needs be an unclean and impure beast that liveth only upon vermin and by ravening for it is commonly said of a man when he neeseth that he hath eaten with Cats likewise the familiars of Witches do most ordinarily appear in the shape of Cats which is an argument that this beast is dangerous to soul and body It is said that if bread be made wherein the dung of Cats is mixed it will drive away Rats
being about fourteen or twenty dayes old and some have devised a cruel delicate meat which is to cut the young ones out of the dams belly and so to dresse and eat them but I trust there is no man among Christians so inhumanely gluttonous as once to devise or approve the sweetness of so foul a dish but the tame ones are not so good for in Spain they will not eat of a tame Cony because every creature doth partake in tast of the air wherein he liveth and therefore tame Conies which are kept in a close and unsweet air by reason of their own excrements cannot tast so well or be so wholesome as those which run wilde in the mountains and fields free from all infection of evill air They love above all places the rocks and make Dens in the earth and whereas it is said Psal 104 that the stony rocks are for the Cony it is not to be understood as if the feet of the Cony could pierce into the rock as into the earth and that she diggeth her hole therein as in looser ground but that finding among the rocks holes already framed to her hand or else some light earth mingled therewith she more willingly entreth thereinto as being more free from rain and floods then in lower and softer ground for this cause they love also the hils and lower grounds and woods where are no rocks as in England which is not a rocky Countrey but wheresoever she is forced to live there she diggeth her holes wherein for the day time she abideth but morning and evening cometh out from thence and sitteth at the mouth thereof In their copulation they engender like Elephants Tygres and Linxes that is the male leapeth on the back of the female their privie parts being so sramed to meet one another behind because the females do render their urine backward their secrets and the seed of the male are very smal They begin to breed in some Countries being but six moneths old but in England at a year old and so continue bearing every moneth at the least seven times in one year if they litter in March but in the Winter they do not engender at all and therefore the Authors say of these and Hares that they abound in procreation by reason whereof a little store will serve to encrease a great borough Their young being littered are blind and see not till they be nine dayes old and their dam hath no suck for them till she hath been six or seven hours with the male at the least for six hours after she cannot suckle them greatly desiring to go to the Buck and if she be not permitted presently she is so far displeased that she will not be so inclined again for 14 daies after I have been also credibly informed by one that kept tame Conies that he had Does which littered three at a time and within fourteen daies after they littered four more Their ordinary number in one litter is five and sometimes nine but never above and I have seen that when a Doe hath had nine in her belly two or three of them have perished and been oppressed in the womb by suffocation The males will kill the young ones if they come at them like as the Bore cats and therefore the female doth also avoid it carefully covering the nest or litter with gravell or earth that so they may not be discovered there are also some of their females very unnatural not caring for their yong ones but suffer them to perish both because they never provide a warm litter or nest for them as also because they forsake them being littered or else devour them For the remedy of this evill he that loveth to keep them for his profit must take them before they be delivered and pull off the hair or flesh underneath their belly and so put it upon their nest that when the young one cometh forth it may not perish for cold and so the dam will be taught by experience of pain to do the like her self Thus far Thomas Gypâ—on an English Poysician For Conies you may give them Vine-leaves Fruits Herbs Grasse Bran Oatmel Mallows the parings of Apples likewise Cabbages Apples themselves and Lettuce and I my self gave to a Cony blew Wolfe-bane which she did presently eat without hurt but Gallingale and blind Nettle they will not eat In the Winter they will eat Hay Oats and Chaffe being given to them thrice a day when they eat Greenes they must not drink at all for if they do it is hazzard but they will incur the Dropsie and at other times they must for the same cause drink but little and that little must be alway fresh It is also dangerous to handle their young ones in the absence of the dam for her jealousie will easily perceive it which causeth her so to disdain them that either she biteth forsaketh or killeth them Foxes will of their own accord hunt both Hares and Conies to kill and eat them Touching their medicinall properties it is to be observed that the brain of Conies hath been eaten for a good Antidote against poison so also the Hart which is hard to be digested hath the same operation that is in treacle There is also an approved medicine for the Squinancy or Quinsie take a live Cony and burn her in an earthen pot to powder then take a spoonful of that powder in a draught of wine and drink the most part thereof and rub your throat with the residue and it shall cure with speed and ease as Marcellus saith The fat is good against the stopping of the bladder and difficulty of urine being anointed at a fire upon the hairy place of the secrets as Alex. Benedictus affirms Other things I omit concerning this beast because as it is vulgar the benefits thereof are commonly known Of the Indian little PIG-CONY I Received the picture of this beast from a certain Noble-man my loving friend in Paris whose parts it is not needfull to describe seeing the image it self is perspicuous and easie to be observed The quantity of this beast doth not exceed the quantity of a vulgar Cony but rather the body is shorter yet fuller as also I observed by those two which that noble and learned Physician Joh. Munzingerus sent me It hath two little low ears round and almost pild without hair having also short legs five claws upon one foot behind and six before teeth like a mouse but no tail and the colour variable I have seen of them all white and all yellow and also different from both those their voice is much like the voice of a Pig and they eat all kinds of Herbs Fruits Oats and Bread and some give them water to drink but I have nourished some divers moneths together and never given them any water but yet I gave them moist food as Herbs Apples Rapes and such like or else they would incur the Dropsie Their
growing stronger like Beasts fall to fighting for rule and government but when the combate doth shew the victor and strongest the residue do ever after yeeld obedience to him In like sort do the Harts of Epirus swim to Corcyra and of Cilicia to the Island of Curiadactes They are deceived with musick for they so love that harmony that they forbear their food to follow it Also it is amazed at any strange sight for if a Hunter come behinde a Horse or Bullock laying over his back his Bow and Arrows they stand staring upon the new formed Beast untill the Dart do end their lives At the time of their lust or rutting they are above measure fierce fighting naturally for the female and sometimes wounding one another to death and this falleth out most commonly in the latter end of August at which time Arcturus riseth with the Sun and then it is most natural for the Hindes to conceive In some places in October their lust ariseth and also in May and then whereas at other times the males live a part from the females they go about like lascivious woers seeking the company of their females as it were at the Market of Venus The males in their raging desired lust have a peculiar voyce which the French call by a feigned word Reere and the Germans Brulen and the Latines tearm Rancere and the Beasts so affected Ololygones When they finde the females they are received with fear then in short space one male will cover many females continuing in this carnal appetite a month or two their females do seldon admit copulation being herein like unto Cows by reason of the rigour of the males genital and therefore they sink down on their Buttocks when they feel the genital seed as it hath been often observed in tame Harts and if they can the females run away the males striving to hold them back within their fore-feet but surely herein they differ from all other it cannot well be said that they are covered standing lying or going but rather running for so are they filled with greatest celerity When one Month or six Weeks of their rutting is past they grow tame again laying aside all fierceness and return to their solitary places digging every one of them by himself a several hole or Ditch wherein they lie to asswage the strong savour of their lust for they stink like Goats and their face beginneth to wax blacker then at other times and in those places they live untill some showers distill from the clouds after which they return to their pasture again and live in flocks together as before The female being thus filled never keepeth company with the male again untill her burthen be delivered which is eight months for so long doth she bear her young before her Calving she purgeth her self by eating Seselis or Siler of the Mountain and whereas she never purgeth untill that time then she emptieth her self of pituitous and flegmatique humors Then go they to the places neer the high ways and there they cast forth their Calf for the causes aforesaid being more afraid of wilde Beasts then Men whom she can avoid by flying which when they have seen they go and eat the Seselis aforesaid and the skin which cometh forth of her own wombe covering the young one finding in it some notable medicine which the Graecians call Chorion and not the herb Arum and this she doth before she lye down to give her young one suck as Pliny affirmeth They bring forth but one or very seldom twain which they lodge in a stable fit for them of their own making either in some rock or other bushy inaccessible place covering them and if they be stubborn and wilde beating them with their feet untill they lie close and contented Oftentimes she leadeth forth her young teaching it to run and leap over bushes stones and small shrubs against the time of danger and so continueth all the Summer time while their own strength is most abundant but in the Winter time they leave and forsake them because all Harts are feeble in the Winter season They live very long as by experience hath been often mentioned not only because they have no gall as the Dolphin hath none but for other causes also some affirm that a Raven will live nine ages of a Man and a Hart four ages of a Raven whereunto Virgil agreeth in these verses Ter binis deci sque super exit in annos Iusta senescéntum quos implét vita virorum Hos novies superat vivendo garrula cornix Et quater egreditur cornicis saecula cervus Alipedem cervum ter vincit corvus at illum Multiplicat novies Phoenix reparabilis ales That is as the life of a man is threescore and six so a Raven doth live nine times so many years viz. 528 years The Hart liveth four times the age of the Raven viz. 2112 years The Crow exceedeth the Hart three times viz. 6336. But the Phenix which is repaired by her own ashes surmounteth the Crow nine times and so liveth 57524 years The which I have set down not for truth but for report leaving every reader to the chiefest matter of credit as in his own discretion he conceiveth most probable But it is confessed of all that Harts live a very long life for Pliny affirmeth that an hundred years after the death of Alexander Magnus there were certain taken alive which had about their necks golden Collars with an inscription that they were put on by Alexander In Calabria once called Iapygia and Peucetia there was Collar taken off from the neck of a Hart by Agathocles King of Sicily which was covered with the flesh and fat of the Hart and there was written upon it Diomedes Dianae whereby it was conjectured that it was put on by him before the siege of Trey for which cause the King brought the same and did offer it up in the Temple of Iupiter The like was in Arcadia when Arcesilaus dwelt in Lycosura for he confidently affirmed that he saw an old sacred Hinde which was dedicated to Diana having this inscription in her Collar Nebros eoon ealoon ota es Ilion en Agapenor When Agapenor was in Troy then was I a young Calf taken By which it appeareth that a Hart liveth longer then an Elephant for indeed as they live long before they grow to any perfection their youth and weakness cleaving fast unto them so is it given to them to have a longer life for continuance in ripeness and strength of years These Beasts are never annoyed with Feavers because their flesh allayeth all adventitial and extraordinary heat If he eat Spiders he instantly dyeth thereof except he eat also Wilde Ivie or Sea-crabs Likewise Navew-gentil and Oleander kill the Hart. When a Hart is in his chase he is greatly pained in his bowels by reason that the skin wherein they lie is very thin and
weak and apt to be broken with any small stroke and for this cause he often stayeth to ease himself There is a kinde of thorn called Cactus where withall if a young one be pricked in his legs his bones will never make Pipes Besides these Beasts are annoyed with Scabs and Itches in their head and skin tearmed by the French by a peculiar name Froyer I will not stand upon the idle conceit of Albertus that Waspes and Emmets breed in the heads of Harts for he mistaketh them for the worm before mentioned The skins of this Beast are used for garments in some Countries and in most places for the bottom of Cushions and therefore they chuse such as are killed in the Summer time when they are fat and most spotted and the same having their hair pulled from them are used for Breeches Buskins and Gloves Likewise Pliny and Sextus affirmed that if a man sleep on the ground having upon him a Harts skin Serpents never anoy him whereof Serenus made this Verse Aut tu cervina per noctem in pelle quicscis And the bons of young ones are applyed for making of Pipes It is reported that the bloud of Harts burned together with herb-dragon orchanes orgament and mastick have the same power to draw Serpents out of their holes which the Harts have being alive and if there be put unto it wilde Pellitory it will also distract and dissipate them again The marrow of a Hart hath the same power against Serpents by ointment or perfumed upon coles and Nicander prescribeth a certain ointment to be made of the flesh of Serpents of the marrow of a Hart and Oils of Roses against the bitings of Serpents The fat of a Hart hath the like effects that the marrow hath Achilles that Noble Souldier was said never to have tasted of milk but to be nourished with the marrow of Harts by Chiro as is affirmed by Varinus and Etymologus The like operation hath the tooth as Serenus saith Aut genere ex ipso dentem portabis amicum If the seed of a young Hinde Calf be drunk with Vinegar it suffereth no poison of Serpents to enter into the body that day The perfume of the horn driveth away Serpents and noisome flies especially from the young Calves or from Horses if womens hair be added thereto with the hoof of the Hart. And if men drink in pots wherein are wrought Harts horns it will weaken all force of venom The Magicians have also devised that if the fat of a Dragons heart be bound up in the skin of a Roe with the nerves of a Hart it promiseth victory to him that beareth it on his Shoulder and that if the teeth be so bound in a Roes skin it maketh ones Master Lord or all superior powers exorable and appeased toward their servants and suitors Orpheus in his book of stones commandeth a husband to carry about him a Harts horn if he will live in amity and concord with his wife to conclude they also add another figment to make men invincible The head and tail of a Dragon with the hairs of a Lion taken from between the browes and his marrow the froath or white-mouth of a victorious Horse the nails of a Dog and the nerves of a Hart and a Roe bound up all together in a Harts skin and this is as true as the wagging of a Dogs tail doth signifie a tempest To leave these trifles scarce worthy to be rehearsed but only to shew the vanity of men given over to lying devises let us come to the other natural and medicinal properties not as yet touched The flesh of these Beasts in their running time smelleth strongly like a Goats the which thing is by Blondus attributed also to the flesh of the females with young I know not how truly but I am sure that I have known certain Noble women which every morning did eat this flesh and during the time they did so they never were troubled with Ague and this virtue they hold the stronger if the beast in dying have received but one wound The flesh is tender especially if the beast were libbed before his horns grew yet is not the juice of that flesh very wholesome and therefore Galen adviseth men to abstain as much from Harts flesh os from Asses for it engendereth melancholy yet is it better in Summer then in Winter Simeon Sethi speaking of the hot Countries forbiddeth to eat them in Summer because then they eat Serpents and so are venemous which falleth not out in colder Nations and therefore assigneth them rather to be eaten in Winter time because the concoctive powers are more stronger through plenty of inward heat but withal admonisheth that no man use to eat much of them for it will breed Palsies and trembling in mans body begetting grosse humors which stop the Milt and Liver and Avicen proveth that by eating thereof men in our the quartane Ague wherefore it is good to powder them with salt before the dressing and then seasoned with Peper and other things known to every ordinary Cook and woman they make of them Pasties in most Nations The heart and brain of a Hare or Cony have the power of Triacle for expelling of evill humors but the Liver is intolerable in food the horns being young are meat for Princes especially because they avoid poison It was a cruell thing of King Ferdinand that caused the young ones to be cut out of the Dams belly and baked in Pasties for his liquorous Epicureal appetite The whole nature and disposition of every part of this beast is against poison and venemous things as before recited His bloud stayeth the looseness of the belly and all fluxes especially fryed with Oil and the inferior parts anointed therewith and being drunk in Wine it is good against poisoned wounds and all intoxications The marrow of this beast is most approveable above other and is used for sweet odour against the Gowt and heat of men in Consuptions and all outward pains and weakness as Serenus comprised in one sentence saying Et cervina potest mulcere medulla rigorem Frigoris Likewise the fat and marrow mollifieth or disperseth all bunches in the flesh and old swellings all Ulcers except in the shins and legs and with Venus-navil the Fistula mattery Ulcers in the ears with Rozen Pitch Goose-greace and Goat-sewet the cleaving of the lips and with Calves sewet the heat and pain in the mouth and jawes It hath also vertue being drunk in warm water to aswage the pain in the bowels and small guts or Bloudy flux The gall of a Bull Oil of bayes Butter and this marrow by anointing cureth pain in the knees and loins and other evils in the seat of man in the hips and in the belly when it is costive It procureth flowers of Women cureth the Gowt Pimples in ones face and Ringwormes Absyrtus prescribeth it to be given in sweet wine with wax unto a Horse
hath appointed that place to receive all the venom of the whole Body I should here end the discourse of this beast after the method already observed in the precedents but seeing the manner of the taking hereof being a sport for Princes hath yet been touched but very little it shall not be tedious unto me to abstain from the necessary relation of the subsequent stories for the delightful narration of the hunting of the Hart to the end that as the former treatise hath but taught how to know a Bird in a bush that which insueth may declare the several wayes of catching and bringing the same to hand This is a beast standing amazed at every strange sight even at the hunters bow and arrow coming behind a stalking Horse as is already declared and moreover like as the Roes are deceived by the hissing of a leaf in the mouth of the hunter so also is this beast for while she hearkeneth to a strange noise imitating the cry of a Hind-Calf and proceeding from one man she receiveth a deadly stroke by the other so also if they hear any musical pipings they stand still to their own destruction for which cause the Egyptians decipher a man overthrown by flattery by painting a Hart taken by musick and Varro relateth upon his own knowledge that when he supped in his Lordship bought of M. Piso the Pastour or Forrester after supper took but a Harp in his hand and at the sound hereof an innumerable flock of Harts Boars and other four-footed beasts came about their Cabanet being drawn thither only by the musick in so much as he though he had been in the Roman Circus or Theater beholding the playing spectacles of all the African beasts when the Aedilian Officers have their huntings the like is also reported by Aelianus saving that he addeth that no toil or engine is so assured or unavoidable to draw these beasts within a labyrinth as is musick whereby the Hunter getteth as it were the Hart by the ear for if through attention he hold down his ears as he doth in musick he distrusteth no harm but if once he prick up his ears as he commonly doth being chased by men and dogs an infinite labour will not be sufficient to over-take and compass him It is reported that they are much terrified with the sight of red feathers which thing is affirmed by Ausonius in these Verses An cum fratre vagos dumeta per avia cervos Circundas maculis multa indagine pennae And Ovid also saying Nec formidatis cervos includite pennis And Lucan also Sic dum pavidos formidine cervos Claudat odoratae metuentes aera pennae Of which thing the Hunters make an advantage for when they have found the beast they set their nets where they imagine the beast will flie and then one of them sheweth to the beast on the other side the red feathers hanging on a rope which scareth them in haste into the Hunters nets as S. Jerom testifieth in one of his Dialogues saying Et pavidorum more cervorum dum vanos pennarum evitatis volatus fortissimis retibus implicamini And you saith he speaking to the Luciferian hereticks run away from the vain shaking of feathers like the fearfull Harts while in the mean time you are inclapsed in unavoidable and inextricable nets And this caused Seneca to write that the babe feareth a shadow and wilde beasts a red feather Many times the young Calf is the cause of the taking of his Dam for the Hunter early in the morning before day light watcheth the Hinde where she layeth her young one untill she go and refresh her self with pasture when he hath seen this then doth he let loose his Dogs and maketh to the place where the Hind-Calf was left by his mother The silly Calf lyeth immoveable as if he were fastened to the earth and so never stirring but bleating and braying suffereth himself to be taken except there be rainy weather for the impatience of cold and wet will cause him to shift for himself which if it fall out the Dogs are at hand to over-take him and so being taken is committed to the keeper of the nets The Hinde both hearing and seeing the thraldom of her poor son cometh to relieve him without dread of Hound or Hunter but all in vain for with his dart he also possesseth himself of her but if the Calf be greater and so be able to run with the Dam among the herds they are most hâ—ard to be taken for in that age they run very fast and the fear of Dogs increaseth their agility in so much as to take them among the herds is impossible every one fighting for them But the only way is to single one out of them from the flock and so follow him until he be weary for although he be very nimble yet by reason of his tender age his limbes are not able to continue long The elder Harts are taken in snares and gins laid in ditches and covered with leaves whereby the feet of this beast is snared in wood this kind is described by Xenophon and Pollux and is called in Greek Podestrabe in Latin Pedica of which also the Poets make mention as Virgil Tunc gruibus pedicas retia ponere cervis And this kind is better described by Gratius with whose words I will passe it over as a thing on t of use Nam fuit laqueis aliquis curracibus usus Cervino issere magis conterere nervo Quidque dentatas iligno robere clausit Saepe habet imprudens alieni lucra laboris Fraus tegit insidias habitu mentita ferino Venator pedicas cum dissimulantibus armis Their manner is when they are chased with Dogs to run away with speed yet oftentimes stand still and look back not only to hearken to the hunter but also to rest themselves for in their chase they are ever troubled in their belly as is before declared and sometime they grow so weary that they stand still and are pierced with arrows sometime they run till they fall down dead sometime they take themselves to the water and so are refreshed or else to avoid the teeth of Dogs they forsake the dry land and perish in the floods or else by that means escape scotfree wherefore it must be regarded by every good hunter to keep him from the waters either among the woods or other rough places But herein the subtilty of this beast appeareth that when he is hunted he runneth for the most part to the high wayes that so the savour of his steps may be put out by the treadings of men and he avoid the prosecution of the Hound Their swiftnesse is so great that in the Champaine and plain fields they regard not Dogs for which cause in France they poison Arrows with an herb called Zenicum or Toca and it is a kinde of Aconite or Wolfe-bane which hath power to corrupt and destroy agility of
called Melita from whence are transported many fine little Dogs called Melitaei Canes they were accounted the Jewels of Women but now the said Town is possessed by Fisher-men and there is no such reckoning made of those tender little Dogs for these are not bigger then common Ferrets or Weasils yet are they not small in understanding nor mutable in their love to men for which cause they are also nourished tenderly for pleasure whereupon came the proverb Militaea Catella for one nourished for pleasure and Canis digna throno because Princes hold them in their hands sitting upon their estate Theodorus the tumbler and dancer had one of these which loved him so well that at his death he leaped into the fire after his body Now a dayes they have sound another breed of little Dogs in all Nations beside the Melitaean Dogs either made so by art as inclosing their bodies in the earth when they are Whelps so as they cannot grow great by reason of the place or else lessening and impayring their growth by some kind of meat or nourishment These are called in Germany Bracken Schosshundle and Gutschenhundle the Italians Bottolo other Nations have no common name for this kind that I know Martial made this Distichon of a little French Dog for about Lions in France there are store of this kinde and are sold very dear sometimes for ten Crowns and sometimes for more Delicias parvae si vis audire catellae Narranti brevis est pagina tota mihi They are not above a foot or half a foot long and alway the lesser the more delicate and precious Their head like the head of a Mouse but greater their snowt sharp their ears like the ears of a Cony short legs little feet long tail and white colour and the hairs about the shoulders longer then ordinary is most commended They are of pleasant disposition and will leap and bite without pinching and bark prettily and some of them are taught to stand upright holding up their fore legs like hands other to fetch and carry in their mouths that which is cast unto them There be some wanton women which admit them to their beds and bring up their young ones in their own bosomes for they are so tender that they seldom bring above one at a time but they lose their life It was reported that when Grego in Syracuse was to go from home among other Gossips she gave her maid charge of two things one that she should look to her childe when it cryed the other that she should keep the little Dog within doors Publius had a little Dog called Issa having about the neck two silver bels upon a silken Collar which for the neatness thereof seemed rather to be a picture then a creature whereof Martial made this elegant Epigram comprehending the rare voice and other gestures in it Issa est puriot osculo columbae Issa est blandior omnibus puellis Issa est carior Indicis lapillis Issa est deliciae â—â—tella Publii Hanc ut si queritur loqui pulabis Seâ—tit tristi tiamque gaudiumque Collo nexa cubat capitque somnos Vt suspiria nulla sentiantur Et desideriâ— coacta ventris Gutta pallia non fefellit ulla Sed blando pede suscit at toroque Deponi monet rogat levari Caste tantus inest pudor catellae Hanc ne lux rapiut suprema totam Pictam Publius exprimit tabella In qua tam similem vibebis Issam Vt sit tam similis sibi nec ipsa Issam denique pone cum tabella Aut utramque putabis esse veram Aut utramque putabis esse pictam Marcellus Empiticus reciteth a certain charm made of the rinde of a wilde Figtree held to the Spleen or Liver of a little Dog and afterward hanged up in the smoak to dry and pray that as the rind or bark dryeth so the Liver or Spleen of the Dog may never grow and thereupon the Dog saith that foolish Emperick shall never grow greater then it was at the time that the bark was hanged up to drying To let this trifle go I will end the discourse of these little Dogs with one story of their love and understanding There was a certain noble Woman in Sioily which understanding her husband was gone a long journey from home sent to a lover I should say an Adulterer she had who came and by bribery and money given to her servants she admitted him to her bed but yet privately more for fear of punishment then care of modesty and yet for all her craft she mistrusted not her little Dog who did see every day where she locked up this Adulterer at last her husband came home before her lover was avoided and in the night the little Dog seeing his true Master returned home ran barking to the door and leaped up thereupon within which the Whoremonger was hidden and this he did oftentimes together fauning and scraping his Lord and Master also in so much as he mistrusted and that justly some strange event at last he brake open the door and found the Adulterer ready armed with his sword wherewithal he slew the good man of the house unawares and so enjoyed the Adulterate woman for his wife for Murther followeth if it go not before Adultery This story is related by Aelianus to set forth a virtue of these little Dogs how they observe the actions of them that nourish them and also some descretion betwixt good and evill The Dogs of Egypt are most fearful of all other and their custome is to run and drink or drink of the River Nilus running for fear of the Crocodiles whereupon came the Proverb of a man that did any thing slightly or hastily Vt Canisâ—e Nilo bibit Alcibiades had a Dog which he would not sell under 28 thousand Sesterces that is seven hundred French Crowns it was a goodly and beautiful Dog yet he cut off his tail whereof he gave no other reason being demanded why he so blemished his beast but only that by that fact he might give occasion to the Athenians to talke of him The Dogs of Caramania can never be tamed for their men also are wilde and live without all Law and Civility and thus much of Dogs in special In the next place I thought good to insert into this story the Treatise of English Dogs first of all written in Latin by that famous Doctor in Physick John Cay and since translated by A. F. and directed to that noble Gesner which is this that followeth that so the Reader may chuse whether of both to affect best The Preamble or Entrance into the Treatise following I Wrote unto you well beloved friend Gesner not many years past a manifold history containing the divers forms and figures of Beasts Birds and fishes the sundry shapes of Plants and the fashions of Herbs c. I wrote moreover unto you severally a certain abridgement of Dogs which in your discourse upon the
thin as water rumbling in the belly by reason of crudity redness of the whole body distention of nerves heaviness of minde love of darkness and such like Yet doth not this operation appear presently upon the hurt but sometimes at nine days sometimes at forty days sometimes at half a year or a year or seven or twelve year as hath been already said For the cure of these Dogs and first of all for the preventing of madness there are sundry invented observations First it is good to shut them up and make them to fast for one day then purge them with Hellebor and being purged nourish them with bread of Barley-meal Other take them when they be young whelps and take out of their tongue a certain little worm which the Graecians call Lytta after which time they never grow mad or fall to vomiting as Gracius noted in these verses Namque subit nodis qua lingua tenacibus haeret Vermiculum dixere mala atque incondita pestis c. Iam teneris elementa mali causasque recidunt But immediately it being taken forth they rub the tongue with Salt and Oyl Columella teacheth that Shepheards of his time took their Dogs tails and pulled out a certain nerve or sinew which cometh from the Articles of the Back-bone into their tails whereby they not only kept the tail from growing deformed and over-long but also constantly believed that their Dogs could never afterward fall mad whereunto Pliny agreeth calling it a castration or gelding of the tail adding that it must be done before the Dog be forty days old Some again say that if a Dog taste of a Womans milk which she giveth by the birth of a Boy he will never fall mad Nemesian ascribeth the cure hereof to Castoreum dryed and put into milk but this is to be understood of them that are already mad whose elegant verses of the cause beginning and cure of a mad Dog I have thought good here to express Exhalat seu terra sinus seu noxius aer Causa mali seu cum gelidus non sufficit humor Torrida per venas concrescunt semina flammae Whatsoever it be he thus warranteth the cure Tunc virosa tibi sumes multumque domabis Castorea adtritu silicis lentescere coges Ex ebore huc trito pulvis lectove feratur Admiscensque diu facies concrescere utrumque Mox lactis liquidos sensim superadde fluores Vt non cunctantes hanstus infundere eorm Inserto possis furiasque repellere tristes Armetia a King of Valenâ—ia prescribeth this form for the cure of this evill let the Dog be put into the water so as the hinder-legs do only touch the ground and his fore-legs be tyed up like hands over his head and then being taken again out of the water let his hair be shaved off that he may be pieled untill he bleed then anoint him with Oyl of Beets and if this do not cure him within seven days then let him be knocked on the head or hanged out of the way When a young male Dog suffereth madness shut him up with a Bitch or if a young Bitch be also oppressed shut her up with a Dog and the one of them will cure the madness of the other But the better part of this labor is more needful to be employed about the curing of men or other creatures which are bitten by Dogs then in curing or preventing that natural infirmity Wherefore it is to be remembred that all other poysoned wounds are cured by incision and circumcising of the flesh and by drawing plaisters which extract the venom out of the flesh and comfort nature and by Cupping-glasses or burning Irons as Coelius affirmeth upon occasion of the miraculous fiction of the Temple door Key of S. Bellious neer Rhodigium for it was believed that if a mad man could hold that Key in his hand red hot he should be delivered from his fits for ever There was such another charm or incantation among the Apuleians made in form of a prayer against all bitings of mad Dogs and other poysons unto an obscure Saint called Vithus which was to be said three Saterdays in the evening nine times together which I have here set down for no other cause but to shew their extream folly Aime Vithe pellicane Oram qui tenes Appulam Littusque Polygnanicum Qui morsus rabidos levas Irasque canum mitigas Tu sancte rabiem asperam Rictusque canis luridos Tu saevom prohibe luem I procul hinc rabies procul hinc furor omnis abeste But to come to the cure of such as have been bitten by mad Dogs First I will set down some compound medicines to be outwardly applyed to the body Secondly some simple or uncompounded medicines In the third place such compounded and uncompounded potions as are co be taken inwardly against this poyson For the outward compound remedies a plaister made of Opponax and Pitch is much commended which Menippus used taking a pound of Pitch of Brutias and four ounces of Opponax as Aetius and Actuarius do prescribe adding withall that the Opponax must be dissolved in Vinegar and afterward the Pitch and that Vinegar must be boyled together and when the Vinegar is consumed then put in the Opponax and of both together make like taynters or splints and thrust them into the wound so let them remain many days together and in the mean time drink an Antidore of Sea-crabs and Vinegar for Vinegar is alway pretious in this confection Other use Basilica Onyons Rue Salt rust of Iron White bread seeds of Horehound and Triacle but the other plaister is most forcible to be applyed outwardly above all medicines in the world For the simple and uncompounded medicines to be taken against this sore are many As Goose-grease Garlike the root of wilde Roses drunk bitter Almonds leaves of Chickweed or Pimpernel the old skin of a Snake pounded with a male-Sea-crab Betony Cabbage leaves or stalks with Parsneps and Vinegar Lime and Sewet powder of Sea-crabs with Hony powder of the shels of Sea-crabs the hairs of a Dog laid upon the wound the head of the Dog which did bite mixed with a little Euphorbium the hair of a Man with Vinegar dung of Goats with Wine Walnuts with Hony and Salt powder of Fig-tree in a Sear-cloth Fitches in Wine Euphorbium warm Horse-dung raw Beans chewed in the mouth Fig-tree-leaves green Figs with Vinegar fennel stalks Gentiana dung of Pullen the liver of a Buck-Goat young Swallows burned to powder also their dung the urine of a Man an Hyaenaâ— skin Flower-deluce with Honey a Sea-hearb called Kakille Silphum with Salt the flesh and shels of Snayls Leek-seeds with Salt Mints the tail of a Field-mouse cut off from her alive and she suffered to live roots of Burs with Salt of the Sea-Plantain the tongue of a Ram with Salt the flesh of all Sea-fishes the fat of a Sea-calf and Vervine beside many other superstitious
have wearyed him and broken his untameable nature Then doth the rider leap upon the wearyed and tyred Elephant and with a sharp pointed Sickle doth govern him after the tame one and so in short space he groweth gentle And some of them when the rider alighteth from their backs grow wilde and fierce again for which cause they binde their forelegs with strong bands and by this means they take both great and small old and young ones but as the old ones are more wilde and obstinate and so difficult to be taken so the younger keep so much with the elder that a like impossibility or difficulty interposeth itself from apprehending them In the Caspian lake there are certain fishes called Oxyrineh out of whom is made such a firme glew that it will not be dissolved in ten dayes after it hath taken hold for which cause they use it in the taking of Elephants There are in the Island Zeira many Elephants whom they take on this manner In the Mountains they make certain doysters in the earth having two great trees standing at the mouth of the cloysters and in those trees they hangup a great parcul 〈…〉 gate within that cloyster they place a tame female Elephant at the time of their usual copulation the wilde Elephants do speedily wind her and make to her and so at the last having found the way betwixt the two trees enter into her sometime twenty and sometime thirty at a time then are there two men in the said trees which cut the rope whereby the gate hangeth so it falleth down and includeth the Elephants where they suffer them alone for six or seven dayes without meat whereby they are so infeebled and famished that they are not able to stand upon their legs Then two or three strong men enter in among them and with great slaves and clubs belabour and â—udgel them till by that means they grow tame and gentle and although an Elephant be a monstrous great beast and very subtil yet by these and such like means do the inhabitants of India and Ethiopia take many of them with a very small labour to their great advantage Against these sleights of men may be oposed the subtil and cautelous evasions of the beast avoiding all the footsteps of men if they smell them upon any herb or leaf and for their fight with the Hunters they observe this order First of all they set them foremost which have the least teeth that so they may not be afraid of combate and when they are weary by breaking down of trees they escape and flie away But for their hunting they know that they are not hunted in India for no other cause then for their teeth and therefore to discourage the Hunters they set them which have the worst teeth before and reserve the strongest for the second encounter for their wisdom or natural discretion is herein to be admired that they will so dispose themselves in all their battails when they are in chase that ever they fight by course and inclose the youngest from perill so that lying under the belly of their Dams they can scarce be seen and when one of them flyeth they all flie away to their usual resting places striving which of them shall go foremost And if at any time they come to a wide and deep Ditch which they cannot passe over without a bridge then one of them descendeth and goeth down into the Ditch and standeth transverse or crosse the same by his great body filling up the empty parts and the residue passe over upon his back as upon a bridge Afterward when they are all over they tarry and help their fellow out of the Ditch or Trench again by this sleight or devise one of them putteth down to him his leg and the other in the Ditch windeth his trunck about the same the residue standers by cast in bundles of sprigs with their mouthes which the Elephant warily and speedily putteth under his feet and so raiseth himself out of the Trench again and departeth with his fellowes But if they fall in and cannot finde any help or means to come forth they lay aside their natural wilde disposition and are contented to take meat and drink at the hands of men whose presence before they abhorred and being delivered they think no more upon their former condition but in forgetfulness thereof remain obedient to their deliverers Being thus taken as it hath been said it is also expedient to express by what art and means they are cicurattd and tamed First of all therefore when they are taken they are fastened to some Tree or Pillar in the earth so as they can neither kick backward nor leap forward and there hunger thirst and famine like two most strong and forcible Riders abate their natural wildeness strength fear and hatred of men Afterward when their keepers perceive by their dejection of minde that they begin to be mollified and altered then they give unto them meat out of their hands upon whom the beast doth cast a far more favorable and cheerful eye considering their own bondage and so at the last necessity frameth them unto a contented and tractable course and inclination But the Indians by great labour and industry take their young Calves at their watering places and so lead them away inticing them by many allurements of meat to love and obey them so as they grow to understand the Indian language but the elder Indian Elephants do very hardly and seldom grow tame because of their remembrance of their former liberty by any bands and oppression nevertheless by instrumental musick joyned with some of their Countrey songs and ditties they abate their fierceness and bring down their high untractable stomachs so as without all bands they remain quiet peaceable and obedient taking their meat which is layed before them Pliny and Solinus prescribe the juyce of Barly to be given to them for their mitification whereunto also agreeth Dioscorides calling that kind of drink Zythus and the reason hereof is because of the tart sharpness in Barly water if it stand a little while and therefore also they prescribe Vinegar and ashes to rub the beasts mouth for it hath power in it to pierce stones all sharp things penetrate deep into his flesh and alter his nature the invention whereof is attributed to Democritus Being thus tamed they grow into civill and familiar uses for Caesar ascended into the Capitol betwixt four hundred Elephants carrying at either side burning Torches and Heliogabalus brought four Waggons drawn with Elephants in Vaticanum and men commonly ride upon them for Apâ—llonius saw neer the River Indus a Boy of thirteen year old riding alone upon an Elephant spurring and pricking him as freely as any man will do a lean horse They are taught to bend one of their hinder legs to take up the Rider who also must receive help from some other present standers by or else it is
Foxes and the fat of Foxes for the Swines grease in medicine Some do herewith anoint the places which have the Cramp and all trembling and shaking members The fat of a Fox and a Drake inclosed in the belly of a Goose and so rosted with the dripping that cometh from it they anoint paralytick members The same with powder of Vine twigs mollified and sod in lie attenuateth and bringeth down all swelling tumours in the flesh The fat alone healeth the Alopecias and looseness of the hair it is commended in the cure of all Sores and Ulcers of the head but the gall and fime with Mustard-seed is more approved The fat is also respected for the cure of pain in the ears if it be warmed and melt at the fire and so instilled and this is used against tingling in the ears If the hairs rot away on a Horse tail they recover them again by washing the place with Urine and Bran with Wine and Oil and afterward anoint it with Foxes grease When Sores or Ulcers have procured the hair to fall off from the head take the head of a young Fox burned with the leaves of black Orchanes and Alcyonium and the powder cast upon the head recovereth again the hair If the brain be often given to Infants and sucking children it maketh them that they shall remain free from the falling evill Pliny prescribeth a man which twinkleth with his eyes and cannot look stedfastly to wear in a chain the tongue of a Fox and Marcellus biddeth to cut out the tongue of a live Fox and so turn him away and hang up that tongue to dry in purple thred and afterward put it about his neck that is troubled with the whiteness of the eyes and it shall cure him But it is more certainly affirmed that the tongue either dryed or green layed to the flesh wherein is any Dart or other sharp head it draweth them forth violently and renteth not the flesh but only where it is entred The Liver dryed and drunk cureth often sighing The same or the Lights drunk in black wine openeth the passnges of breathing The same washed in wine and dryed in an earthen pot in an Oven and afterward seasoned with Sugar is the best medicine in the world for an old Cough for it hath been approved to cure it although it hath continued twenty years drinking every day two spoonfuls in wine The Lights of Foxes drunk in water after they have been dryed into powder helpeth the Milt and Myrepâ—us affirmeth that when he gave the same powder to one almost suffocated in a Pâ—urisie it prevailed for a remedy Archigene prescribeth the dryed Liver of a Fox for the Splenetick with Oxymel and Marcelâ—inas for the Milt drunk after the same manner and Sâ—xtus adviseth to drink it simply without composition of Oxymel The Gall of a Fox instilled into the ears with Oil cureth the pain in them and mixed with Hony Attick and anointed upon the eyes taketh away all dimness from them after an admirable manner The Milt bound upon the tumors and bunches of the brest cureth the Milt in mans body The reins dryed and mingled with Hony being anointed upon kernels take them away For the swelling of the chaps rub the reins of a Fox within the mouth The genitals because of their gristly and bony substance are approved for the dispersing of the stone in the bladder The stones take away pimples and spots in the face The dung pounded with Vinegar by anointment cureth the Leprosie speedily These and such other virtues Medicinal both the elder and later Physitians have observed in a Fox wherewithal we will conclude this discourse saving that many writers have devised divers witty inventions and fables of Foxes under them to express vices of the world as when they set a Fox in a Fryers weed preaching to a sort of Hens and Geese following the fiction of Archilochus Fox to signifie how irreligious Pastors in holy habits beguile the simple with subtility Also of a Fox teaching a Hare to say his Credo or Creed betwixt his legs and for this cause almighty God in his word compareth false Prophets to Foxes Ezek. 13. destroying the young Grapes and Plants The Weasil brought a Fox into a Garner of Corn through a small hole and when he had filled his belly he assayed to come out again at the same place but in vain because his body swelled with over eating and therefore he was constrained to come out as empty and hungry as he came in whereupon this conference was betwixt them Forte per angustam tenuis Vulpâ—cula rimam Repserat in cameram frumenti postea ruâ—sus Ire for as pleno tentabat corpore frustra Cui mustela procul Sivis ait effugere isthine Macra cavum repetes arctum quem macra subisti Of the GENNET-CAT called GENETHA THis beast is called Genitocatus either for the similitude it holdeth with a Cat or else because it hath been believed that it was engendred by a Cat but I rather do assent that the right name thereof is Ginetta or Ginetha because they are bred in Spain with the Gennet horses and so taketh his name from the place Albertus though a learned man yet many times he was deceived in the names of beasts called this creature Genocha and the Germans call it Ein Gennithkatz The quantity or stature hereof is greater then a Cat but lesser then a Fox and therefore I think it about the mold or bigness of a young Fox of six moneths old It is a meek and gentle creature except it be provoked for in Constantinople they are kept came and are suffered to go up and down from house to house like Cats Being wilde they love the vallies and low places especially the Marishes or land neer the waters for the steep rocky mountains they cannot endure And these Cardan taketh to be of the Weasil kinde because the forme and disposition thereof especially to the tame and Domestical Weasil and in Spain they are cald Foinai being black and ash-coloured distinguished and variably interlined with many spots But Scaliger who was delighted to contradict Jerom Cardan cannot endure to hear of this comparison betwixt Weasils and Ginnet-cats because he saith the skin of a Gennitta is bigger then three Weasils and that it resembleth a Weasil in nothing except in the ears but Cardans comparison toucheth not the quantity but only the outward form and qualities and he himself disagreeth not that it is equall in quantity to an Otter But certainly the skin thereof is admirable and beautiful to behold and if they were not common but rare and seldom found beasts it is no question but the price thereof and due estimation would excell many others For the abundance of spots their natural and uniform order their shining splendor and brightness give place to no other party-coloured beast as you may observe in the true figure thereof here declared The skin
upon the belly of a Beaver wherein also the vulgar sort are deceived taking those bunches for stones as they do these bladders And the use of these parts both in Beavers and Hares is this that against rain both one and other sex suck thereout a certain humor and anoint their bodies all over therewith and so are defended in time of rain The belly of a Sow a Bitch and a Hare have many cels in them because they bring forth many at a time when a Hare lyeth down she bendeth her hinder legs under her loins as all rough-footed Beasts do They are deceived which deliver by authority of holy Scriptures that Hares love to lodge them upon Rocks but we have manifested elsewhere that those places are to be understood of Conies They have fore-knowledge both of winde and weather Summer and Winter by their noses for in the Winter they make their forms in the Sun-shine because they cannot abide frost and cold and in the Summer they rest toward the North remaining in some higher ground where they receive colder air We have shewed already that their sight is dim but yet herein it is true that Plutarch saith they have Visum indefessum an indefatigable sense of seeing so that the continuance in a mean degree countervaileth in them the want of excellency Their hearing is most pregnant for the Egyptians when they signifie hearing picture a Hare and for this cause we have shewed you already that their ears are long like horns their voyce is a whining voyce and therefore Authors call it Vagitum as they do a young childes according to the verse of Ovid Intus ut infanti vagiat ore Puer They rest in the day time and walk abroad to feed in the night never feeding near home either because they are delighted with forein food or else because they would exercise their legs in going or else by secret instinct of nature to conceal their forms and lodging places unknown their heart and bloud is cold which Albertus assigneth for a cause of their night-feeding they eat also Grapes and when they are overcome with heat they eat of an herb called Lactuca Leporina and of the Romans and Hetrurians Ciserbita of the Venetians Lactucinos of the French Lacterones that is Hares-lettice Hares-house Hares palace and there is no disease in this Beast the cure whereof she doth not seek for in this herb Hares are said to chew the cud in holy Scripture they never drink but content themselves with the dew and for that cause they often fall rotten It is reported by Philippus Belot that when a Hare drunk Wine she instantly dyed they render their urine backward and their milk is as thick as a Swines and of all creatures they have milk in udders before they deliver their young They are very exceedingly given to sleep because they never wink perfectly some Author's derive their name Lagon in Greek from Laein to see and thereupon the Graecians have a common proverb Lagos Catheudon a sleeping Hare for a dissembling and counterfeiting person because the H 〈…〉 seeth when she sleepeth for this is an admirable and rare work of Nature that all the residue of her bodily parts take their rest but the eye standeth continually sentinel Hares admit copulation backward and herein they are like to Conies because they breed every moneth for the most part and that many at that time the female provoking the male to carnal copulation and while they have young ones in their belly they admit copulation whereby it cometh to pass that they do not litter all at a time but many dayes asunder bringing forth one perfect and another bald without hair but all blinde like other cloven-footed-beasts It is reported that two Hares brought into the Isle Carpathus filled that Island with such abundance that in short time they destroyed all the fruits whereupon came the proverb Carpathius Leporem to signifie them which plow and sow their own miseries It falleth out by divine Providence that Hares and other fearfull Beasts which are good for meat shall multiply to greater numbers in short space because they are naked and unarmed lying open to the violence of men and beasts but the cruel and malignant creatures which live only upon the devouring of their inferiours as the Lyons Wolves Foxes and Bears conceive but very seldom because there is less use for them in the world and God in his creatures keepeth down the cruel and ravenous but advanceth the simple weak and despised when the female hath littered her young ones she first sicketh them with her tongue and afterward seeketh out the male for copulation Hares do seldom wax tame and yet they are amongst them which are neither Plaoidae nor Ferae tame nor wilde but middle betwixt both and Cardane giveth this reason of their untameable nature because they are perswaded that all men are their enemies Scaliger writeth that he saw a tame Hare in the Castle of Mount Pesal who with her hinder legs would come and strike the Dogs of her own accord as it were defying their force and provoking them to follow her Therefore for their meat they may be tamed and accustomed to the hand of man but they remain uncapable of all discipline and ignorant of their teachers voyce so as they can never be brought to be obedient to the call and command of their teacher neither will goe nor come at his pleasure It is a simple creature having no defence but to run away yet it is subtile as may appear by changing of her form and by scraping out her footsteps when she leapeth into her form that so she may deceive her Hunters also she keepeth not her young ones together in one litter but layeth them a furlong one from another that so she may not lose them all together if peradventure men or beasts light upon them Neither is she careful to feed her self alone but also to be defended against her enemies the Eagle the Hawk the Fox and the Woolf for she feareth all these naturally neither can there be any peace made betwixt her and them but she rather trusteth the scratching brambles the solitary woods the ditches and corners of rocks or hedges the bodies of hollow trees and such like places then a dissembling peace with her adversaries The wilde Hawk when she taketh a Hare she setteth one of her talons in the earth and with the other holding her prey striving and wrestling with the Beast untill she have pulled out his eyes and then killeth him The Foxes also compass the poor Hare by cunning for in the night time when he falleth into her foot-steps he restraineth his breath and holdeth in his savour going forward by little and little untill he finde the form of the Hare and then thinking to surprize her on a sudden leapeth at her to catch her but the watchful Hare doth not take sleep after a careless manner delighting rather in
is in danger as we shall hear more at large afterwards according to the old Verse Implicitumque sinu spinosi corporis erem The Arabians call him Ceufud or Coufed the Caldeans Caupeda the Septuagints Mugale Silvaticus calleth it Agilium Avicen Aduldus and Aliâ—erha signifieth a great Mountain Hedge-hog the Grecians Cher and Acanthonocos or Echinos by reason of the prickes upon his back The Latines Echinus Ericius Ricius Herix and Erinaceus the Italians Riccio and Rizo the Spaniards Erizo the Portingals Ouriso or Orizo Cache because of hiding themselves the French Herison the Germans Igal as in lower Germany in Holland Een Yjeren Verchen in English a Hedge-hog or an Vrchine by which name we call a Man that holdeth his neck in his bosome the Italians Gess Malax and the Illyrians Azvuiier Zatho and Oâ—zischax So then for the entrance of our discourse we take it for granted that Herinaceus and Echinus signifie one thing except one of them signifie that kinde which is like to a Hog and the other that kinde which is like to a Dog for they differ in place or in habitation some of them keep in the Mountains and in the Woods or hollow trees and other about Barnes and Houses in the Summer time they keep neer Vineyards and Bushie places and gather fruit laying it up against Winter It is about the bigness of a Cony but more like to a Hog being beset and compassed all over with sharp thorny hairs as well on the face as on the feet and those sharp prickles are covered with a kind of soft mosse but when she is angred or gathereth her food she striketh them up by an admirable instinct of nature as sharp as pins or needles these are hair at the beginning but afterwards grow to be prickles which is the lesse to be marvelled at because there be Mise in Egypt as Pliny saith which have hair like Hedge-hogs It hath none of these prickles on the belly and therefore when the skin is off it is in all parts like a Hog When they are nourished at home in houses and brought up tame they drink both milk and Wine But there is an Herb called Potomagiton whereof if they tast they die presently When they are in carnall copulation they stand upright and are not joyned like other beasts for they imbrace one another standing belly to belly but the prickly thornes upon their backs will not suffer them to have copulation like Dogs or Swine and for this cause they are a very little while in copulation because they cannot stand long together upon their hinder legs When the female is to bring forth her young ones and feeleth the natural pain of her delivery she pricketh her own belly to delay and put off her misery to her further pain whereupon came the proverb as Erasmus saith Fchinus partum differt the Hedge-hog putteth off the littering of her young which is also applyed against them which put off and defer those necessary works which God and nature hath provided them to undergo as when a poor man deferreth the payment of his debt untill the value and sum grow to be far more great then the principal The inward disposition of this beast appeareth to be very crafty and full of subtlety by this because Lycophron saith that Nauplius had a cunning crooked wit and was called by him a Hedge-hog When they hide themselves in their den they have a natural understanding of the turning of the winde South and North and they that are nourished came in houses immediately before that change remove from one wall to another the wilde ones have two holes in their cave the one North the other South observing to stop the mouth against the winde as the skilful manner to steer and turn the rudder or sails for which occasion Aristotle saith that some have held opinion that they do naturally foreknow the change of weather There is mortal hatred betwixt the Serpent and the Hedge hog the Serpent seeketh out the Hedge-hogs den and falleth upon her to kill her the Hedge-hog draweth it self up together round like a foot-ball so that nothing appeareth on her but her thorny prickles whereat the Serpent biteth in vain for the more she laboureth to annoy the Hedge-hog the more she is wounded and harmeth herself yet notwithstanding the height of her minde and hate of her heart doth not suffer her to let go her hold till one or both parties be destoyed The Hedge-hog rowleth upon the Serpent piercing his skin and flesh yea many times tearing the flesh from the bones whereby he scapeth alive and killeth his adversary carrying the flesh upon his spears like an honorable banner won from his adversary in the field The Wolf also is afraid of and flyeth from the Hedge-hog and there is also a story of hatred between the Hare and the Hedge-hog for it is said that a Hare was seen to pluck off the prickles from the Hedge-hog and leave her bald pieled and naked without any defence The Fox is also an enemy to the poor Hedge-hog and lyeth in wait to kill it for the proverb is true Multa novit Vulpes Echinus vero unum magnum that is to say the Fox knoweth many devises to help himself but the Hedge-hog knows but one great one for by rowling up her self as before said she opposeth the thorns of her back against the Foxes teeth which alone were sufficient to secure her from a greater adversary but the wily Fox perceiveth that he can no where fasten his teeth without danger of himself pisseth upon the Hedge-hogs face and poisoneth her whereupon the poor beast is forced to lay open himself and to take breath against the Foxes stinking excrement which thing the Fox espying loseth no opportunity but presently teareth the Hedge-hog in pieces thus the poor beast ayoiding the poison falleth into the mouth of her enemy The manner of Hedge-hogs is that whensoever they are hunted by Men they draw up their legs and put down their head to the mossie part of their belly so as nothing of them can be taken but their prickles and perceiving that shift will not serve the turn but their case growing desperate they render out of their own bodies a certain urine hurtful to their skin and back envying that any good thereby should ever come to mankinde and therefore seeing they naturally know the manifold uses of their own hides here is the cunning of her hunting to cause her first of all to render her urine and afterward to take her for the urine maketh the thornes of her back to fall off every day and therefore they take this course for their last refuge But in these cases the Hunters must poure upon the Hedge-hog warm water for feeling warmth she presently unfolds her self and lyeth open which the Hunter must observe and instantly take her by one of her hinder legs so hanging her up till she be killed with famine
nymphae Aegeriae nemoâ—ique relegat Solus ubi in silvis Itolis ignobleis aevum Exigeret verscque ubi nomine Virbius esset Vnde etiam Triviae templo lucisque sacratis Cornipedes arcentur equi quod littore currum Et juvenem monstr is pavidi effudere marinis The Poets also do attribute unto the night black Horses and unto the day white Homer saith that the names of the day Horses are Lampus and Phaethon to the Moon they ascribe two Horses one black and another white the reason of these inventions for the day and the night is to signifie their speedy course or revolution by the swiftness of Horses and of the darkeness of the night by the black Horses and the light of the day by the white and the Moon which for the most part is hid and covered with earth both increasing and decreasing they had the same reason to signifie her shadowed part like a black Horse and her bright part by a white one The like Fiction they had of Hecate whom Ausonius calleth Tergemina because she is described with the head of a Horse a Dog and a wilde Man the Horse on the right hand the Dog on the left hand and the wilde Man in the middle whereby they declared how vulgar illiterate and uncivilized men do participate in their conditions the labours and envie of brute beasts We may also read in the Annales of Tacitus that in his time there was a Temple raised to Equestrial fortune that is for the honour of them which managed Horses to their own profit and the good of their Countrey and that Fulvius the Praetor in Spain because he obtained the victory against the Celtiberians by the valour and diligence of his Horse-men was the first that builded that Temple Likewise there was another Temple in Boeotia for the same cause dedicated unto Hercules The ancient Pagans call the God of Horses Hippona as the God of Oxen Bubona It is also apparent that many Nations use to sacrifice Horses for at Salentinum a Horse was cast alive into the fire and offered to Jupiter Likewise the Lacedemonians sacrificed a Horse to the winds At Rome also they sacrificed a Horse to Mars and thereof came the term of Equus October which was sacrificed every year in October in Campus Martius This Horse was often take out of a Chariot which was a Conqueror in race and stood on the right hand as soon as he was killed some one carried his tail to a place called Regia and for his head there was a continual combate betwixt the inhabitants of the streets Suburra and Sacravia which of them should possesse it for the Suburrans would have fastened it to the wal of Regia and the Sacravians to the Tower Mamillia The reason why they Sacrificed a Horse some have conjectured because the Romans were the off-spring of the Trojans and they being deceived by a Horse their posterity made that Sacrifice for punishment of Horses but it is more reasonable that because they Sacrificed a conquering Horse they did it only for the honour of Mars the God of victory or else because they would signifie that flying away in battle was to be punished by the example of Sacrificing of a swift Horse The Carmani did also worship Mars and because they had no Horses to use in War they were forced to use Asses for which cause they Sacrificed an Asse unto him There is another fable amongst the Poets that the Methimnaeans were commanded by the Oracle to cast a Virgin into the Sea to Neptune which they performed now there was a young man whose name was Ennallus which was in love with the said Virgin and seeing her in the Waters swum after her to save her but both of them were covered with the waters of the Sea yet after a certain space Ennallus returned back again and brought news that the Virgin lived among the Pharies of the Sea and that he after that he had kept Neptunes Horses by the help of a great wave escaped away by swimming for the Poets fain that Neptunes Chariot was drawn by Horses of the Sea according to these Verses of Gillius Non aliter quotiens perlabitur aequora curru Extremamque petit Phoebaea cubilia Tethyn Fraenatis Neptunus equis They also faign that the Sun is drawn with two swift white Horses from whence came that abomination that the Kings of Judea had erected Horses and Chariots in honour of the Sun which were set at the entrance of the Temple of the Lord which Horses were destoyed by Josias as we read in holy Scripture And the manner of their abomination was that when they did worship to the Sun they road upon those Horses from the entrance of the Temple to the chamber of Nethan-melech The Persians also Sacrificed a Horse to Apollo according to these Verses of Ovid Placat equâ— Persis radiis Hyperiona cinctum Ne detur sceleri victima tarda deo And for this cause the Massagetes sacrificed a Horse the swiftest of all Beasts unto the Sun the swiftest of all the Gods Philostratus also recordeth that Palamedes gave charge to the Grecians to Sacrifice to the Sun rising a white Horse The Rhodians in honor of the Sun did cast yearly away into the Sea the Chariots dedicated to the Sun in imagination that the Sun was carryed about the World in a Chariot drawn by six Horses As the Army of the Persians did proceed forward on their journey the fire which they did call Holy and Eternal was lifted up on silver Altars presently after this there followed the Wise-men and after those Wise-men came 165 young men being cloathed with as many red little garments as there are dayes in the year Instantly upon the same came the holy Chariots of Jupiter which was drawn by white Horses after which with a resplendent magnitude the Horse of the Sun was seen to appear for so it was called and this was the manner of their Sacrifices The King of Indians also as is said when the dayes began to wax long he descended down to the River Indus and thereunto sacrificed black Horses and Buls for the Buls in ancient time were consecrated to the Rivers and Horses also were thrown thereinto alive as the Trojans did into Xanthus The Veneti which worshiped Diomedes with singular honour did Sacrifice to him a white Horse when the Thebanes made war on the Lacedemonians it is said that Caedasus apeared in a vision to Pelopidas one of the Thebane Captains and told him that now the Lacedemonians were at Leuctra and would take vengeance upon the Thebanes and their Daughters Whereupon Pelopidas to avert that mischief caused a young foal to be gallantly attired and the day before they joyned battle to be led to a Sepulcher of their Virgins and there to be killed and sacrificed The Thessalians observed this custome at their marriages and nuptial Sacrifices the man took a Horse of War
of the old Moon for it will have the same operation you shall therefore take as much or this dung as you can hold in your hand or fist at one time so that the quantity of the dung be unlike and you shall put it in a morter and beat it to powder and cast twenty grains of Pepper into the same fime being very diligently pounded or bruised and then you shall adde nine ounces of the best Hony unro the aforesaid mixture and four pounds of the best Wine and mix the potion in the manner of a compound Wine and the dung or dirt being dryed and beaten first 〈◊〉 on sha 〈…〉 mingle all the rest and put them together in a vessel made of glass that when you have any need you may have the medicine ready prepared to comfort him or her which is so afflicted Of the ICHNEUMON MArcellus and Solinus do make question of this Beast Ichneumon to be a kinde of Otter or the Otter a kinde of this Ichneumon which I find to be otherwise called Enydros or 〈◊〉 because it liveth in water and the reason of this name I take to be fetched ab investigando because like a Dog or hunting Hound it diligently searcheth out the seats of wilde Beasts especially the Crocodile and the Asp whose Egs it destroyeth And for the enmity unto Serpents it is called Ophi 〈…〉 us Is 〈…〉 is of opinion that the name of this Beast in the Greek is given unto it because by the favour thereof the venom and wholesomess of meates is deseried Whereof Dracontius writeth in this manner Praed 〈…〉 t Suillus 〈…〉 cujuscunque 〈◊〉 The Ic 〈…〉 foretelleth the power and presence of all poyson And it is called Suillus in Latine because like a Hog it hath bristles in stead of hair Albertus also doth call it Neomon mistaking it for Ichneumon There be some that call it an Indian Mouse because there is some proportion or similitude in the outward form between this 〈…〉 st and a Mouse But it is certain that it is bred in no other Nation but only in Egypt about the River Nilus and of some it is called Mus Pharaonis Pharaohs Mouse For Iber 〈…〉 was a common name to all the Egyptian Kings There be some that call it Thyamon and Ans 〈…〉 and also Damula mistaking it for that Weasil which is an enemy to Serpents called by the Italians Do 〈…〉 〈◊〉 yet I know no learned man but taketh these two names to signifie two different Bensts The quantity of it or stature is sometimes as great as a small Cat or Ferret and the hairs of it like the hairs of a Hog the eyes small and narrow which signifie a malignant and crafty disposition the tail of it very long like a Serpents the end turning up a little having no hairs but scales not much unlike the tail of a Mouse Aelianus affirmeth that both sexes bear young having seed in themselves whereby they conceive For those that are overcome in combates one with another are branded with a warlike mark of Villanage or subjection to their Conquerours and on the contrary side they which are conquered and overcome in fight do not only make vassals of them whom they overcome but in token thereof for further punishment fill them with their seed by carnal copulation so putting off from themselves to them the dolours and torments of bearing young This first picture of the Ichneumon was taken by Bellonius except the back be too much elevated The second picture taken out of Oppianus Poems as it was found in an old Manuscript When it is angry the hairs stand upright and appear of a double colour being white and yellowish by lines or rows in equal distance entermingled and also very hard and sharp like the hair of a Wolf the body is something longer then a Cats and better set or compacted the beak black and sharp at the nose like a Ferrets and without beard the 〈…〉 a short and round the legs black having five claws upon his hinder-feet whereof the last or hindmost of the inner 〈…〉 de of the foot is very short his tail thick towards the rump the tongue teeth and stones are like a Cats and this it hath peculiar namely a large passage compassed about with hair on the outside of his excrement hole like the genital of a woman which it never openeth but in extremity of heat the place of his excrements remaining shut only being more hollow then at other times A 〈…〉 it may be that the Authors aforesaid had no other reason to affirm the mutation of feeble or common transmigration of genital power beside the observation of this natural passage in male and female They bring forth as many as Cats and Dogs and also eat them when they are young they live both in land and water and take the benefit of both elements but especially in the River Nilus amongst the Reeds growing on the banks thereof according to the saying 〈◊〉 Nemetian Et placidis Ichneumona quaerere ripis Inter arundineas segetes For it will dive in the water like an Otter and seem to be utterly drowned holding in the breath longer then any other four-footed Beast as appeareth by his long keeping under water and also by living in the belly of the Crocodile until he deliver forth himself by eating through his bowels as shall be shewed afterwards It is a valiant and nimble creature not fearing a great Dog but setteth upon him and biting him mortally but especially a Cat for it killeth or strangleth her with three bites of her teeth and because her beak or snout is very narrow or small it cannot bite any thing except it be less then a mans fist The proportion of the body is much like a Badgers and the nose hangeth over the mouth like as it were always angry the nature of it is finding the Crocodile asleep suddenly to run down into his throat and belly and there to eat up that meat which the Crocodile hath devoured and not returning out again the way it went in maketh a passage for it self through the Beasts belly And because it is a great enemy and devourer of Serpents the common people of that Countrey do tame them and keep them familiarly in their houses like Cats for they eat Mice and likewise bewray all venemous Beasts for which cause as is said before they call it Pharaohs Mouse by way of excellency At Alexandria they sell their young ones in the Market and nourish them for profit It is a little Beast and marvellously studious of purity and cleanliness Bellonius affirmeth that he saw one of them at Alexandria amongst the ruines of an old Castle which suddenly took a Hen and eat it up for it loveth all manner of fowls especially Hens and Chickens being very wary and crafty about his prey oftentimes standing upright upon his hinder-legs looking about for a fit booty and when
he came to it he found it a sleep so that with no perill he might have killed her with his Musket before she saw him but he like a fool-hardy fellow thought it as little honour to kill a Lyon sleeping as a stout Champion doth to strike his enemy behind the back Therefore with his Musket top he smote the Lion to awake it whereat the beast suddenly mounted up and without any thankes or warning set his forefeet on this Squires brest and with the force of her body overthrew the Champion and so stood upon him keeping him down holding her grim face and bloudy teeth over his face and eyes a sight no doubt that made him wish himself a thousand miles from her because to all likelihood they should be the grinders of his flesh and bones and his first executioner to send his cursed soul to the Devill for denying Jesus Christ his Saviour Yet it fell out otherwise for the Lion having been lately filled with some liberal prey did not presently fall to eat him but stood upon him for her own safegard and meant so to stand till she was an hungry during which time the poor wretch had liberty to gather his wits together and so at the last seeing he could have no benefit by his Musket Sword or Dagger and perceiving nothing before him but unavoidable death thought for the saving of his credit that he might not die in foolish infamy to do some exploit upon the Lion whatsoever did betide him and thereupon seeing the Lion did bestride him standing over his upper parts his hands being at some liberty drew out his long Barbarian knife and thrust the same twice or thrice into the Lions flank which the Lion endured never hurting the man but supposing the wounds came some other way and would not forsake her booty to look about for the means whereby she was harmed At last finding her self sick her bowels being cut asunder within her for in all hot bodies wounds work presently she departed away from the man above some two yards distance and there lay down and dyed The wretch being thus delivered from the jawes of death you must think made no small brags thereof in the Court notwithstanding he was more beholding to the good nature of the Lion which doth not kill to eat except he be hungry then to his own wit strength or valour The Male Lion doth not feed with the female but either of them apart by themselves They eat raw flesh for which cause the Grecians call them Omesteres Omoboroi and Omophagoi the young ones themselves cannot long be fed with milke because they are hot and dry being at liberty they never want meat and yet they eat nothing but that which they take in hunting and they hunt not but once a day at the most and eat every second day whatsoever they leave of their meat they return not to it again to eat it afterwards whereof some assigned the cause to be in the meat because they can endure nothng which is unsweet stale or stinking but in my opinion they do it through the pride of their natures resembling in all things a Princely majesty and therefore scorn to have one dish twice presented to their own table But tame Lions being constrained through hunger will eat dead bodies and also cakes made of meal and hony as may appear by that tame Lion which came to Apollonius and was said to have the soul in it of Amasis King of Egypt which story is related by Philostratus in this manner There was saith he a certain man which in a leam led up and down a tame Lion like a Dog whithersoever he would and the Lion was not only gentle to his leader but to all other persors that met him by which means the man got much gains and therefore visited many Regions and Cities not sparing to enter into the temples at the time of sacrificing because he had never shed bloud but was clear from slaughter neither licked up the bloud of the Beasts nor once touched the flesh cut in pieces for the holy Altar but did eat upon Cakes made with meal and hony also bread Gourds and sod flesh and now and then at customary times did drink wine As Apollonius sat in a Temple he came unto him in more humble manner lying down at his feet and looking up into his face then ever he did to any as if he had some special supplication unto him and the people thought he did it for hope of some reward at the command and for the gain of his Master At last Apollonius looked upon the Lion and told the people that the Lion did entreat him to signifie unto them what he was and wherewithal he was possessed namely that he had in him the soul of a man that is to say of Amasis King of Egypt who raigned in the Province of Sai At which words the Lion sighed deeply and mourned forth a lamentable roaring gnashing his teeth together and crying with abundance of tears whereat Apollonius stroked the Beast and made much of him telling the people that his opinion was forasmuch as the soul of a King had entred into such a kingly Beast he judged it altogether unfit that the Beast should go about and beg his living and therefore they should do well to send him to Leontopolis there to be nourished in the Temple The Egyptians agreed thereunto and made sacrifice to Amasis adorning the Beast with Chains Bracelets and branches so sending him to the inner Egypt the Priests singing before him all the way their idolatrous Hymnes and Anthems but of the transfiguration of men into Lions we shall say more afterward only this story I rehearsed in this place to shew the food of tame and enclosed Lions The substance of such transfigurations I hold to be either Poetical or else Diabolical The food therefore of Lions is most commonly of meek and gentle Beasts for they will not eat Wolves or Bears or such Beasts as live upon ravening because they beget in them melancholy they eat their meat very greedily and devour many things whole without chewing but then they fast afterwards two or three days together never eating untill the former be digested but when they fast that day they drink and the next day they eat for they seldom eat and drink both in one day and if any stick in his stomach which he cannot digest because it is overcharged then doth he thrust down his nails into his throat and by straining his stomach pulleth it out again the self same thing he doth when he is hunted upon a full belly And also it must not be forgotten that although he come not twice to one carcasse yet having eaten his belly full at his departure by a wilful breathing upon the residue he so corrupteth it that never after any beast will taste thereof for so great is the poison of his breath that it putrifieth the flesh and also in
sandy and fat and being bruised or eaten tasteth like earth both kindes are covered with little white skins and there is apparent in them a spungy tenacious substance and this I take to be the Mushrom whereof Hermolaus speaketh And by the little stones and small skins it may be conjectured to be Corpus heterogenes in terra coalescens A Hetrogenean body encreasing in the earth wherewithal it hath no affinity There was another stone of the urine of a Linx to be seen in Savoy the substance whereof was clearly crystal the form of it was triangular the hardness so as you might strike fire with it and the colour partly white and partly like Wine mingled with water so that I will conclude that the urine of a Linx may engender a stone though not in such manner as is beforesaid For the Arabian Jâ—rath affirmeth that within seven dayes after the rendring it turneth into a stone but it is not the Lyncurium properly so called for that is the Amber or Gum before spoken of although catachrestically so called And if it be true that there be certain Mushroms neer the Red-sea which by the heat of the Sun are hardned into stones then also it may follow very naturally that those stones may produce Mushroms again for both the dissolution and the constitution of things are thought to be grounded upon the same principles And thus much shall suffice for the urine of the Linx and the stone made thereof The skins of Linxes are most pretious and used in the garments of the greatest estates both Lords Kings and Emperors as we have shewed before and for that cause are sold very dear The claws of this Beast especially of the right foot which he useth in stead of a hand are encluded in silver and sold for Nobles a piece and for Amulets to be worn against the falling sickness The love of these beasts to their young ones is very great like as the Pardals Lions and Tygers The King of Tartaria hath tame Linxes which he useth in hunting in stead of Dogs The antient Pagans dedicated this Beast to Bacchus feigning that when he triumphed in his chariot of Vine branches he was drawn by Tygers and Linxes And therefore Virgil saith Quid Lynces Bacchi variae And Ovid Dicta racemisero Lyncas dedit India Baccho All the nails of a Linx being burned with the skin beaten into powder and given in drink will very much cohibite and restrain abominable Lechery in men it will also restrain the lust in women being sprinkled upon them and also very effectually and speedily take away either itch or scurf in man or womans body The urine of this Beast is accounted very medicinable for those which are troubled with the Strangury and running of the reins The same is also very good and wholesome for the curing of any pain or grief in the winde-pipe or throat Bonarus Baro doth a affirm that the nails of Linxes which are in their Countrey are had in great estimation and price amongst their Peers and Noble men for there is a very certain opinion amongst them that those nails being put upon the yard of either Horse or Beast whose urine is kept back or restrained will in very short space cause them to void it without any grief at all He reporteth also that their nails do there wax white and that they include them all in silver and do commend them for an excellent remedy against the Cramp if they be worn peradventure because they are bending and crooked by which perswasion there are some superstitious men which hang certain roots which are crooked and knotty about them against the Cramp There are some which do ascertain that these nails are good and ready helps for the soreness of the Uvula which is in the Horses mouthes and for that cause there are many Horsemen which carry them continually about them The Linx or Wolf which is begotten of a Wolf and a Hinde the Musk-cat the Weasill and all such other like Beasts do more hurt men by their biting teeth-wounds then by poison There was a certain Hunter as Collinus reporteth which told him that the flesh of a Linx being sod in some hot pottage or broath and afterwards eaten would be a very good and wholesome medicine for the expelling of the Ague or Quartan Fever and that the bones of the same Beast being burnt and pounded into powder would be a very excellent remedy for the curing of wounds which are old and stale and full of putrifaction as also the Fistulaes which grow in the thighes or hips of men Of the Marder Martel or Marten And therefore the French call the word Martin by the name of Foines And the skins of the Fir-martin or House-martin are far more beautiful to look upon then those that live wilde in the trees or Woods Agricola calleth the Wood-martin Baummarder because it liveth for the most part in trees and saith that it never forsaketh the Woods or very seldom and therefore in that thing differeth from the Fir-martin But herein he seemeth to be deceived that he ascribeth to the Beech-martin a loamy or red throat and also a continual abode among the Woods For they come some-times to houses and to Rocks for which as we have said already it is called a Housemarder and Rock-marder And all these multitude of names do but express the two kindes afore-named whereof the Fir-Martin is most excellent for Princes and great Nobles are clothed therewith every skin being worth a French crown or four shillings at the least And they are so much the better when there are more white hairs aspersed among the yellow For their ordinary colour is a deep brown yellow and these that are clean white are four times worse then the former and therefore are not sold for above three or four groats a piece howsoever the saying of Martial Venator capta Marte superbus adest Here cometh the proud Hunter that hath killed a Martin may very well be applyed unto them which take any of these beasts for they cannot chuse but be very joyful which get a good sum of money for a little labour as they have for a Martins skin By inspection of the Foins that is the Martins of the beech for the French men called a Beâ—ch Fau from whence cometh the word Foines you may see that their skins are more dusky having a tail both greater and blacker then the Martins of the Firs And therefore you must understand that they of the Firs are by way of excellency called Martins and the other of the woods called Foines There is no great difference betwixt their bigness and if by their skins at any time there seem any inequality in breadth or length it must be attributed to their age and difference of years and not to any proportion in nature or distinction of kinde And as we have said that the Fir-Martins are absolutely the best yet that is
they have another property if they do not breed and engender before the casting of their Colts-teeth they remain steril and barren all their life long for so doth the generative power of the Asses body rest upon a tickle and nice point apt to rise or easie to fall away to nothing And in like sort is a Horse prone to barrenness for it wanteth nothing but cold substance to be mingled with his seed which cometh then to pass when the seed of the Ass is mixed with it for there wanteth but very little but that the Asses seed waxeth barren in his own kinde and therefore much more when it meeteth with that which is beside his nature and kinde This also hapneth to Mules that their bodies grow exceeding great especially because they have no menstruous purgation and therefore where there is an annual breeding or procreation by the help and refreshing of these flowers they both conceive and nourish now these being wanting unto Mules they are the more unfit to procreation The excrements of their body in this kinde they purge with their urine which appeareth because the male Mules never smell to the secrets of the female but to their urine and the residue which is not voided in the urine turneth to encrease the quantity and greatness of the body whereby it cometh to pass that if the female Mule do conceive with foal yet is she not able to bring it forth to perfection because those things are dispersed to the nourishment of her own body which should be imployed about the nourishment of the foal and for this cause when the Egyptians describe a barren woman they picture a Mule Alexander Aphrodiseus writeth thus also of the sterility of Mules Mules saith he seem to be barren because they consist of Beasts divers in kinde for the commixtion of seeds which differ both in habit and nature do evermore work something contrary to nature for the abolishing of generation for as the mingling together of black and white colours doth destroy both the black and white and produce a swart and brown and neither of both appear in the brown so is it in the generation of the Mules whereby the habitual and generative power of nature is utterly destroyed in the created compound which before was eminent in both kindes simple and several These things saith he Alcmaeon as he is related by Plutarch saith that the male Mules are barren by reason of the thinness and coldness of their seed and the females because their wombs are shut up and the veins that should carry in the seed and expel out the menstruous purgation are utterly stopt And Empedocles and Diocles say that the womb is low narrow and the passages crooked that lead into it and that therefore they cannot receive seed or conceive with young whereunto I do also willingly yeeld because it hath been often found that women have been barren for the same cause To conclude therefore Mules bear very seldom and that in some particular Nations if it be natural or else their Colts are prodigious and accounted monsters Concerning their natural birth in hot regions where the exterior heat doth temper the coldness of the Asses seed there they may bring forth And therefore Collumella and Varro say that in many parts of Africk the Colts of Mules are as familiar and common as the Colts of Mares are in any part of Europe So then by this reason it is probable unto me that Mules may ingender in all hot Countries as there was a Mule did engender often at Rome or else there is some other cause why they do engender in Africk and it may be that the African Mules are like to the Syrian Mules before spoken of that is they are a special kinde by themselves and are called Mules for resemblance and not for nature It hath been seen that a Mule hath brought forth twins but it was held a prodigy Herodotus in his fourth Book recorded these two stories of a Mules procreation When Darius saith he besieged Babylon the Babylonians scorned his Army and getting up to the top of their Towers did pipe and dance in the presence of the Persians and also utter very violent opprobrious speeches against Darius and the whole Army amongst whom one of the Babylonians said thus Quid istic desidetis ô Persâ— quin potius absceditis tunc expugnaturi nos cum pepererint Mulae O ye Persians why do you sit here wisdom would teach you to depart away for when Mules bring forth young ones then may you overcome the Babylonians Thus spake the Babylonian believing that the Persians should never overcome them because of the common proverb epcan emionoi tekâ—sin when a Mâ—le beareth young ones But the poor man spake truer then he was aware of for this followed after a yeer and seven months While the siege yet lasted it hapned that certain Mules belonging to Zâ—pirus the son of Megabizus brought forth young ones whereat their Master was much moved while he remembred the aforesaid song of the Babylonian and that therefore he might be made the Author of that fact communicated the matter with Darius who presently entertained the device therefore Zopirus cut off his own nose and ears and so ran away to the Babylonians telling them that Darius had thus used him because he perswaded him to depart with his whole Army from Babylon which he said was in expugnable and invincible The Babylonians seeing his wounds and trusting to their own strength did easily give credence unto him for such is the nature of men that the best way to beguile them is to tell them of those things they most desire for so are their hopes perswaded before they receive any assurances But to proceed Zopirus insinuated himself further into the favour of the Babylonians and did many valiant acts against the Persians whereby he got so much credit that at last he was made the General of the whole Army and so betrayed the City unto the hands of Dirius Thus was Babylon taken when Mules brought forth Another Mule brought forth a young one at what time Xerxes passed over Hellespont to go against Graecia with his innumerable Troops of Souldiers and the said Mule so brought forth had the genitals both of the male and female Unto this I may adde another story out of Suetonius in the life of Galba Caesar As his father was procuring Augurisms or divinations an Eagle came and took the bowels out of his hands and carryed them into a fruit-bearing-oak he enquiring what the meaning of that should be received answer that his posterity should be Emperours but it would be very long first whereunto he merrily replyed Sane cum Mula pepererit I sir when a Mule brings forth young ones which thing afterwards happened unto Galba for by the birth of a Mule he was confirmed in his enterprises when he attempted the Empire so that that thing which was a prodigy and cause of sorrow and
or wrung together through the pinching of their shoos to help themselves withall and for those which are lame and those which are troubled with those grievous sores called Fistulaes If any man shall take either in meat or drink the marrow of a Mule to the weight or quantity of three golden crowns he shall presently become blockish and altogether unexpert of wisdom and understanding and shall be void of all good nutriment and manners The ear-laps or ear-lages of a Mule and the stones of a Mulet being born and carried by any woman are of such great force and efficacy that they will make her not to conceive The heart of a Mule being dryed and mingled with Wine and so given to a woman to drink after that she is purged or cleansed thirty times hath the same force and power that the aforesaid medicine hath for the making of a woman barren The same effect against conception hath the bark of a white poplar tree being beaten together with the reins of a Mule then mingled in Wine and afterwards drunk up If the herb called Harts-tongue be tied upon any part of a woman with the spleen of a Mule but as some have affirmed by it self only and that in the day which hath a dark night or without any Moonshine at all it will make her altogether barren and not able to conceive If the two stones of a Mule be bound in a piece of the skin of the same Beast and hanged upon any woman they will make that she shall not conceive so long as they shall be bound unto her The left stone of a Weesil being bound in the skin or hide of a Mule and steeped or soked for a certain space or time in Wine or in any other drink and the drink in which they are so steeped given to a woman to drink doth surely make that she shall not conceive The stones of a Mulet being burned upon a barren and unfruitful tree and put out or quenched with the stale or urine of either Man or Beast which is gelded being bound and tyed in the skin of a Mule and hanged upon the arm of any woman after her menstrual fluxes will altogether resist and hinder her conception The right stone of a Mule being burned and fastned unto the arm of a woman which is in great pain and travail will make that she shall never be delivered until the same be loosened and taken away but if it shall happen that a Maid or young Virgin shall take this in drink after her first purgation or menses she shall never be able to conceive but shall be always barren and unfruitful The matrix or womb of a female Mule taken and boiled with the flesh of an Ass or any other flesh whatsoever and so eaten by a woman which doth not know what it is will cause her never to conceive after the same The worm which is called a Gloworm or a Globird being taken out of the womb or matrice of a female Mule and bound unto any part of a womans body will make that she shall never be to able conceive The dust or powder which proceedeth from the hoofs of a male or female Mule being mixed or mingled with Oyl which cometh from Myrtleberries doth very much help those which are troubled with the Gout in their legs or feet The dust of the hoofs of a Mule being scorched or burned and the Oyl of Myrtle-berries being mingled with Vinegar and moist or liquid Pitch and wrought or tempered in the form or fashion of a plaister and opposed or put unto the head of any one whose hairs are too fluent and abundant doth very speedily and effectually expel the same The liver of a Mule being burned or dryed unto dust and mixed with the same Oyl of Myrtle-berries and so anointed or spread upon the head is an excellent and profitable remedy for the curing of the aforesaid enormity The dust or powder of the hoofs of a female Mule is very wholesome and medicinable for the healing and curing of all griefs and pains which do happen or come unto a mans yard being sprinkled thereupon The hoof of a Mule being born by a woman which is with childe doth hinder her conception The filth or uncleanness which is in the ears of a Mule being bound in the skin or hide of a little or young Hart and bound or hanged upon the arm of a woman after her purgation doth cause that she may not conceive The same being in like manner mingled or mixed with Oyl which is made of Beavers-stones doth make any woman to whom it is given to drink altogether barren The dirt or dung of a Mule being mixed with a syrup made of Hony Vinegar and Water and given to any one to drink that is troubled with the heart swelling will very speedily and effectually cure the pain thereof The dung of a Mule being burned or dryed and beaten small and afterwards sifted or seirced and washed or steeped in Wine and given to any woman to drink whose menstrual fluxes come forth before their time will in very short space cause the same to stay The stale or urine of a male or female Mule being mingled with their dirt or dung is very good and medicinable for those to use which are troubled with corns and hard bunches of flesh which grow in their feet Assa foetida being mingled with the urine of a Mule to the quantity of a bean and drunk will altogether be an impediment and hinderance to the conception of any woman The stale or urine of a Mule being taken to the quantity of eight pounds with two pounds of the scum or refuge of silver and a pound of old and most clear Oyl all these being beaten or pounded together until they come to the thickness of the fat or sweat which falleth from mens bodies and boiled until they come unto so liquid and thin a juyce that they will speedily and effectually cure and help those which are troubled with the Gout or swelling in the joynts If a woman shall take the sweat which proceedeth from a Horse and anoint it upon a Woollen cloth and so apply it as a plaister or suppository unto her secret parts it will make her altogether barren There is an excellent remedy for those which are pursie or short winded which cometh also by the Mule which is this To take or gather the froath or some of a Mule and to put it into a cup or goblet and give it in warm water for a certain space or time to be drunk either to the man or woman which is troubled with this enormity and the party which do so use it shall in short space have remedy but the Mule will without any lingring of time or consuming of time in pain and sorrow die The milt of a male or female Mule being drunk in a potion or juyce
devoureth more then needeth for he is never so tamed that he forgetteth his old ravening being tamed on the land he is very full of sport and game I marvail how it came into the Writers heads to affirm that the Beaver constraineth the Otter in the Winter time to trouble the water about her tail to the intent it may not frieze which opinion we have confuted already in the discourse of the Beaver for herein I agree with Albertus Fiber sortior est lutra acutissimis dentibus quepropter eam vel expellit vel occidit The Beaver is much stronger then the Otter having also most sharp teeth and therefore either expelleth her out of the waters because they live both upon one kinde of food or else destroys her wherefore it is unreasonable to believe that he preserveth her to keep his tail from friezing The flesh of this Beast is both cold and filthy because it feedeth upon stinking fish and therefore not fit to be eaten Tragus writeth that this notwithstanding is dressed to be eaten in many places of Germany and I hear that the Carthusian Fryers or Monks whether you will which are forbidden to touch all manner of flesh of other four-footed Beasts yet they are not prohibited the eating of Otters These Otters are hunted with special Dogs called Otter-hounds and also with special instruments called Otter-speares having exceeding sharp points for they are hardly taken and Beasts do not willingly set upon them specially in the waters when they feel themselves to be wounded with the spear then they come to land where they fight with the Dogs very irefully and except they be first wounded they forsake not the waters for they are not ignorant how safe a refuge the waters are unto them and how unequal a combate they shall sustain with Men and Dogs upon the land yet because the cold water annoyeth their green wounds therefore they spin out their lives to the length of the thread chusing rather to die in torments among Dogs then to die in the waters There is a kinde of Assa called Benioyn a strong herb which being hung in a lionen cloth near fish-ponds driveth away all Otters and Bevers The hair of the skin is most soft neither doth it leese his beauty by age for which cause as also for that no rain can hurt it when it is well dressed it is of great price and estimation and is sold for seven or eight shillings thereof also they make fringes in hems of garments and face about the collars of men and womens garments and the skin of the Otter is far more pretious then the skin of the Beaver and for this cause the Swetian Merchants do transport many into Muscovia and Tartaria for clokes and other garments Thereof also in Germany they make caps or else line other caps with them and also make stocking-soles affirming that they be good and wholesome against the Palsie the Megrim and other pains of the head The bloud of an Otter is prescribed against the swelling of the Nerves The Liver dryed in an Oven against the Bloudy-flix and against the Colick being drunk in Wine The stones are also prescribed to be given against the Falling-sickness and all pains in the belly And thus much for the Otter There be certain beasts which are kindes of Otters which because they live in the waters and yet being unknown to us in England I have thought good to express them in this place by their Greek and Latine names In the first place that which the Graecians call Latax broader and thicker then an Otter and yet liveth in the waters or else goeth to the waters for his food yet breatheth air and not water like Otters The hair of this Beast is very harsh betwixt the similitude of a Sea-calf and a Hart and it hath also strong and sharp teeth wherewithall in the night season they shear asunder small boughs and twigs It is called also Fastâ—z Lamyakyz and Noertza There is another called Satyrium and Fassuron and Chebalus whose skin is black and very pretious and very much used for the edging of the best garments these live also in ponds lakes and still waters There is a third kinde called Satherium Kacheobeon and Kachyneen and Martarus having a white throat and being as big as a Cat and finally unto these may be added Porcos a four-footed beast living in the waters in the River Isther And Maesolus another four-footed beast living in some Rivers of India being as big as as a Calf Of the Panther commonly called a Pardal a Leopard and a Libbard THere have been so many names devised for this one beast that it is grown a difficult thing either to make a good reconciliation of the Authors which are wed to their several opinions or else to define it perfectly and make of him a good methodical History yet seeing the greatest variance hath arisen from words and that which was devised at the first for the better explication and description of it hath turned to the obscuration and shadowing of the truth I trust it shall be a good labour to collect out of every Writer that which is most probable concerning this Beast and in the end to express the best definition thereof we can learn out of all First of all therefore for as much as all the question hath arisen from the Greek and Latine names it is most requisite to express them and shew how the different construction began The Graecians do indifferently call Pordalis Pardalis and Panther the Latines Panthera Pardalis Pardus and Leopardus and these names are thus distinguished by the learned Pordalis they say signifieth the male and Pardalis the female and also Pantherâ— among the Latines for the female and Pardus for the male and these are understood of a simple kinde without commixture of generation Leopardus the Leopard or Libbard is a word devised by the later writers compounded of Leo and Pardus upon opinion that this Beast is generated betwixt a Pardal and a Lion and so indeed it ought properly to be taken if there be any such Pliny is of opinion that Pardus differeth from Panthera in nothing but in sex and other say that betwixt the Lions and the Pardals there is such a confused mixed generation as is betwixt Asses and Mares or Stallions and Asses as for example when the Lion covereth the Pardal then is the Whelp called Leopardus a Leopard or Libbard but when the Pardal covereth the Lioness then is it called Panthera a Panther 〈…〉 In this controversie the Hebreâ— and Arabian names which are generally indifferently translated Panthers or Libbards do take up the strife and almost end the controversie for Nameâ— in Hebrew and Alph 〈…〉 or Alâ—hed in Araâ—â—â—k are so translated both in holy Scripture and also in Avicen as may appear by these places following Esa 11. Habitabit Lupus cum agno Nameâ— Pardus cum â—â—do de 〈◊〉 That is to say The Wolf shall
drawing him with one of her feet unto the cave whereinto her young ones were fallen out of which he delivered them to the mother as ransome for his own life and then both she and the young ones did follow him rejoycing out of the danger of all Beasts and out of the Wilderness dismissing him without all manner of harm which is a rare thing in a man to be so thankful and much more in a Beast and unto this story of their love and kindeness to their young ones I may add another worthy to be remembred out of Aelianus There was saith he a man which brought up a tame Panther from a whelp and had made it so gentle that it refused no society of men and he himself loved it as if it had been his wife There was also a little Kid in the House brought up tame of purpose to be given unto the Panther when it was grown to some stature or quantity yet in the mean season the Panther played with it every day at last it being ripe the Master killed it and said it before the Panther to be eaten but he would not touch it whereupon he fasted till the next day and then it was brought unto him again but he refused it as before at last he fasted the third day and making great moan for meat according to his usual manner had the Kid laid before him the third time the poor Beast seeing that nothing would serve the turn but that he must either eat up his chamber-fellow or else his Master would make him continually fast he ran and killed another Kid disdaining to meddle with that which was his former acquaintance yea though it were dead herein excelling many wicked man who do not spare those that have lived with them in the greatest familiarity and friendship to undo and overthrow them alive for the advancement of themselves We have said already that they most of all resemble Women and indeed they are enemies to all creatures The Leopards of Barbary do little harm to men that they meet except they meet them in some path way where the man cannot decline the Beast nor the Beast the Man there they leap most fiercely into his face and pull away as much flesh as they can lay hold upon and many of them with their nails do pierce the brains of a man They use not to invade or force upon flocks of Sheep or Goats yet wheresoever they see a Dog they instantly kill and devour him The great Panther is a terror to the Dragon and so soon as the Dragon seeth it he flyeth to his cave The lesser Panthers or Leopards do overcome Wolves being single and hand to hand as we say but by multitude they over-master and destroy him for if he endevour to run away yet they are swifter and easily overcome it There is also great hatred and enmity betwixt the Hyaena and the Panther for in the presence of the Hyaena the Pardal dareth not resist and that which is more admirable if there be a piece of an Hyaenas skin about either man or beast the Panther will never touch it and if their skins after they be dead be hung up in the presence of one another the hair will fall off from the Panther and therefore when the Egyptians would signifie how a Superiour was overcome by a Inferiour they picture those two skins If any thing be anointed with broath wherein a Cock hath been sodden neither Panthers nor Lions will ever touch it especially if there be mixed with it the juyce of Garlick Leopards are afraid of a certain tree called Leopardi-arbor Leopards-tree Panthers are also afraid of the skull of a dead man and run from the sight thereof yet it is reported that two year before the death of Francis King of France two Leopards a male and a female were â—et escape in France into the Woods either by the negligence or the malice of their Keepers that is a male and a female and about Orleance tore in pieces many men and women at last they came and killed a Bride which was that day to have been marryed and afterward there were found many carkases of Women destroyed by them of which they had eaten nothing but only their breasts Such like things I might express many in this place whereby the vengeance of Almighty God against man-kinde for many sins might seem to be executed by the raging ministery of wilde savage and ungentle Beasts For this cause we read in ancient time how the Senators of Rome gave laws of punishment against them that should bring any Panthers into Italy especially any African Beasts and the first that gave dispensation against those laws was Cneius Ausâ—â—ius the peoples Tribune who permitted them for the sake of the Cirâ—â—nsâ—an games and then Sta 〈…〉 in the office of his aedility brought also in an hundred and fifty After him Poâ—â—pey the great four hundred and ten and lastly Augustus that ever remembred and renowned Emperor four hundred and twenty Thus laws which were first made by great men and good Senators for the safety of the common-wealth became of no great value because as great or greater then the Law-makers had a purpose to advance themselves by the practise of those things which law had justly forbidden for if those decrees had stood effectual as the victorious Champions had lost that part of their vain triumphs so many people had afterward been preserved alive who by the cruelty of these Beasts were either torn in pieces or else received mortal wounds It was not in vain that the blessed Martyr of Jesus Christ Ignatius who was afterwards torn in pieces by wilde Beasts at Rome did write thus in his Epistle to the Roman Christians concerning his handling by the Roman Souldiers as he was brought prisoner out of Syria to Rome A Syria Romam asque cum bestiis depugnoper terram mare die nocteque vinctus cum decem Leopardis hoc est cum militari cusâ—odia qui ex beneficiis deteriores fiunt From Syria saith he to Rome I have fought with Beasts being night and day held in bondage by ten Leopards I mean ten Souldiers who notwithstanding many benefits I bestowed upon them yet do they use me worse and worse and thus much for the cruelty of Panthers and Leopards We have shewed already how they become tame and are used in hunting unto which discourse somewhat out of the place I will adde a true narration of two Panthers or Leopards nourished in France for the King whereof one was of the bigness of a great Calf and the other of a great Dog and that on a day the lesser was brought forth for the King to behold how tame and tractable he was and that he would ride behinde his Keeper upon a cloth or pillow being tyed in a chain and if a Hare had been let loose in his presence and he turned down to her within a
in the folds of their own accord they will lick thereof and it will encrease in them great appetite In the Winter time when they are kept within doores they must be fed with the softest hay such as is cut down in the Autumn for that which is riper is less nourishable to them In some Countries they lay up for themselves especially green Ewe leaves or Elm three-leaved-grass sowed-vines and chaffe or pease when other things fail where there are store of Vines they gather their leaves for Sheep to eat thereof without all danger and very greedily and I may say as much of the Olive both wilde and planted and divers such other plants all which have more vertue in them to fat and raise your beast if they be aspersed with any salt humor and for this cause the Sea-wormwood excelleth all other herbs or food to make fat Sheep And Myndius writeth that in Pontus the Sheep grow exceeding fat by the most bitter and vulgar Wormwood Beans encrease their milk and also Three-leaved-grass for that is most nourishable to the Ews with young And it is observed for the fault which in Latine is called Luxuria segetum and in English ranckness of corn there is no better remedy then to turn in your Sheep in May when the ground is hard if not before for the Sheep loveth well to crop such stalks and also the corn will thrive never the worse for in some places they eat it down twice and in the Countrey about Babylon thrice by reason of the great fertility thereabouts and if they should not do so it would turn or run all into stalk and idle and unprofitable leaves The same extasie is reported to follow Sheep when they have eaten Eringâ—a that we have expressed also in the History of Goats namely that they all stand still and have no power to go out of their pastures till their Keeper come and take it out of their mouths It is reported that they are much delighted with the herb called Laserpitium which first purgeth them and then do fat them exceedingly It is therefore reported that in Cyrene there hath been none of this found for many years because the Publicans that hire the pastures are enemies to Sheep For at the first eating thereof the Sheep will sleep and the Goat will fall a neezing In India and especially in the Region of the Prasians it raineth many times a dew like liquid Honey falling upon the herbs and grass of the earth wherefore the shepheards lead their flocks unto those places wherewithal their cattle are much delighted and such as is the food they eat such also is the taste of the milk they render neither need they to mingle Honey with their Milk as the Graecians are constrained to do for the sweetness of that liquor saveth them of that charge Such a kinde of dew the Hebrews call Manna the Gracians Aeromelos and Drosomelos the Germans Himmelhung and in English Honey-dew but if this be eaten upon the herbs in the month of May it is very hurtful unto them We have shewed already that in some parts of Africk and Aethiopia their Sheep eat flesh and drink milk and it is apparent by Philostratus that when Apollonius travelled towards India in the Region Pegades inhabited by the Orite they fed their Sheep with fishes and so also they do among the 〈…〉 nian Indians which do inhabit the Sea-coasts and this is as ordinary with them as in Caria to feed their Sheep with figs because they want grass in that Country and therefore the flesh of the Sheep doth tast of fish when it is eaten even as the flesh of Sea-fouls The people of that Countrey are called Ichthyâ—phagi that is fish-eaters Likewise the Sheep of Lydia and Macedonia their Sheep grow fat with eating of fishes Aenius also writeth of certain fishes about the bigness of Frogs which are given unto Sheep to be eaten In Arabia in the Province of Aden their Oxen Camels and Sheep eat fishes after they be dryed for they care not for them when they be green the like I might say of many other places generally it must be the care of the shepheard to avoid all thorny and stony places for the feeding of his Sheep according to the precept of Virgil Si tibi lanicium curae primum aspera sylva Lappaeque tribulique absint Because the same thing as he writeth maketh them bald and oftentimes scratcheth their skin asunder his words are these Turpis oves tentat scabies cum tonsis illotus ad haesit Sudor hirsuti secuêrunt corpora vepres Although a Sheep be never so sound and not much subject to the Pestilence yet must the shepheard regard to feed it in choice places for the fat fields breed strait and tall Sheep the hills and short pastures broad and square Sheep the Woods and Mountain places small and slender Sheep but the best places of all are the plowed grounds Although Virgil prescribeth his shepheard to feed his flock in the morning according to the manner of the Countrey wherein he lived for the middle part of the day was over hot and not fit for cattel to eat in yet other Nations especially Germany and England and these Northern parts of the world may not do so The whole cunning of shepheards is excellently described for the ordering of their Sheep in these verses following Ergo omni studio glaciem venâ—osque nivales Quo minus est illis curae mâ—rtalis egestas Avertes victumque feres virgea laetus Pabula nec toâ—a claudes foenilia bruma Al vero Zephyr is cum laeta vocantibus aest is In saltus utrumque gregem atque in pascua mittes Luciferi primo cum sydere frigida rura Carpamus dum mane novum dum gramina canent Et ros in tenera pecori gratissimus herba est Inde ubi quarta sitim coeli collegerit hora Et cantu querulae rumpent arbusta cicadae Ad puteos aut alta greges ad stagna jubâ—to Currentem illignis petare canalibus undam Aestibus at mediis umbrosam exquirere vallem Sicubi magna Jovis antiquo robore quercus Ingentes tendat ramos aut sicubi nigrum Ilicibus crâ—bris sacra nemus occubet umbra Tum tenues dare rursus aquas pascere rursus Solis ad occasum cum frigidus aeâ—a vesper Temperat saltus reficit jam roscida luna Litioraque halcyonem resonant acanthida dumi When they return from their feeding the shepheard must regard that he put them not into the folds hot and if the time of the year be over hot let them not be driven to pastures a far off but seed them in those which are near and adjacent to their folds that so they may easily have recourse unto the shadow they ought not also to be turned out clustering al together but dispersed abroad by little and little neither must they be milked while they are hot until they
be cold a little so likewise in the morning let them be milked so soon as day appeareth and the little Lambs be turned out unto them which were shut from them But if there appear upon the grass Spiders webs or Cob-webs which bear up little drops of water then they must not be suffered to feed in those places for fear of poysoning and in times of heat and rain drive them to the highest hills â—or pastures which do most of all lie open to the windes for there shall the cattle feed most temperately They must avoid all sandy places and in the month of April May June and July they must not be suffered to feed overmuch but in October September and November let them have their full that so they may grow the stronger against the Winter time The Romans had a special regard to chuse some places for the Summering of their Sheep and some place for their Wintering for if they summered them in Apulia they wintered them in Samnis and therefore Varro saith the flocks of Apulia betimes in the morning in the Summer season are led forth to feeding because the dewy grass of the morning is much better then that which is dry in the middle of the day and about noon when the season groweth hot they lead them to shadowy trees and rocks until the cool air of the evening begin to return at which time they drive them to their pasture again and cause them to feed towards the Sun-rising for this is a general rule among the shepheards Quod mane ad solis occasum vesper◠〈◊〉 sous â—â—tum pascantur oves That is that in the morning they feed their Sheep towards the Sun-setting and in the evening towards the Sun-rising and the reason of it is Quia infirmissimum pecori caput averso sole pasci cogendum Because the head of Sheep is most weak therefore it ought to be fed turned from the Sun In the hot Countries a little before the Sun-setting they water their Sheep and then lead them to their pasture again for at that time the sweetness seemeth to be renewed in the grass and this they do after the Autumnal aequinoctium It is good to feed them in corn fields after harvest and that for two causes First because they are exceedingly filled with such hearbs as they finde after the plough and also they tread down the stubble and dung the land whereby it becometh more fruitful against the next year There is nothing that maketh a Sheep grow more fat then drink and therefore we read in holy Scripture how Jacob watred the Sheep and the Daughters of Jethro their Sheep at what time Moses came unto them therefore it is best oftentimes to mingle their water with Salt according to these verses At cui lactis amer cytisum lotosque frequentes Ipse manu salsaâ— ferat praesepibus herbas Hinc amant fluvios magis magis ubera tendant Et salis occultum referunt in lacte saporem There be many that trouble themselves about this question namely for what cause the Sheep of England do never thirst except they see the water and then also seldom drink and yet have no more Sheep in England then are in any other Countrey of the world insomuch that we think it a prodigious thing that Sheep should drink but the true cause why our English Sheep drink not is for there is so much dew on the grass that they need no other water and therefore Aristotle was deceived who thinketh that the Northern Sheep had more need of water then the Southern In Spain those Sheep bear the best fleeces of wooll that drink least In the Island of Cephalene as we have shewed in the story of the Goat all their Cattle for want of water do draw in the cold air but in the hotter Countries every day once at the least about nine or ten a clock in the morning they water their Sheep and so great is the operation of drink in Sheep that divers Authors do report wonders thereof as Valerius Maximus and Theophâ—asius who affirm that in Macedonia when they will have their Sheep bring forth white Lambs they lead them to the River Alia 〈…〉 on and when they will have them to bring forth black Lambs to the River Axius as we have shewed already It is also reported that the River Scamander doth make all the Sheep to be yellow that drink thereof Likewise there are two Rivers in Aâ—tandria which turn Sheep from black to white and white to black and the like I might add of the River Thrases of the two Rivers of Beotia all which things do not come to pass by miracle but also by the power of nature as may appear by the History of Jacob when he served his father in law Laban For after that he had covenanted with Laban to receive for his stipend all the spotted Sheep the Scripture saith in this manner Then Jacob took rods of green Poplar and of Hasel and of the Ches-nut tree and pilled white strakes in them and made the white appear in the rods Then he put the rods which he had pilled into the gutters and watering troughs when the Sheep came to drink before the Sheep and the Sheep were in heat before the rods and afterwards brought forth young of party colour and with small and great spots And Jacob parted these Lambs and turned the faces â—f the flick towards these party-coloured Lambs and all manner of black among the Sheâ—p of Laban so he put his own flocks by themselves and put them not with Labans flock And in every Ramming time of the stronger Sheep Jacob layed the rods before the eyes of the Sheep in the gutters that they might conceive before the rods but when the Sheep were feeble he put them not in and so the feebler were Labans and the stronger were Jacobs Upon this action of the Patriarch Jacob it is clear by testimony of holy Scripture that divers colours â—aid before Sheep at the time of their carnal copulation do cause them to bring forth such colours as they see with their eyes for such is the force of a natural impression as we read in stories that fair women by the sight of Blackamores have conceived and brought forth black children and on the contrary black and deformed women have conceived fair and beautiful children whereof there could be no other reason given in nature but their only cogitation of and upon fair beautiful men or black and deformed Moores at the time of their carnal copulation So that I would not have it seem incredible to the wise and discreet Reader to hear that the power of water should change the colour of Sheep for it being once granted that nature can bring forth divers coloured Lambs being holpen by artificial means I see no cause but diversity of waters may wholly alter the colour of the elder as well as whited sticks ingender a colour in the younger And thus much
upon the teeth or gums doth make the breath of any man more sweet and delightful then it hath been accustomed The same being used in the said manner doth procure a very great whiteness and clearness in the teeth Unwashed Wool being parched and bound in a linnen cloth a third part or portion of salt being afterwards added thereunto and all beaten together in small dust or powder and rubbed upon the teeth will keep them from any pain or grief therein Unwashed Wool being dipped in Nitre Brimstone Oyl Vinegar and liquid Pitch being all boyled together doth asswage all pains in the hanches or loins whatsoever being twice a day as hot as possibly may be suffered applyed thereunto Sheeps dung mingled with unwashed wool and certain other things is very much applyed against that troublesom and painful disease called the stone or gravel Unwashed wool in cold water doth cure diseases in the privy parts of any man or woman whatsoever The wool of black Sheep is commonly reported to be very commodious and helpful for those whose Cods or stones are much swelled The gall of an Ox being mixed with unwashed wool doth help the purgation or menstrual fluxes of women but Olympies the Thebane affirmeth that Hysop and Nitre ought to be mixed with this wool for the helping of the same Unwashed wool being applyed unto the secret parts of women doth cause a dead childe to come forth The same doth also stay the issues of women The pure or clear fleeces of Sheep either applyed by themselves or mingled with Brimstone do cure all hidden or secret griefs whatsoever and Pliny commendeth them above all other medicines whatsoever Fleeces of wool mingled with quicksilver are very profitable to be taken for the same diseases in certain perfumes The root of a Mallow being digged up before the rising of the Sun and wrapped in undyed wool doth cure the Wens or mattry impostumes of those Sheep which have lately brought forth young Sheeps wool being dyed in purple colour doth very much profit the ears but some do steep it in Vinegar and Nitre to make the operation more effectual The dust of wool being burnt doth bring forth the matter or corruption lying hid under scabs restrain the swellings in the flesh and bringeth all Ulcers to a scar Wool being burnt hath a sharp force and likewise hot together with the slenderness of the parts it doth therefore very speedily clense and purge the sores in the flesh which are moist and too much full of matter It is also put in drying medicines It is burned as if there were many other things in it filling a new pot which may be covered with a cover which is bored through with many holes like unto a sive The powder of unwashed Wool is anointed upon divers sores and is very curable for them as bruised new wounded and sores half burnt and it is used for the curing of the diseases in the eyes as also in the easing of the Fistulaes and corrupt mattery sores in the ears The power of the powder of unwashed wool is clensing and it doth very effectually purge the eye-lids or cheek-bals It doth also clense and cure for the most part all diseases as Serenus saith in these Verses Succida cum tepido nectetur tana Lyaeo Ambustaeve cinis complebit vulneris ora Aut tu succosae cinerem perducito lanae The hairs which grow about the secret hole of Sheep being burned beaten and drunk in sweet wine doth help the shortness of the breath and ease the pursiness of the stomach The wool of a little sheep being pulled from betwixt his thighes and burnt and afterwards dipped in Vinegar doth very speedily cure those which are troubled with the head ach being bound about the temples The dust of Sheeps fleeces is very medicinable for the curing of all diseases in the genital parts whatsoever The dust of Sheeps wool doth heal all passions in Cattle The Grecians Plaister called Enneapharmacum consisted of nine several things and amongst the rest of unwashed wool The filth which sticketh to the Sheeps wool and groweth thereunto from which the thing which the Grecians call Oesypon is made hath the force of digestion like unto Butter and also a like ability of concoction In a certain medicine of Andromachus for the curing of the disease of the secret parts unwashed wool is added to the rest but Lepas as Galen saith for unwashed wool doth add Goose grease in the same quantity Some do also for unwashed wool use the marrow of a young calf and apply it in the aforesaid manner but this unwashed wool is termed of the Grecians Ae 〈…〉 pus and therefore being by divers Authors set down diversly concerning the making and virtue thereof I have thought good to set down the truest and excellentest way to make the same as Dioscorides whom in this I suppose best to follow reporteth First to take new shorn wool which is very soft and not trimmed with sope-weed and wash it with hot water then to presse all the filth forth of the same and cast it into a Cauldron which hath a broad lip and afterwards to pour the water in and to stir it up and down with a certain instrument with such great force as it may foam again of with a wooden rod still greatly to turn and trouble it so that the filthy froath or spume may more largely be gathered together afterwards to sprinkle it over with Sea water and the fat remaining which did swim upon the top being gathered together in an earthen vessel to powr the water into the Cauldron then must the froath be powred again into the Sea water and lastly taken out again this is so often to be done that the fat being consumed there will not any froath be left remaining the Aesypus then being gathered together is to be mollifyed with mens hands and if there be any filth therein it must out of hand be taken away and all the water by little and little excluded and being fresh poured in let it be mingled with ones hands until the Aesypus being touched with the tongue of any one may lightly bind it but not savour either sharp or tartly and the fat may seem very white and then let it be hid in an earthen vessel but let there be great care had they be done in the hot sun But there are some which use another manner of way to make the same which is this to cleanse the fleeces and wash away all filth and presse it forth of the same and boyl them in water over a soft fire in a brazen vessel then to wash the fat which swimmeth on the top being gathered together with water and being strained in another platter which may have some hot water in it to hide or overcast it with a linnen cloth and lay it forth in the sun until it be very white and thick enough Some also do use another way as this to
yet Solinus and Seneca seem to be of opinion that their spots are sometimes of divers colours both yellow and black and those long like rods in these sayings Tibi dant variâ— pectora Tigres And again Vbera virgata ferae Caspiae And Silius saith Corpore virgato Tigris It were needless to speak of their crooked claws their sharp teeth and divided feet their long tail agility of body and wildeness of nature which getteth all their food by hunting It hath been falsely believed that all Tigers be females and that there are no males among them and that they engender in copulation with the winde whereupon Camerarius made this witty riddle in his â—hetorical exercises A fluvio dicor fluâ—ius vel dicitur ex me Junctaque sum vento vento velocior ipso Et mihi dat ventus natos nec quaero maritos The Epithets of this beasts are these Armenian Tigers sharp Ganietican Hyrcanian fierce cruel and wicked untamed spotted divers coloured straked bitter ravenous African greedy Caspian Câ—rcesian Caucasean Indian Parthian Marsian straight-footed mad stiffe fearful strong foaming and violent with many such others as are easie to be found in every Author The voice of this beast is called Ranking according to this verse Tigrides indomitae rancant rugiuntque Leones Now because that they are strangers in Europe as we have said already never breeding in that part of the world and as seldom seen we must be constrained to make but a short story of it because there are not many divers things concerning the nature of it and in the Physick none at all For the manner of their food they prey upon all the greatest beasts and seldom upon the smaller as Oxen Harts and Sheep but Hares and Conies they let alone It is reported by Plutarch of a tame Tiger that was brought up with a Kid the said Kid was killed and laid before him to eat but he refused it two days together and the third day oppressed with extremity of hunger by her ranking and crying voice she made signes to her Keeper for other meat who cast unto her a cat which presently it pulled in pieces and devoured it The like story unto this we have shewed already in the Panther Generally the nature of this beast is according to the Epithites of it sharp untamed cruel and ravenous never so tamed but sometimes they return to their former natures yet the Indians do every year give unto their King tamed Tigers and Panthers and so it cometh to pass that sometimes the Tiger kisseth his Keeper as Seneca writeth In the time of their lust they are very raging and furious according to these Verses of Virgil Per sylvas tum saevus aper tum pessima Tigris Heu male cum Libyae solis â—rratur in agriâ— They ingender as Lions do and therefore I marvel how the fable first came up that they were all females had no males among them and that the females conceived with young by the West wind We have shewed already in the story of the Dogs that the Indian Dog is engendered of a Tiger and a Dog and so also the Hircanian Dogs Whereby it is apparent that they do not only conceive among themselves but also in a mingled race The male is seldom taken because at the sight of a man he runneth away and leaveth the female alone with her young ones for he hath no care of the whelps and for this occasion I think that the fables first came up that there were no males among the Tigers The female bringeth forth many at once like a Bitch which she nourisheth in herden very carefully loving them and defending them like a Lioness from the Hunters whereby she is many times ensnared and taken It is reported by Aelianus that when they hear the sound of Bels and Timbrels they grow into such a rage and madness that they tear their own flesh from their backs For the taking of Tigers the Indians near the River Ganges have a certain herb growing like Bugloss which they take and press the juyce out of it this they preserve beside them and in still silent calm nights they pour the same down at the mouth of the Tigers den by vertue whereof it is said the Tigers are continually enclosed not daring to come out over it through some secret opposition in nature but famish and dye howling in their caves through intolerable hunger So great is the swiftness of this beast as we have shewed already that some have dreamed it was conceived by the winde For as the swiftest Horses and namely the Horses of Dardanus are likewise fabled to be begotten by the Northern winde so the Tigers by the West winde Therefore they are never taken but in defence of their young ones neither is there any beast that liveth upon preying so swift as they Solam Tigrim Indis insuperabilem esse dicunt quoniam fugiendi celeritate quae ventos aequare dicitur è conspectu aufugit Only the Tiger the Indians say can never be conquered because when he is hunted he runneth away out of sight as fast as the winde For this cause they diligently seek out the caves and dens of the Tigers where their young ones are lodged and then upon some swift Horses they take and carry them away when the female Tiger returneth and findeth her den empty in rage she followeth after them by the foot whom she quickly overtaketh by reason of her celerity The Hunter seeing her at hand casteth down one of her Whelps the distressed angry beast knowing that she can carry but one at once first taketh up that in her mouth without setting upon the Hunter contented with that one returneth with it to her lodging having laid it up safe back again she returned like the wind to pursue the Hunter for the residue who must likewise set her down another if he have not got into his ship for except the hunter be near the water side and have a ship ready she will fetch them all from him one by one orelse it will cost him his life therefore that enterprise is undertaken in vain upon the swiftest Horses in the world except the waters come betwixt the Hunter and the Tiger And the manner of this beast is when she seeth that her young ones are shipped away and she for ever deprived of seeing or having them again she maketh so great lamentation upon the Sea shore howling braying and rancking that many times shâ— dyeth in the same place but if she recover all her young ones again from the Hunters she departeth with unspeakable joy without taking any revenge for their offered injury For this occasion the Hunters do devise certain round sphears of glass wherein they picture their young ones very apparent to be seen by the dam one of these they cast down before her at her approach she looking upon it is deluded and thinketh that her young ones are inclosed therein and
long And these white Weasels differ nothing from the common vulgar Weasels of other colours except that their hair stick faster to their backs and it is observed that in Russia the Noblest women are apparelled with these skins And there is a Wood in Scandinavia called Lanzetuoca which is fourscore mile long wherein are abundance of white Weasels And the Kings tents among the Tartarians are said to be covered all over with the skins of Lyons without and the walls to be hung with these Armins or white Weasels within and although the price of these skins be very deer among them for sometimes so many as are used in one Garment will cost two thousand Crowns yet do the people earnestly seek after them accounting it no small honour to wear so much wealth upon their backs Now the reason why these beasts came to be called Armilini is from Armilla a chain because they did wear them in fringes about their garments like chains and although that some of the Alpine Mice be all white and likewise the Pontique Mouse yet there must be a difference observed betwixt these Weasels which are properly called Armins and those Mice which are so called only by way of resemblance as we have shewed already in their stories And of the Pontique Mouse I may adde thus much more that they live in the Winter time in hollow trees wherein they become as white as snow all over except their tails and are in quantity like Squirrels but in the end of May they turn somewhat red because that then they give themselves to copulation and generation of young ones when they lay aside their whitenesse and live many dayes together in care all copulation among the green and fresh herbs leaving behinde them such rank and unsavoury smells as are very odious to a good sent And it is said that every three year their skins through abundance of food grow greater and greater to the exceeding commodity of Merchants and Skinners in Norway and Helsyngia There are certain little four-footed beasts called Lemmar or Lemmus which in tempestuous and rainy weather do seem to fall down from the clouds and it was never yet found whether their beginning arose first from heaven or earth but this is certain that as soon as ever they have fallen to the ground some of them have been opened and in their bowels have been found green herbs and therefore I marvel why ever it should be beleeved that these beasts are bred of some feculent matter in the clouds but if any man ask me from whence then have they their beginning I answer from the earth even as Locusts and Catterpillers who are said in holy Scripture to be carryed to and fro with the windes and so these beasts being destitute of naturall food in their places of generation do advance themselves into the winde and so are carried into other strange and unknown Countreys where they fall like Locusts upon every green thing living untill they have devoured all but when once they taste of new grown herbs they perish and die by means whereof they encrease great pestilence and corruption but the Arâ—â—lins or Armins do eat and devour them Now the Skins of these beasts are exceeding delicate having in them divers colours and therefore the people flea them off from their bodies and sell them by thirty or forty in bundles for great price but of these skins I have said enough both here and elsewhere The wilde Weasels differ not from the vulgar domesticall Weasel their foreteeth are short and not long like a Mouses the face broad their genital part like a Foxes their tail short their legs and clawes short strong and sharp and it is reported by Strabo that the Weasels of Mauritania are as big as Cats but their gaping and opening of their mouth much longer and wider There is an Island called Dordocel 〈…〉 on the one side whereof as Pliny writeth there are Weasels and through the middle there is a way over which they never passe and on the other side there are not only not any bred but also if they be brought into it they die and perish and so likewise it is reported of Beotia They make themselves caves and holes in the earth rocks and walls wherein they lodge into the which they frame two passages or doors one into the South the other into the North resembling herein the Squirrels that so they may be free from the winde on which side soever it bloweth sometimes they get into stacks of Hay and straw and there they lodge those Weasels which live neer houses sleep not much for they have been seen abroad all the Winter time not only the vulgar but the Armins neither are they unthankfull unto the Countrey men in whose houses they lodge for they kill eat and devour all manner of Mice Rats and Moles for because of their long slender bodies they are apt to creep into the holes of the earth and narrow passages fetching their prey from those places whither Cats cannot come therefore in He 〈…〉 tia the Countrey men nourish them more then Cats because they destroy more vermin then Cats The harm they do is to Hens Chickens and Egs and yet some say they eat the Egs and â—et the Hens alone they are likewise enemies to Geese and devour their Egs and Aelianus writeth that if they come unto dead men they will pull out their eyes in such manner as they do Egs and therefore such Carkases are to be watched against them Amyntat writeth that the Shrew-mouse is conceived betwixt a Mouse and a Weasel which opinion is not only râ—diculous but impossible for how is it likely that a Mouse will ingender with that beast which lyeth in wait to destroy her It is also said that a Weasel fighteth with those Serpents that hunt after Mice for no other cause but to gain the prey from him There is nothing in this beast more strange then their conception and generation for they do not engender nor couple in their hinder parts like other four-footed beasts but at their ears and bring forth their young ones at their mouth and for this cause Aristeas writeth the Jewes were forbidden to eat them for this their action was an emblem of folly and of foolish man which can keep no secrets but utter all that they hear thus saith he But we that are Christians knew other reasons why the Jewes were forbid to eat them The Egyptians make of it another sign for they say that their copulation at the ear and generation at the mouth are emblems of speech which is first taught to the ear and then uttered by the tongue there be other again that hold this to be a fable And Pope Clement writeth that they conceive at the mouth and bring forth aâ— the â—ar Many say it is true of the Weasel of the Sea but not of the Weasel of the earth which is therefore called Collipara and this they would
and yet the same Beast appear meek and gentle unto them there they should take their wives When they came into the land of the Cleonians they met with a Wolf carrying a Lamb in his mouth whereupon they conceived that the meaning of Apollo was that when they met with a Wolf in that Countrey they might very happily and successively take them wives and so they did for they married with the daughters of Thesander Cleonymus a very honest man of that Countrey It is reported of Milo Crotoniata that valiant strong man how upon a season rending a tree in sunder in the woods one of his arms was taken in the closing of the tree and he had not strength enough to loose it again but remained there inclosed in most horrible torments until a Wolf came and devoured him The like story unto this is that which Aelianus reporteth of Gelon the Syracusan a Scholar unto whom there came a Wolf as he sat in the School writing on his Tables and took the writing tables out of his hand The Schoolmaster being inraged herewith and knowing himself to be a valiant man took hold of the same tables in the Wolfs mouth and the Wolf drew the Master and Scholars in hope of recovery of the tables out of the School into a plain field where suddenly he destroyed the Schoolmaster and a hundred Scholars sparing none but Gelon whose tables were a bait for that prey for he was not only not slain but preserved by the Wolf to the singular admiration of all the world whereby it was collected that that accident did not happen naturally but by the over-ruling hand of God Now for these occasions as also because that the wooll and skin of beasts killed by Wolves are good for nothing although the flesh of Sheep is more sweeter are unprofitable and good for nothing Men have been forced to invent and finde out many devises for the destroying of Wolfs for necessity hath taught men much learning and it had been a shameful misery to indure the tyranny of such spoiling beasts without labouring for resistance and revenge for this cause they propounded also a reward to such as killed VVolfs for by the law of Draco he that killed a young VVolf received a talent and that killed an old VVolf received two talents Solon prescribed that he that brought a VVolf alive should receive five pieces of money and he that brought one dead should receive two Apollo himself was called Lycoctonos a VVolf-killer because he taught the people how to put away VVolfs Horner calleth Apollo Lycegenes for that it is said immediately after he was born of his mother Latona he was changed into the shape of a VVolf and so nourished and for this cause there was the Image of a VVolf set up at Delphos before him Others say that the reason of that Image was because that when the Temple of Delphos was robbed and the treasure thereof hid in the ground while diligent inquisition was made after the theeves there came a VVolf and brought them to the place where the golden vessels were covered in the earth which she pulled out with her feet And some say that a VVolf did kill the sacrileger as he lay asleep on the Mountain Parnassus having all the treasure about him and that every day she came down to the gates of Delphos howling until some of the Citizens followed her into the Mountain where she shewed them the theef and the treasure both together But I list not to follow or stand upon these fables The true cause why Apollo was called a VVolf-killer was for that he was feigned to be a Shepheard or Herdsman and therefore in love of his Cattle to whom VVolfs were enemies he did not only kill them while he was alive but also they were offered unto him in sacrifice for VVolfs were sacred to Apollo Jupiter and Mars and therefore we read of Apollo Lycius or Lyceus to whom there were many Temples builded and of Jupiter Lyceus the sacrifices instituted unto him called Lycaea and games by the same name There were other holy-days call'd Lupercalia wherein barren women did chastise themselves naked because they bare no children hoping thereby to gain the fruitfulness of the womb whereof Ovid speaketh thus Excipe foecundae patienter verbera dextrae Jam socer optatum nomen habebit avi Propertius and some other writers seem to be of the minde that those were first instituted by Fabius Lupercus as appeareth by these verses Verbera pellitus seto samovebat arator Vnde licens Fabius sacra Lupercus habet And Juvenal thus Nec prodest agili palmas praebere Luperco Now concerning the manner of taking of VVolfs the Ancients have invented many devises and gins and first of all an Iron toil which they still fasten in the earth with Iron pins upon which pins they feave a ring being in compass about the bigness of a VVolfs head in the midst whereof they lay a piece of flesh and cover the Toil so that nothing is seen but the flesh when the Wolf cometh and taketh hold of the flesh feeling it stick pulling hard he pulleth up the ring which bringeth the whole Toil on his neck and sharp pins This is the first manner that Crescentiensis repeateth of taking VVolfs and he saith there are other devises to ensnare their feet which the Reader cannot understand except he saw them with his eyes The Italians call the nets wherein VVolfs are taken Tagliola Harpago Lo Rampino and Lycino the French Hauspied and Blondus affirmeth that the shepheards of Italy make a certain gin with a net wherein that part of the VVolf is taken which is first put into it Now the manner of taking VVolfs in ditches and pits is divers first of all they dig a deep ditch so as the VVolf being taken may not go out of it upon this pit they lay a hurdle and within upon the pillar they set a live Goose or Lamb when the VVolf windeth his prey or booty he cometh upon the trench and seeing it at a little hole which is left open on purpose to cast the VVolf into the deep ditch and some use to lay upon it a weak hurdle such as will not bear up either a man or a beast that so when the VVolf cometh upon it it may break and he fall down but the best devise in my opinion that ever was invented in this kinde is that the perch and hurdle may be so made and the bait so set that when one VVolf is fallen down it may rise again of it owne accord and stand as it did before to entrap another and great care must be had that these kinde of ditches may be made in solid and strong earth or if the place afford not that opportunity then must the inside be lined with boards to the intent that the beast by scraping and digging with his feet make no evasion The Rhatians use to raise up to a Tree a certain
English thus The cunning Atyr Serpents fierce of poyson did disarm And Water-snakes to deadly sleep by touching he did charm Alvisius Cadamustus in his description of the new World telleth an excellent history of a Ligurian young man being among the Negroes travelling in Africk whereby he endevoureth to prove how ordinary and familiar it is to them to take and charm Serpents according to the verse of the Poet Frigidus inpratis cantando rumpitur anguis That is The cold-earth-snake in Medows green By singing broke in pieces may be seen The young man being in Africk among the Negroes and lodged in the house of a Nephew to the Prince of Budoniel when he was taking himself to his rest suddenly awaked by the hearing the unwonted noise of the hissing of innumerable sorts of Serpents whereat while he wondred and being in some terror he heard his Host the Princes Nephew to make himself ready to go out of the doores for he had called up his servants to saddle his Camels the young man demanded of him the cause why he would go out of doores now so late in the dark night to whom he answered I am to go a little way but I will return again very speedily and so he went and with a charm quieted the Serpents and drove them all away returning again with greater speed then the Ligâ—â—ian young man his guess expected And when he had returned he asked his guess if he did not hear the immoderate hissing of the Serpents and he answered that he had heard them to his great terrour Then the Princes Nephew who was called Bisboror replyed saying they were Serpents which had beset the house and would have destroyed all their Cattel and Herds except he had gone forth to drive them away by a charm which was very common and ordinary in those parts wherein were abundance of very hurtful Serpents The Ligurian young man hearing him say so marvailed above measure and said that this thing was so rare and miraculous that scarsely Christians would believe it The Negro thought it as strange that the young man should be ignorant hereof and therefore told him that their Prince could work more strange things by a charm which he had and that this and such like were small vulgar and not to be accounted miraculous For when he is to use any strong poyson upon present necessity to put any man to death he putteth some venom upon a sword or other piece of Armor and then making a large round circle by his charm compelleth many Serpents to come within that circle he himself standing amongst them and observing the most venomous of them all so assembled which he thinketh to contain the strongest poyson killeth him and causeth the residue to depart away presently then out the dead Serpent he taketh away the poyson and mixeth it with the seed of a certain vulgar tree and therewithal anointeth his dart arrow or swords point whereby is caused present death if it give the body of a man but a very small wound even to the breaking of the skin or drawing of the bloud And the said Negro did earnestly perswade the young man to see an experiment hereof promising to shew all as he had related but the Ligurian being more willing to hear such things told then bold to attempt the trial told him that he was not willing to see any such experiment And by this it appeareth that all the Negroes are addicted to Incantations which never have any approbation from GOD except against Serpents which I cannot very easily be brought to believe And seeing I have entered into this passage of Charming being no doubt an invention of Man and therefore argueth his power to tame these venomous Beasts according to the former saying of Saint James although I condemn such courses utterly yet it is lawful to prosecute the same seeing the holy Ghost Psalm 58. vers 4 5. affirmeth a practise against Serpents a dexterity and ripeness in that practise and yet an impossibility to affect any good except the voyce of the Charmer come to the ear of the Adder For thus he writeth Their poyson is like the poyson of a Serpent like a deâ—f Aâ—der that stoppeth his ear 5. Which heareth not with the voyce of the Inchanter though he be most expert in cunning Upon which words Saint Augustine Saint Jerom and Cassidorus writing say that when the Charmer cometh to Inchant or Charm then they lay one of their ears to the earth so close as it may not receive the sound and their other ear they stop with their tail I will therefore yet add somewhat more of this taming of Serpent I have heard a Gentleman of singular learning and once my worshipful good friend and dayly encourager unto all good labours report divers times very credibly upon his own knowledge and eye-sight that being at Padua in Italy he saw a certain Quack-salver or Mountebanck upon a stage pull a Viper out of a box and suffered the said Viper to bite his flesh to the great admiration of all the beholders receiving thereby no danger at all Afterward he put off his doublet and shirt and shewed upon his right arm a very great unwonted blew vein standing beyond the common course of nature and he said that he was of the linage of Saint Paul and so were all other that had such veins and that therefore by special vertue to that Family given from above no Viper nor Serpent could ever annoy or poyson them but withall the fellow drank a certain compound water or antidote for fear of the worst and so at one time vented both his superstitious hypocrisie and also much of his Antidote to his great advantage It was an invention of ancient time among the wise Magitians to make a pipe of the skins of Cats legs and therewithall to drive away Serpents by which it appeareth that the soveraignty of Man over Serpents was given by GOD at the beginning and was not lost but continued after the fall of man although the hand that should rule be much weaker and practised by the most barbarous of the world necessity of the defence forcing a violence and hatred betwixt the Serpent and the Womans seed For this cause we read of the seaven daughters of Atlas whereof one was called Hyas whose daily exercise was hunting of venomous Beasts and from her the Hyades had her denomination And for a conclusion of this Argument I will adde this one story more out of Aelianus When Thonis the King of Egypt had received of Menelaus Helen to be safely kept whiles he travelled through Aethiopia it hapned that the King fell in love with her beauty oftentimes endevoured by violence to ravish her then it is also said that Helen to turn away the Kings unlawful lust opened all the matter to Polydamna the wife of Thonis who instantly fearing her own estate lest that in time to come fair Helen should deprive her of her husbands love
or warmth then in other whose leaves fall off and decay in the cold weather except in the roots of Birth And by reason of their multitude gathered together at the root of this tree it falleth out that their breath heateth the same and so preserveth the leaves from falling off Wherefore in ancient time the ignorant multitude seeing a Birch tree with green leaves in the Winter did call it our Ladies Tree or a holy tree attributing that greenness to miracle not knowing the former reason or secret in Nature Solinus reporteth of such a like Wood in a part of Africa where in all the Winter time the leaves of all the trees abide green the cause is as before recited for that the Serpents living at the roots of the trees in the earth do heat them with their breath Neither ought any man to wonder that they should so friendly live together especially in the Winter and cold time seeing that by experience in England we know that for warmth they will creep into bed-straw and about the legs of men in their sleep as may appear by this succeeding discourse of a true history done in England in the house of a worshipful Gentleman upon a servant of his whom I could name if it were needful He had a servant that grew very lame and feeble in his legs and thinking that he could never be warm in his bed did multiply his clothes and covered himself more and more but all in vain till at length he was not able to go about neither could any skill of Physitian or Chirurgeon finde out the cause It hapned on a day as his Master leaned at his Parlour window he saw a great Snake to slide along the house side and to creep into the chamber of this lame man then lying in his bed as I remember for he lay in a low chamber directly against the Parlour window aforesaid The Gentleman desirous to see the issue and what the Snake would do in the chamber followed and looked into the chamber by the window where he espyed the Snake to slide up into the bed-straw by some way open in the bottom of the bed which was of old boards Straightway his heart rising thereat he called two or three of his servants and told them what he had seen bidding them go take their Rapiers and kill the said Snake The serving men came first and removed the lame man as I remember and then the one of them turned up the bed and the other two the straw their master standing without at the hole whereinto the said Snake had entered into the chamber The bed was no sooner turned up and the Rapier thrust into the straw but there issued forth five or six great Snakes that were lodged therein Then the serving-men bestirring themselves soon dispatched them and cast them out of doors dead Afterward the lame Mans legs recovered and became as strong as ever they were whereby did evidently appear the coldness of these Snakes or Serpents which came close to his legs every night did so benum them as he could not go And thus for heat they pierce into the holes of chimneys yea into the tops of hills and houses much more into the bottoms and roots of trees When they perceive that Winter approacheth they finde out their resting places wherein they lie half dead four months together until the Spring sun again communicating her heat to all Creatures reviveth and as it were raiseth them up from death to life During which time of cold Winter as Seneca writeth Tuto tractari postifera Serpens potest non desunt tuno illi venena sed 〈◊〉 They may be safely handled without fear of harm not because they want poyson at that time but because they are drouzy and deadly astonished But there is a question whether when they be in this secresie or drouziness they awake not to eat or else their sleep be unto them in stead of food Olaus Magnus affirmeth of the Northern Serpents that they eat not at all but are nourished with sleep Cardan saith that they take some little food as appeareth by those which are carryed up and down in boxes to be seen and are fed with bran or cheasil But this may be answered that Serpents in boxes are not so cold as those in Woods and Deserts and therefore seeing cold keepeth them from eating the external heat of the box-house or humane body which beareth them about may be a cause that inclosed Serpents feed in Winter as well as in Summer and yet the Serpents which run wilde in the fields eat nothing at all during the time of their Chias or Ehiaus that is their lying hid Grevinus that learned man proponeth this question Si Serpentes calidi sunt qui fit ut integros trâ—t aut quatuor menses id est toto illo tempore quo delitescunt absque cibo vivunt If saith he Serpents be hot how cometh it to pass that they can live three or four moneths without all food that is all the time of their lying secret He maketh in my opinion a sufficient answer to this question which for me shall conclude the cause saying Doth it not fall out with Serpents as it doth with some women who being full of humor and thick phlegmatick matter have but a little and weak natural heat yet proportionable to the said humor do live a great time by reason thereof without food or nourishment And for this cause all the hoasts of Philosophers do define that Serpents do also abstain from eating a long season For Nature hath clothed them with a more solid skin and lined them with a more thick and substantial flesh to the intent that their natural heat should not easily vanish away and decay in their bodies but remain therein permanent for the feeding and preserving of life When they sleep they seem to sleep with open eyes which is elegantly described by Philes in these Greek verses Opos kathéude kai dokei palin blepein Ophis te kai ptox kaâ— thumou pleres león Epipetatai gar he chlamys ton ommaton Allou tinos Chitonos hapaloterou Phrorountos autois os dioptras task-óras Which may be Englished thus How can the Hare the Serpent and the Lion bold Both sleep and see together at one time Within their eye-lids a soft skin their sight doth fold Shilding their apples as glass doth weakened eyne The food of Serpents that is permitted them by God is the dust of the earth as may appear by that first and just sentence which GOD himself gave upon them for seducing our first Parents Ad 〈…〉 and Eve Gen. 3. 14. Because thou hast done this thing thou art accursed above all the Beasts of the field for thou shalt go upon thy belly and eat dust all the days of thy life And again Esay 65. 25. Dust shall be meâ—t to the Serpent And lest that we should think that this curse hath not taken hold upon the Serpent we may finde the
Cardamomum Galbanum Propolis which may be called Bee glew the herb called Horstrange Panax Opopanax Fleabane the shavings or serapings of the Cypresse or Cedar tree being steeped in Oyl the Jet-stone Sagapâ—num the herb called Poley Fern and all other things that have a strong or vehement ill savour being cast on the coals for a fumigation do with their vapour chase away venomous beasts For whereas all venomous Creatures have the passages or pores of their bodies very straight and narrow they are very easily filled and stuffed and are quickly stopped and suffocated by such like sents and smells Aetius in his thirteenth Book setteth down an excellent fume after this manner Take of Galbenum of Sandracha Butter and of Goats-fat of every one alike much make them into Pills and use them for a fumigation Nicander in Theriacis setteth down some for the same intentions in these Verses Cervinique gravi cornu nidore fugabis Et sic cum accendens Gagatae quandoque lapillum Quem consumentis non exedit impetus ignis Multifidam filicem crepitantibus injice flammis Aut imas viridis libanotidos accipe fibras Tantundemque acris nasturci his junge duobus Aequali capreae jam jactum pondere cornu Aut exiccantem nares cerebrumque nigelam Interdum Sulphur foedum quandoque Bâ—â—â—men Vt sumpta aequali pendantur singula parte Praeterea graveolens candentibus indita prunis Galbana ignitum faciens urtica dolorem Dentatisque cedrum maxillis sectile lignum Omnibus invisum Serpentibus eflat odorem In English thus By Hart-horn fume do Serpents slide away When stone Gagates burning's put thereto Which heat of fire doth not clean destroy Then in t ' those flames cast many-leaved Fern also Of green hogs-fennel take the lowest branches Of Nosewort sharp so much then to them joyn A like proportion of Roes horn in weight and kantches Or else Nigella drying nose and brain Or Brimstone called filthy Sulphure So all be equall in weight and parts to cure Besides Galbanum rank laid on burning coals Or nettles which do cause 〈…〉 ry pain And Cedar cut all burn'd bout Serpents holes Them overcome and make them flie amain The breath or vapour that issueth from Serpents is so pestilent that it killeth all young chickins as Columella saith and for preventing of this mischief it is good to burn Harts-horn Womens hair or Galbanum Vis mirificos cautus perdiscere odores Accensis quibus arcetur teterrima Serpens Aut Styracem uras aut atri vulturis alam Vel Nepetam aut frondem rigidae stirpemque myricae In English thus If thou wouldst learn what cdours for thy skill Were best to scare the Serpent fierce away Burn Styrax or black Vultures winged quill Or Neppe green leaves or stock of Tamarisk assay And Pliny and Sextus agreeing with him do say that if you burn the feathers of a Vultur all Serpents will quickly avoid the strong sent thereof There is a certain River in the Countreys of Media and Paeonia as Aristotle testifieth wherein there is a stone found with whose fume Serpents are chased away whose property is such that if any man cast water on it it will burn and burning if with any Fan you go about to make it to flame it is straightway quenched and thus being extinguished it sendeth forth a savour stronger then any Brimstone And to this subscribeth Nicander in these words Veltu Threicium flamma succende lapillum Quilicet irriguis mersus tamen ardet in undis Expressaque statim resting uitur unctus oliva Hanc quem fluctisoni mittant de littore P 〈…〉 i Qui rudevulgus ibi vescentes carne magistri Pascendi pecoris sua post armenta sequuntur In English thus Or take the Thracian stone which set on fire Will burn in water yet quenched is with Oyl This cast from Pontus shore Heard-men desire The better to feed their flocks and Serpents foyle The powder of a Cedar tree putteth to flight venomous Serpents as Virgil in the third of his Georgicks witnesseth Disce odoratum stabulis accendere Cedrum Galbaneoque agitare graves nidore chelydros Which may be Englished thus Learn how of Cedar fire in thy folds to make And with Galbanums savour put to flight the Snake Things that are strewed or said under us both in our houses and in high-wayes or beds will likewise defend and keep us from venomous creatures as for example Southernwood Dittander Flea-bane Calamint Gentian Hastula regia Sage Nightshade S. Johns wort called of some Fuga daemonum Marjoram Origan wilde Rue wilde Thyme Bay-leaves the shavings or tops of the Cypres or Cedar-tree Cardamomum Penyroyal Wormwood Mugwort Lysimachia called in English Loose-strife and Rosemary And if we cannot lie upon such a bed Tunc juxta virides sinuosi vorticis alveos Amnicolam nepetam per â—besas collige ripas Aut tibi costa salix pulchro quae flore renidet Praebeat instrata securum fronde grabatum Sic quoque montanum polium cujus grave spirans Horret odor nomenque suum qua debet echidnae Herba ab Euxina quae fertur origanus urbe Quaecunque illarum decerpitur obvia prodest Quin etiam multo per aprica cacumina flore Ridens abrotonus pecorique ingrata petitum Pabula serpyllum molli quod pascitur horto Praestat item exiguam circumlustrare conyzam Vrticeasque comas spinosas anagyros Sic punicea sectis ex arbore ramis Regalisque amplis licet hastae frondibus uti Accipe item innocuo medicantem frigore strumum Atque invisa pigris Scyra prima aestate bubulcis Nicander In English thus Then by the winding banks of crooked streams The Water-nep take up which under-foot is tread Or the chast Osier whose fair flower hath beams And leaves secure from Serpents make thy bed The Mountain Poley whose strong smelling breath The snakes abhor that which doth the hydra name The Origan which cometh from Euxinus earth Doprofit all gainst Serpent if you bear the same The smiling Southernwood which groweth on tops of hills Wilde Marjoram to beasts abhorred food Conyza strewed the haunt of Serpents spills The Nettle-crops thorny Anagres stay their mood So do Pomegranate branches cut from tree And the broad leaves of Kingly Hasta use Strume bealing strumes in harmless cold I see And Scyra which in Summer Neatheards do refuse In like sort to sprinckle the place with water where in Sal Ammoniaoum is dissolved driveth away Serpents as Avicen affirmeth If any one anoint himself either with Dears-sewet the fat of Elephants or Lions Serpents wil shun that person and there be some as Pliny saith that for fear of Serpents do anoint their bodies with the seeds of Juniper The juyce of the black Vine extracted from the root and anointed on the body performeth the like For preservation from Serpents Nicander compoundeth this ointment Take two Vipers about the end of Spring time Deer-sewet thirty drams Vngenti rosati
The tail exceeding long far exceeding the quantity and proportion of his body being marked all over with certain white and yellowish spots The skin all covered with an equal smooth and fine coloured scale which in the midst of the belly are white and greater then in other parts It can abide no water for a little poured into the mouth killed it and after it had been two or three days dead being brought to the fire it moved and stirred again faintly even as things do that lye a dying It is not venomous nor hurtful to eat and therefore is digged out of his cave by any body safely without danger Of the CROCODILE of the Earth called Scincus a Scink THere have been some that have reckoned Scinks and Lizards among Worms but as the Greek words Expeix and Scolex differ in most apparent dialect and signification and therefore it is an opinion not worth the confuting for there are no Worms of this quantity But for the better explication of the nature of this Beast because some have taken it for one kinde and some for another some for a Crocodile and others for a Beast like a Crocodile we are to know that there are three kindes of Crocodiles the first is a water Beast or Serpent and vulgarly termed a Crocodile the second is a Scink or a Crocodile of the earth which is in all parts like that of the water except in his colour and thicknesse of his skin the third kinde of Crocodile is unknown to us at this day yet Pliny and others make mention of it and describe it to be a beast having his scales like a Gorgon growing or turning to his head from the tail and not as others do from the head to the tail The Grecians call this Beast Skigkot and some unlearned Apothecaries Stincus and Myrepsus Sigk. It is also called Kikaeros and the Hebrew Koach doth more properly signifie this Beast then any other Crocodile or Chamaeleon or Lizard Some of the Hebriws do expound Zab for a Scink and from thence the Chaldees and the Arabians have their Deo and Aldab turning Z into D So we read Guaril and Adhaya for a Scink or Crocodile of the earth Alarbian is also for the same Serpent among the Arabians Balecola and Ballâ—â—arâ— Sehanchur and Asehanchur and Askincor and Scerantum and Nudalep and Nudalepi are all of them Synonymaes or rather corrupted words for this Crocodile of the earth But there are at this day certain Ps 〈…〉 scink set out to be seen and sold by Apothecaries that are nothing else but a kinde of water Lizard but the true difference is betwixt them that these water Lizards are venomous but this is not and neither living in the Northern parts of the world nor yet in the water and so much shall suffice for the name and first entrance into this Serpents History They are brought out of the Eastern Countries or out of Egypt yet the Monks of Mesuen affirm that they had seen Scinks or Crocodiles of the earth about Rome Sylvaticus and Platearius in Apulia But howsoever their affections may lead them to conjecture of this Serpent I rather believe that it is an African beast and seldom found in Asia or Europe They love the banks of Nilus although they dare not enter the water and for this cause some have thought but untruly that when the Crocodile layeth her egges in the water the young is there also engendered and hatched and is a Crocodile of the water but if they lay their egges on the dry land from thence cometh the Scink or Crocodile of the earth This folly is evidently refuted because that they never say egs in the but all upon the dry land They are found as I have said before in Egypt and also in Africk and among the Lydians of Mauritania otherwise called Lodya or rather Lybia among the Pastoral or Plow-men Africans among the Arabians and neer the Red-sea for all those at this day sold at Venice are brought from those parts The greatest in the world are in India as Cardan teacheth who are in all things like Lizards saving in their excrements which smell or savour more strongly and generally the difference of their quantity ariseth from the countrey which they inhabit for in the hotter and moister countrey they are greater in the hotter dryer Region they are smaller and generally they exceed not two or three cubits in length with an answerable proportionable body which is thus described There be certain crosse lines which come along the back one by one somewhat white and of a dusky colour and those that be dusky have also in them some white spots The upper part of the neck is very dusky the head and the tail are more white the feet and all the neather part of the breast and belly are white with appearance upon them of some scales or rather the skin figured in the proportion of scales upon either feet they have five distinct fingers or claws the length of their legs is a thumb and a half that is three inches the tail two fingers long the body six so that the whole length from the head to the tip of the tail which is first thick and then very small at the end is about eight fingers When they have taken them they bowel them and fill their bodies with Sugar and Silk of Wooll and so they sell them for a reasonable price That which I have written of their length of eight fingers is not so to be understood as though they never exceeded or came short of that proportion for sometimes they are brought into these parts of the World twenty or four and twenty fingers long sometimes again not above five or six fingers long When they lay their Egges they commit them to the earth even as the Crocodiles of the water do They live upon the most odoriferous flowers and therefore is his flesh so sweet and his dung or excrements odoriferous They are enemies to Bees and live much about Hives insomuch as some have thought they did lay their Egges in Hives and there hatch their young ones But the occasion of this error was that they saw young ones brought by their parents into some Hive to feed upon the labouring Bee For the compassing of their desire they make meal of any tree which they have ground in the Mill of their own mouths and that they mix with black Hellebore juyce or with the liquor of Mallows this meal so tempered they lay before the Hives whereof assoon as the Bees tast they die and then cometh the Crocodile with her young ones and lick them up and beside Bees I do not read they are hurtful to any The Indians have a little Beast about the quantity of a little Dog which they call Phattage very like to a Scink or Crocodile of the earth having sharp scales as cutting as a saw There is some hurt by this beast unto men for which cause I may justly reckon
further that at such time as the Millet-seed groweth and flourisheth this Serpent is most strong and hurtful and so with the residue he agreeth with Aelianus but herein he is also deceived writing by hear-say as himself confesseth and therefore it is more safe for us to have recourse to some eye-witnesse for the description of this Serpent then to stand upon the opinions of them which write by the relation of others Bellonius faith that he saw one of these in Rhodes being full of small round black spots not greater then the seeds of Lentiles every one having a round circle about him like an eye after such a fashion as is to be seen in the little Fish called the Torpedo In length it exceedeth not three palms and in bignesse no greater then the little finger It was of an Ash-colour coming neer to the whitenesse of milk but under the belly it was altogether white upon the back it had scales but upon the belly a thin skin as in all other Serpents The upper part of the back was somewhat black having two black lines in the middle which begin at the head and so are drawn along the whole body to the tail As for the Cafezati and Alteratati or Altinatyri those are red Serpents as Avicen saith which are but small in quantity yet as deep and deadly in poyson as in any other for they hurt in the same manner that these Darts do Some of them do so wound with their poyson as the afflicted person dyeth incontinent without sense or pain Some again die by languishing pain after many hopes of recovery losing life Among all the people of the World the Sabeans are most annoyed with this kinde of red Serpents for they have many odoriferous and sweet smelling Woods in the which these Serpents do abound but such is their rage and hatred against men that they leap upon them and wound them deadly whensoever they come within their compasse And surely if it be lawful to conjecture what kinde of Serpents those were which in the Scripture are called fiery Serpents and did sting the Israelites to death in the Wildernesse until the Brazen Serpent was erected for their cure among all the Serpents in the world that kinde of pain and death can be ascribed to none more properly then to these Cafezati or Red-dart-serpents For first the Wildernesse which was the place wherein they annoyed the people doth very well agree to their habitation Secondly those fiery Serpents are so called by figure not that they were fiery but as all Writers do agree either because they were red like fire or else because the pain which they inflicted did burn like fire or rather for both these causes together which are joyntly and severally found in these red Serpents and therefore I will conclude for my opinion that these Serpents as the highest poyson in nature were sent by GOD to afflict the sinning Israelites whose poyson was uncurable except by Divine miracle Mâ—â—thiâ—lus also telleth a story of a Shepheard which was slain in Italy by one of these as he was sleeping in the heat of the day under the shadow of a tree his fellow Shepheards being not far off looking to their flocks suddenly there came one of these Dart-serpents out of the tree and wounded him upon his left pap at the biting whereof the man awaked and cryed out and so dyed incontinently his fellow Shepheards hearing this noise came unto him to see what he ailed and found him dead with a Serpent upon his breast now knowing what kinde of Serpent this was they forsook their flocks and ran away for fear The cure of this Serpents biting if there be any at all is the same which cureth the Vipers as Aetius and Avicen writeth and therefore I will not relate it in this place The gall of this Beast mixed with the Scythian Stone yeeldeth a very good Eye-salve The which gall lyeth betwixt the back and the liver And thus much shall suffice for this Serpent Of the DIPSAS THis Dipsas hath many names from many occasions First Dipsas in Greek signifieth thirst as Sitis doth in Latine and thereof also it is called Situla because whosoever is wounded by this Serpent dyeth It is also called by some Prester and by some Causon because it setteth the whole body on fire but we shall shew afterwards that the Prester is a different Serpent from this It is called likewise Melanurus because of his black tail and Ammoatis because it lyeth in the sand and there hurteth a man It is not therefore unfitly defined by Avicen to be Vipera sitim faciens that is A Viper causing thirst and therefore Ovid sporting at an old drunken woman named Lena calleth her Dipsas in these verses Est quaedam nomine Dipsas anus Ex re noniex habet nigri non illa parentem Memnonis in roseis sobria vidit equis In English thus There is a woman old which Dipsas may be hight And not without some cause thirsty she ever is For never Memnons sire all black and seldom bright Did she in water sweet behold in sobernesse They live for the most part neer the waters and in salt marishy places whereupon Lucan said Stant in margine siccae Aspides mediis sitiebant Dipsades undis That is to say Vpon pits brink dry Aspes there stood And Dipsads thirst in midst of water floâ—d It is called Torrida Dipsat and Arida Dipsas because of the perpetual thirst and therefore the Egyptians when they will signifie thirst do picture a Dipsas whereupon Lucianus relateth this story there is saith he a statue or monument upon a Grave right over against the great Syrtes betwixt Sillya and Egypt with this Epigram Talia passus erat quoque Tantalus Aethiope ortus Qui nullo potuit fonte levare sitim Tale nec è Danao natas implere puellas Assiduis undis vas potuisse reor That is to say Such Tantalus indured in Aethiope bred Which never could by water quench his thirst Nor could the Grecian Maids with water sped That with dayly pourings till the vessel curst The statue was the picture of a man like unto Tantalus standing in the midst of a water ready to drink by drawing in of the water about whose foot was folded a Dipsas close by stood certain women bringing water and pouring it into him to make it run into his mouth besides there were certain Egges as it were of Estriches lay pictured beside them such as the Garamants in Lybia seek after For it is reported by Lucianus that the people of that Countrey do earnestly seek after the Estriches Egges upon the sands not only to eat the meat that is in them but also to make sundry vessels or instruments of the shell and among other things they make Caps of them Near unto these Egges do these treacherous Serpents lie in wait and so while the poor Countrey man cometh to seek for meat suddenly he leapeth upon him and giveth him
wherein they say is the picture of a Toad with her legs spread before and behinde And it is further affirmed that if both these stones be held in ones hand in the presence of poyson it will burn him The probation of this stone is by laying of it to a live Toad and if she lift up her head against it it is good but if she run away from it it is a counterfeit Geor. Agricola calleth the greater kinde of these stones Brontia and the lesser and smoother sort of stones Ceraunie although some contrary this opinion saying that these stones Brantia and Ceraunia are bred on the earth by thundering and lightning Whereas it is said before that the generation of this stone in the Toad proceedeth of cold that is utterly unpossible for it is described to be so solid and firm as nothing can be more hard and therefore I cannot assent unto that opinion for unto hard and solid things is required abundance of heat and again it is unlikely that whatsoever this Toad-stone be that there should be any store of them in the world as are every where visible if they were to be taken out of the Toads alive and therefore I rather agree with Salveldensis a Spaniard who thinketh that it is begotten by a certain viscous spume breathed out upon the head of some Toad by her fellows in the Spring time This stone is that which in ancient time was called Batrachites and they attribute unto it a vertue besides the former namely for the breaking of the stone in the Bladder and against the Falling-sicknesse And they further write that it is a discoverer of present poyson for in the presence of poyson it will change the colour And this is the substance of that which is written about this stone Now for my part I dare not conclude either with it or against it for Hermolaus Massarius Albertus Sylvaticus and others are directly for this stone ingendered in the brain or head of the Toad on the other side Cardan and Cesner confesse such a stone by name and nature but they make doubt of the generation of it as others have delivered and therefore they being in sundry opinions the hearing whereof might confound the Reader I will refer him for his satisfaction unto a Toad which he may easily every day kill For although when the Toad is dead the vertue thereof be lost which consisted in the eye or blew spot in the middle yet the substance remaineth and if the stone be found there in substance then is the question at an end but if it be not then must the generation of it be sought for in some other place Thus leaving the stone of the Toad we must proceed to the other parts of the story and first of all their place of habitation which for them of the water is neer the water-side and for them of the earth in bushes hedges rocks and holes of the earth never coming abroad while the Sun shineth for they hate the Sun-shine and their nature cannot endure it for which cause they keep close in their holes in the day time and in the night they come abroad Yet sometimes in rainy weather and in solitary places they come abroad in the day time All the Winter time they live under the earth feeding upon earth herbs and worms and it is said they eat earth by measure for they eat so much every day as they can gripe in their fore-foot as it were sizing themselves lest the whole earth should not serve them till the Spring Resembling herein great rich covetous men who ever spare to spend for fear they shall want before they die And for this cause in ancient time the wise Painters of Germany did picture a woman sitting upon a Toad to signifie covetousnesse They also love to eat Sage and yet the root of Sage is to them deadly poyson They destroy Bees without all danger to themselves for they will creep to the holes of their Hives and there blow in upon the Bees by which breath they draw them out of the Hive and so destroy them as they come out for this cause also at the Water-side they lie in wait to catch them When they come to drink in the day time they see little or nothing but in the night time they see perfectly and therefore they come then abroad About their generation there are many worthy observations in nature sometimes they are bred out of the putrefaction and corruption of the earth it hath also been seen that out of the ashes of a Toad burnt not only one but many Toads have been regenerated the year following In the New-world there is a Province called Dariene the air whereof is wonderful unwholesome because all the Countrey standeth upon rotten marishes It is there observed that when the slaves or servants water the pavements of the dores from the drops of water which fall on the right hand are instantly many Toads ingendered as in other places such drops of water are turned into Gnats It hath also been seen that women conceiving with childe have likewise conceived at the same time a Frog or a Toad or a Lizard and therefore Platearius saith that those things which are medicines to provoke the menstruous course of women do also bring forth the Secondines And some have called Bufonem fratrem Salernitanorum lacertam fratrem Lombardorum that is a Toad the Brother of the Salernitâ—ns and the Lizard the Brother of the Lombards for it hath been seen that a woman of Salernum hath at one time brought forth a Boy and a Toad and therefore he calleth the Toad his Brother so likewise a woman of Lombardy a Lizard and therefove he calleth the Lizard the Lombards Brother And for this cause the women of those Countries at such time as their childe beginneth to quicken in their womb do drink the juyce of Parsley and Leeks to kill such conceptions if any be There was a woman newly marryed and when in the opinion of all she was with childe in stead of a childe she brought forth four little living creatures like Frogs yet she remained in good health but a little while after she felt some pain about the rim of her belly which afterward was eased by applying a few remedies Also there was another woman which together with a Man-childe in her Secondines did bring forth such another Beast and after that a Merchants wife did the like in Aneonitum But what should be the reason of these so strange and unnatural conceptions I will not take upon me to decide in nature lest the Omnipotent hand of God should be wronged and his most secret and just counsel presumptuously judged and called into question This we know that it was prophesied in the Revelation that Frogs and Locusts should come out of the Whore of Babylon and the bottomlesse pit and therefore seeing the seat of the Whore of Babylon is in Italy it may be that God would have manifested
ditches and other simple medicines such as are applyed to the curing of the Yellow-jaundise The eyes must be washed with the urine of a childe or young man which never knew any woman carnally and this may be applyed either simply and alone or else by Brine and Pickle so also must the head After that the body is purged anoint it with Balsamum and Honey and take an Eye-salve to sharpen again and recover the sight and for this cause it is very good to weep for by evacuation of tears the venom also will be expelled But if the eyes grow to pain then let their Eye-salve be made more temperate and gentle to keep the head and brain from stupefaction And thus much for the Pelias out of Aetius Of the PORPHYRE THere is among the Indians a Serpent about the bignesse of a span or more which in outward aspect is like to the most beautiful and well coloured Purple the head hereof is exceeding white and it wanteth teeth This Serpent is fought for in the highest Mountains for out of him they take the Sardius stone And although he cannot bite because he wanteth teeth yet in his rage when he is persecuted he casteth forth a certain poyson by vomit which causeth putrefaction where ever it lighteth But if it be taken alive and be hanged up by the tail it rendereth a double one whiles it is alive the other when it is dead both of them black in colour but the first resembleth black Amber And if a man take but so much of the first black venom as is the quantity of a Sesamine seed it killeth him presently making his brains to fall out at his nostrils but the other worketh neither so speedily nor after the same manner for it casteth one into a Consumption and killeth within the compasse of a year But I finde Aelianus Volateran and Textor to differ from this relation of Ctesias for they say that the first poyson is like to the drops of Almond trees which are congealed into a gum and the other which cometh from it when he is dead is like to thin mattery water Unto this Porphyre I may add the Palmer Serpent which Strabo writeth doth kill with an unrecoverable poyson and it is also of a Scarlet colour to the loyns or hinder-parts Of the PRESTER ALthough there be many Writers which confound together the Prester the Dipsas and make of them but one kinde or Serpent of divers names yet seeing on the contrary there he as many or more which do distinguish or divide them and make them two in nature different one from another the Dipsas killing by thirst and the Prester by heat as their very names do signifie therefore I will also trace the steps of this latter opinion as of that which is more probable and consonant to truth The Grecians call it Prester of Prethein which signifieth to burn or inflame and Tremellius and Junius think that the Serpents called fiery Serpents which did sting the Israelitos in the Wildernesse were Presters We finde in Suidas Prester for the fire of Heaven or for a cloud of fire carryed about with a vehement strong winde and sometimes lightenings And it seemeth that this is indeed a fiery kinde of Serpent for he himself always goeth about with open mouth panting and breathing as the Poet writeth Oraque distendens avidus fumantia Prester Inficil ut laesus tumida membra gorat Which may be Englished thus The greedy Presters wide-open foming mouth Infects and swelleth making the members by unâ—outh When this Serpent hath struck or wounded there followeth an immeasurable swelling distraction conversion of the bloud to matter and corrupt inflamation taking away freedom or easinesse of aspiration likewise dimming the sight of making the hair to fall off from the head at last suffocation as it wereby fire which is thus described by Mantuan upon the person of one Narsidus saying as followeth Ecce subit facies leto diversa fluenti Narsidium Marsi cultorem torridus agri Percussit prester illi rubor igneus ora Succendii tenditque cutem pereunte figura Misoens ouncta tumor toto jam corpore major Humanumque egressa modum super omnia membra Efflatur Sanies latè tollente veneno Ipse late penitus congesto corpore mersus Nec lorica tenet distenti corporis auctum Spumeus accenso non sic exundat aheno Vndarum cumulus nec tanto carbasa Core Curvavere sinus tumides j am non capit artus Informis globus confuso pondere triâ—â—â— Intactum voluctum rostris epulasque duturum Haud impune feris non aufi tradere busto Nondum siante modo crescens fugere cadaver Which may be thus Englished Lo suddenly a divers fate the joyful current stayed Narsidius which Marsinus mirror did adere By burning sting of scorching Prester dead was layed For fiery colour his face enflam'd not as before The first appearing visage faild all was out-stretcht Swelling cover'd all and bodies grosnesse doubled Surpassing humane bounds and members all ore reacht Aspiring venom spreads matter blown in carkasse troubled The man lyeth drownd within swoln bodies banks No girdle can his monstrous growth contain Not so are waters swoln with rage of sandy flanks Nor sails bend down to blustering Corus wain Now can it not the swelling sinews keep in hold Deformed globe it is and trunk ore-come with waight Vntoucht of flying Fowls no beaks of young or old Do him dare eat or beasts full wilde upon the body bait But that they die No man to â—ury in earth or fire Durst once come nigh nor stand to look upon that haplesse cste For never ceased the heat of corps though dead to swell Therefore afraid they ran away with speedy pace The cure of the poyson of this Serpent is by the Physitians found out to be wilde Purslain also the flowers and stalk of the bush the Beavers stone called Castoreum drunk with Opoponax and Rew in Wine and the little Sprat-fish in diet And thus much of this fire-burning venomous Serpent Of the RED SERPENT THis kinde of Serpent being a Serpent of the Sea was first of all found out by Pelicerius Bishop of Montpelier as Rondoletus writeth and although some have taken the same for the Myrus or Berus of which we have spoken already yet is it manifest that they are deceived for it hath gills covered with a bony covering and also fins to swim withal much greater then those of the Myrus which we have shewed already to be the male Lamprey This Serpent therefore for the outward proportion thereof is like to the Serpents of the land but of a red or purplish colour being full of crooked or oblique lines descending from the back to the belly and dividing or breaking that long line of the back which beginneth at the head and so stretcheth forth to the tail The opening of his mouth is not very great his teeth are very sharp and like a saw his gils like scaly fishes
that in Italy in his dayes there was a man that had a Scorpion bred in his brain by continuall smelling to this herb Basill and Gesner by relation of an Apothecary in France writeth likewise a story of a young maid who by smelling to Basill fell into an exceeding head-ache whereof she dyed without cure and after her death being opened there were found little Scorpions in her brain Aristotle remembreth an herb which he calleth Sissimbria out of which putrefied Scorpions are engendred as he writeth And we have shewed already in the history of the Crocodile that out of the Crocodiles egges do many times come Scorpions which at their first egression do kill their Dam that hatched them which caused Archelaus which wrote Epigrams of wonders unto Ptolemaeus to sing of Scorpions in this manner In vos dissolvit morte redigit Crocâ—dilum Natura extinctum Scorpii omnipotens Which may be Englished thus To you by Scorpions death the omnipotent Ruines the Crocodil in natures life extinct And thus much for the generation of Scorpions out of putrefaction Now we will proceed to the second manner of their generation which is by propagation of seed for although Ponzettus make some question about their copulation yet he himself inclineth to that opinion as neerer unto truth which attributeth carnall copulation unto them and therefore he alledgeth the example of flies which admit copulation although they engender not thereby Wherefore we will take it for granted that Scorpions lay egges after copulation which hapneth both in the Spring and Autumne And these are for the most part in number eleven upon which they sit and hatch their young ones and when once they are perfected within those egges which are in sight like the little worms out of which Spyders are engendred then do they break their egges and drive the young out For as Isidorus writeth otherwise the old should be destroyed of the young even as are the Crocodiles Some again say that the old Scorpions do devour their young ones Being thus produced by generation they live upon the earth and those which are bred of the Sea-crab do feed upon the foam of the Sea-water and a continuall white mould or chalk neer the Sea But the Scorpions of Aethiopia do eat all kinde of worms flyes and small Serpents Yea those Serpents whose very dung being troden upon by man bringeth exulcerations And a tryall that Scorpions eat flies was made by Wolphius at Montpelier for having a young one in a boxe for one whole moneth together it lived upon flies and grew by the devouring of them bigger being put into the Glasse unto him They live among tiles and bricks very willingly and for this cause they abound in Rome in the hill called Testaceus They are also in Bononia found in the walls of old houses betwixt the stones and the morter They love also clean clothes as we have said already and yet they abhorre all places whereon the Sun shineth And it seemeth that the Sun is utterly against their nature for the same Scorpion which Wolphius had at Montpeller lived in the Glasse untill one day he set it in the Sun and then presently after it dyed To conclude they love hollow places of the earth neer gutters and sometimes they creep into mens beds where unawares they do much harm and for this cause the Lybians who among other Nations are most of all troubled with Scorpions do use to set their beds far from any wall and very high also from the floor to keep the Scorpions from ascending up into them And yet fearing all devises should be too little to secure them against this evil they also set the feet of their beds â—n vessels of water that so the Scorpion may not attempt so much as to climbe up unto them for fear of drowning And also for their further safeguard they were socks and hose in their beds so thick as the Scorpion cannot easily sting through them And if the bed be so placed that they cannot get any hold thereof beneath then they climbe up to the sieling or cover of the house and if there they finde any hold for their pinching legs to apprehend and fasten upon then in their hatred to man-kinde they use this policy to come unto him First one of them as I have said taketh hold upon that place in the house or sieling over the bed wherein they finde the man asleep and so hangeth thereby putting out and stretching his sting to hurt him but finding it too short and not being able to reach him he suffereth another of his fellowes to come and hang as fast by him as he doth upon his hold and so that second giveth the wound and if that second be not able likewise because of the distance to come at the man then they both admit a third to hang upon them and so a fourth upon the third and a fifth upon the fourth untill they have made themselves like a chain to descend from the top to the bed wherein the man sleepeth and the last striketh him after which stroke he first of all runneth away by the back of his fellow and every one again in order till all of them have withdrawn themselves By this may be collected the crafty disposition of this Scorpion and the great subtilty and malice that it is endued withall in nature and seeing they can thus accord together in harming a man it argueth their great mutuall love and concord one with another wherefore I cannot but marvell at them who have written that the old ones destroy the young all but one which they set upon their own buttocks that so the Dam may be secured from the sting and bitings of her son For seeing they can thus hang upon one another without harm favouring their own kinde I see no cause but that nature hath grafted much more love betwixt the old and the young ones so as neither the old do first destroy the young nor afterward that young one preserved in revenge of his fellowes quarrell killeth his Parents It is reported by Aristotle that there is a hill in Caria wherein the Scorpions do never sting any strangers that lodge there but only the naturall born people of that Countrey And hereunto Pliny and Aelianus seem to subscribe when they write that Scorpiones extraneos leniter mordere that is Scorpions bite strangers but gently And hereby it may be collected that they are also by nature very sagacious and can discern betwixt nature and nature yea the particular differences in one and the same nature To conclude Scorpions have no power to hurt where there is no bloud The naturall amity and enmity they observe with other creatures commeth now to be handled and I finde that it wanteth not adversaries nor it again hath no defect of poyson or malice to make resistance and opposition and to take vengeance on such as it meeteth withall The principall of all other subjects
showres and very much rain a thing fatall to Islands do yeeld such extraordinary pure honey that it hath not the least mixture of venome and doth last a long time before it be corrupted or putrified that we do not speak of its excellent whiteness hardness sweetness hanging well together viscosity and ponderousness and other principal signs of the goodness of it But let us leave off to commend our own Countrey wherein good is to be found and set forth those Countreys which are infamous for the badness of it For the extreme bitterness the Cholchian honey and next the Corsican and in some places the Hungarian and the Sardinian hath an ill name For in Sardinia Wormwood in Corsica Rose-lawrel in Colâ—his the venomous Yew and all of them in Hungary Also the honey is venomous in Heraclea of Pontus and in the flowers of Goats-bane fading with the wetness of the spring for then the flowers contract that hurtfull venome which doth presently infect the honey-dew that falls upon them There is also another kinde of pernicious honey made which from the madness that it causeth is termed Mad-honey which Pliny conceiveth to be contracted from the flower of a certain shrub very frequently growing there in the woods Dioscorides and Aetius do not amiss impute this poyson to be caused of great plenty of the venomous herb called Libbardsbane or Wolf-wort which groweth there in that it is cured with the very same remedies as the venome of that herb is In Carina Persis Mauritania and Getulia bordering to Massesulia either by reason of vapours of the earth or by reason of the virulent and poysonous juice of the plants poysoned honey-combs are produced but are descried by their duskie or blackish colour In Trapezuntum in the Countrey of Pontus Pliny reports of a certain honey that is gathered of the flowers of the Box-tree which as it doth make those that are well sick with the noysome smell of it so those that are not well it restores to health On the trees of the Heptocometanes a people near unto Cholchis there growes a kinde of infectious honey The which poyson being drank makes men stupid and out of their wits This was sent by the enemy to the three Legions of Pompey with a token for the desire of peace they drinking very freely of it were put both besides their wits and their lives too as Strabo saith Ovid makes mention of the Corsick honey very infamous being extracted from the flower of Hemlock speaking thus I think it 's Corsick Honey and the Bee From the cold Hemlocks flowers gathered thee But yet it may seem to be not so much for Dame Natureâ— honour that she should bring forth a thing so desired of all men as honey is and so ordinarily to temper it with poyson Nay but in so doing she did not amiss so to permit it to be that thereby she might make men more cautious and lesse greedy and to excite them not only to use that which should be wholesome but to seek out for Antidotes against the unwholsomeness of it And for that cause she hath hedged the Rose about with prickles given the Bees a sting hath infected the Sage with Toad-spittle mixed poyson and that very deadly too with Honey Sugar and Manna The signs of poysoned honey are these it staines the honey-comb with a kinde of Lead-colour doth not become thick it looks of a bright shining glistering hew sharp or bitter in taste and hath a strange and 〈…〉 th smell it is far more ponderous then the other as soon as it is taken it causeth neâ—sing and a loosness of the belly accompanied with excess of sweating They which have drunk it dâ— tumble themselves up and down upon the cold earth very desirous of refrigeration The 〈◊〉 poy 〈…〉 honey hath the same symptomes with the poyson of Wolfâ—â—ane and hath the same way of cure Galen reports that two Physicians in Rome tasted but a very small quantity of poysoned honey and fell down dead in the open Market-place Against madness from eating honey Dioscorides prescribes Rue to be eaten and salt fish and honey and water to be drank but being taken they must be vomited up again and he prescribes the same remedie against this disease as he doth against Wolfs-bane and Rose-lawrel and Pliny agrees with him also he adds one singular antidote to eat a fish called a Gilt-head which also wonderfully corrects the loathing of good honey Gulielmus Placontia bids to cause vomit abundantly with syrup of Violets acetosus simplex and warm water eating salt fish before vo-miting Afterwards he gives Theriac with hot vinegar Christophanus de honest is perswades vo-miting and to set cold water under the nosthrils with the flowers of Violets Water-lillies and Fleawort But his Bezoar stone are Quince kernels bruised and given with hot water as Sanctus Ardoinas relates Avicenna hath prescribed nothing worth speaking of but what he had from others for I understand not what he means by his Aumeli But what if I a youth and an English man after so many grave and experienced Physicians should asseâ—t this for a certain Antidote viz. to take nothing down but the Bees themselves The likelyhood of the conjecture doth perswade and reason it self doth somewhat seem to favour it For unless that Dame Nature had given to these Bees a very marvellous power against poysoned honey as amongst men to the Psilli against Serpents to Storks and Peacocks amongst the Birds without all doubt with gathering of it swallowing of it and for some time keeping of it in their bodies yea concocting of it there they would be grievously pained and the poyson running and dispersing it self through all the parts would kill them Now the Terrestrial honey although it be not alwaies poysonous yet by reason of the blackness and clamminess of it 't is not much to be commended also it is often found to be subject to be infected by the venomous breath of Serpents Toads red Toads and therefore is carefully to be avoided Now let us come to the Qualities of Honey whereof some are first or primary others derived from them some formal some specifical which we deservedly call Energetical or operative In respect of the first Crasis or temper Honey is thought to be hot and dry in the second degree for which cause Galen did forbid those that are in Hectick Feavers and in all Feavers young men or those that have the yellow Jaundies to use it whereas in cold distempers he doth very much commend it and did prescribe it to those that were troubled with a raw and watry stomach whom if you gently anoint therewith it doth very much nourish and causeth a good colour and constitution of body If you desire to know the second qualities of honey viz. the smelling tasting visible tactile the best honey ought not to have the eminent quality of any herb or other thing whatsoever and therefore the honey that doth strongly smell of
will stand to the judgement of Hippocrates that women are more â—ot than men but if they be not so yet it must needs be acknowledged that the female Grashoppers are more hot than the male because under the midriffe they are not so divided but the males in that place were it not for that little membrane to hinder they might easily be blown through Nature certainly intended by denying a voice to the females of these Grashoppers to teach our women that lesson 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 what ornament silence brings to the female sex They begin first of all to sing about the latter end of the Spring the Sun being 〈◊〉 past the Meridian and perchance in hotter Countreys sooner where quickseâ—s or thickeâ—s are 〈◊〉 rare there they live more happily and sing more willingly For they are of all creatures the least melancholy and for that reason they do affect not only green and pleasant 〈…〉 es but 〈…〉 on and open fields Yea they are not to be found in those places where there are no trees at all nor where there are too many and too shady Hence it comes to passe saâ—tâ— Arist that aâ— Cyrene in none of the fields there is there any Grashoppers to be found whereas near the Town they are frequently heard They shun also cold places indeed they cannot live in them They love the Olive tree because of the thinness of the bough and narrowness of the leaves whereby they are lesse shady They never alter their place as neither doth the Stork or at least very seldome or if they do they are ever after silent they sing no more so much doth the love of their native soyl prevail with them In the Countrey of Miletus saith Pliny they are seldome seen In the Island Cepholenia there runs a River on the one side whereof there is plenty of them on the other in a manner none that which I should take to be the cause is either the want of trees or the too much abundance or else a certain natural antipathy of the soyl as Ireland neither brings forth not breeds any venomous creature for the same reasons they do not fancy the Kingdome of Naples although Niphus relates that to be done by the enchantment of one Maro Timaeus that writeth the History of Sicily reports that in the Countrey of Locris on the hither side of the River Helicis they are marvellous loud on the other side toward the city of Rhegium there is scarce one to be heard they are not therefore silent because Hercules prayed against them for disturbing him of his sleep as Solinus fabulously relates but because they are more merry and jocond at home as the Cock is whence it is that the Locrian Grashoppers will not sing at Rhegium nor theirs on the contrary near Locris and yet there is but a small river runs between them such a one as one may cast a stone over Much certainly doth their Countrey which comprehends in it all the love that may be move them where like the people of the Jewes they refuse to sing their native Songs in a strange Countrey who being cast out of their own habitation seek means to die rather than waies to live so prodigal seem they of their short life and desirous after their native dwelling They do so affect the company of men that unless they see fields full of Mowers or harvest folk and the waies with passengers they sing very low and seldome or silently and to themselves But if once they hear the reapers making merry talking and singing which is commonly at noon then they sing so loud as if they strove who should sing loudest together with them Wherefore not undeservedly was the Parasice in Athenaeus called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 who being naturally obstemious by nature yet was so full of talk as if he strove that no body should be heard at the table but he Socrates in his Phaedro recites the History of the Grashoppers very wittily warning men not to sleep in the heat of the day lest the Grashoppers mock them for the Poets report how their diligence was highly rewarded For they â—ay that the Grashoppers before the Muses were were men who afterwards when the Muses came taught them to sing but some of them were so delighted with musick and singing that altogether neglecting their meat and drink inconsiderately they perished the which afterwards being turned into Grashoppers the Muses gave them that for a reward that they should be able to live even in the heat of the day without meat or drink neither to have any need of bloud or moisture They couple and generate with creatures of the same kinde as Aristotle tels us and the male casts his seed into the female which she accordingly receives they bring forth in fallow grounds hollowing it with that sharp picked hollow part of their tail as the Bruchus doth and therefore there is great plenty of Grashoppers in the Countrey of Cyrene Also in reeds wherewith the vines are propped they make hollow a place for their nest and sometimes they breed in the stalk of the herb Squilla but this brood soon fals to the ground This is also worth the notice which Hugo Solerius writing upon Aetius affirmeth that the Grashoppers dye with bringing forth the ventricle of the female being rent asunder in the birth the which some being very much deceived therein do report of the Viper the which I exceedingly marvel at For they lay white eggs and do not bring forth a living creature as the field mouse doth unless it be by reason of weakness of the egge comes a little worm of that comes a creature like to the Aurelia of the Butterfly which is called Tettigometra at what time they are very delicate meat to be eaten before the shell be broken afterwards about the Solstices in the night come forth of that matrix the Grashoppers all black hard and somewhat big When they are thus got out those that are for the quicksets betake themselves thither those that live amongst the corn go and sit upon that at their departue they leave behinde them a little kinde of moisture not long after they are able to take wing and they begin to sing That therefore which Solerius feigneth concerning the bursting of the womb of the mother I should conceive to be understood of the matrixes A certain woman did bring up some young Grashoppers for her delight sake and to hear them sing which became with young without the help of the male if we may believe Arist 1. l. de hist anim but since he hath told us that all the females of Grashoppers are mute by nature and this spontaneous impregnation is far from truth either the woman deceived Aristotle or he us There is another kinde of Generation of Grashoppers that we read of For if clay be not dug up in due time it will breed Grashoppers so saith Paracelsus and before him Hesychius For this cause Plato saith
I thought good to write these histories out of Pennius A woman thirty six years old had great pain of an Apostume in her reins and she consumed at length she cast forth little Worms a fingers breadth long which I first saw in the bottome of her urine Anno 1582. Randulph a London Physician very learned and pious when he looked on at the dissection of the body of one that was dead of the Stone in the kidneys he sound in one of the kidneys that was corrupted it was wrinkled and putrefied a Worm of a full length Timothy Bright a very skilful Physician and to whom we are much indebted for the Epitomie of the Ecclesiastical History saw a Scholar at Cambridge when he lived there that pissed out a Worm an inch and half long but it was not without feet as Worms are but it had many feet and was very nimble Aloysius Mundella Medicina Dialog 4. Argenterius cap. de vesic morb Rondeletius lib. de dign morb c. 17. Scholiastes Hollerii lib. de morb in t cap. de vesic affec to say nothing of Levinus Cardan and my own experience do sufficiently testifie that such Creatures breed also in the bladder That Worms come forth of the matrix like to Ascarides I did not only see at Frankfurt in a German woman at eighty years of her age but Aloysius confirms the same in his Epistle to Gesner and Hippocrates 2. de m. mulier and Avenzoar lib. 1. tract 2. have said the like Kiranides writes that there is a Worm to be found in the matrix of a Mule which tied to a woman will make her barren In India and the Countreys above Egypt there are some living Creatures like to Worms in form they are commonly called Dragons they are in the Arms Legs Shanks and other brawny parts also in young children they breed in secret places under their skin and more apparently When they have stayed there for some long time at some end of this Dragon the place comes to supputation and the skin being opened out comes this Dragons head Paulus lib. 4. c. 59. Soranus granteth this but he questions whether they be living creatures Moreover in the bloud it self some living creatures breed like to Worms that feed on the body as Pliny writes Hist 26. c. 13. Plutarch 8. Sympos who writes that a young man of Athens voided Worms with his seed Aegineta saw them come forth at the groins and buttocks as he saith lib. 4. to whom Benevennius subscribes c. 100. Also they breed under Sheeps clawes saith Columella and such I have seen under the nails of those that were troubled with a Whit-flaw And thus farre concerning Worms in the bodies of living Creatures But such as breed in dead and corrupt bodies whether it be from the disease or the Chirurgeons fault want a Latin name but the Greeks call them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as appears by Hippocrates The English call them Maggots Coelius would also have them called Eulas in Latin borrowing the word from the Greeks We will speak of these in order And first concerning Worms of the guts the descriptions whereof the causes signs symptomes and cure wil bring much light to the History of the rest CHAP. XXXI Of the Description of Worms in the Intestines VVEE shewed before that there are three sorts of Worms that are bred in the guts It will be worth our labour to describe what each of them is The round Worms are the first difference and that manifest to all men because these are the most common and are so called because they are indeed round and smooth not unlike to those worms that breed in dunghils and gardens which we said before are called by the Greeks the bowels of the earth These as all other Worms are blinde without any eyes and they are a hand length or something more yet Benivennius c. 〈◊〉 affirms that a Smith did vomit up a Worm with grosse flegm almost a foot and half long very plain with a red head that was smooth and about the bigness of a pease but the body of it was downy and the tail crooked like the half-moon Also at Rome anno 1543. one that was now upon his youthful years when as for many daies as Gabucinns tels the story he had been in great torments of his belly at last he voided by stool a great black Worm with black hair five feet long as big as a cane He saw one also that did not exceed the hands length like to the round Worms but that the back of it was hairy and set as it were with red hairs but this being cast forth by using good remedies he grew very well One Antonianus a Canon as Hieronymus Montuus tels the story voided a green Worm but he died shortly after he had voided that But for the most part they are smooth and not hairy a hand long and not a foot at both ends pointed as it were with a nib And they differ so far from Earth-worms that they wear no collar nor girdle what concerns their colours I have seen some red yellow black and partly white or gold colour Green ones are seldom seen yet Montuus saw some Gourd-worms are those quick Worms that are like unto Gourd-seeds concerning which the question is so great between Gabucinus and Mercurialis for when he treats of a broad VVorm that is made of an infinite number of Gourd-seeds shut up in a skin he saith thus I saith he think a broad Worm to be nothing else but according to Hippocrates as it were a white shaving of the guts that comprehends all the intestines between which some living creatures are bred like unto Gourd-seeds which may then be seen to be voided when all that shaving is voided yet oft-times it is voided by parts which if they break when they are voiding then you may behold these Worms like to Cucumer-seeds voided by themselves sometimes many of them being folded together sometimes but a few But if any man shall see all that portion let him know that that scraping off like a Worm doth not live but the creatures that are in it like Cucumer-seeds I once saw this Worm called a Broad Worm that pants to have been of a wonderful length and it crawled a woman in a Quotidian Feaver voided it by siege and when I did with admiration much view it and sought to finde the cause of its motion that other man who said he voided a portion of a broad Worm some daies before which he would shew unto me for a wonder did shew it me with incredible des I had to see it for this portion did move it self whence I was more desirous to know the cause of that At last searching diligently I observed through the whole hollow part of it a rank of living creatures like to Cucumer-seeds which crept forth of it as out of some bed some-times one sometimes two folded together oft-times four or more and that part of the shaving of the
Ardentesque faces quas quamvia savids horret For as they are inwardly filled with natural fire for which cause by the Egyptians they were dedicated to Vulcan so are they the more afraid of all outward fire and so suspicious is he of his welfare that if he tread upon the rinde or bark of Oke or the leaves of Osyer he trembleth and standeth amazed And Democritus affirmeth that there is a certain herb growing no where but in Armenia and Cappadocta which being laid to a Lion maketh him to fall presently upon his back and he upward without stirring and gaping with the whole breadth of his mouth the reason whereof Pliny faith is because it cannot be bruised There is no Beast more desirous of copulation then a Lioness and for this cause the males oftentimes fall forth for sometimes eight ten or twelve males follow one Lioness like so many Dogs one salt Bitch for indeed their natural constitution is so not that at all times of the year both sexes desire copulation although Aristotle seemeth to be against it because they bring forth only in the spring The Lioness as we have shewed already committeth adultery by lying with the Libbard for which thing she is punished by her male if she wash not her self before she come at him but when she is ready to be delivered she flyeth to the lodgings of the Libbards and there among them 〈◊〉 deth her young ones which for the most part are males for if the male Lion finde them he knoxeth them and destroyeth them as a bastard and adultenous issue and when she goeth to give them suck she saigneth as though she went to hunting By the copulation of a Lioness and an Hyaena is the Ethiopian Crocuta brought forth The Arcadian Dogs called Leontomiges were also generated betwixt Dogs and Lions In all her life long she beareth but once and that but one at a time as Esop seemeth to set down in that fable where he expresseth that contention between the Lioness and the Fox about the generosity of their young ones the Fox objecteth to the Lioness that she bringeth forth but one whelp at a time but he on the contrary begetteth many cubs wherein he taketh great delight unto whom the Lioness maketh this answer Parere se quidem unum sed Leonem that is to say she bringeth sorth indeed but one yet that one is a Lion for one Lion is better then a thousand Foxes and true generosity consisteth not in popularity or multitude but in the gifts of the minde joyned with honorable descent The Lionesses of Syria bear five times in their life at the first time five afterwards but one and lastly they remain barren Herodotus speaking of other Lions saith they never bear but one and that only once whereof he giveth this reason that when the whelp beginneth to stir in his Dams belly the length of his claws pierce through her matrix and so growing greater and greater by often turning leaveth nothing whole so that when the time of littering cometh she casteth forth her whelp and her womb both together after which time she can never bear more but I hold this for a fable because Homer Pliny Oppianus Solinus Philes and Aelianus affirm otherwise contrary and besides experience sheweth the contrary When Apollonius travelled from Babylon by the way they saw a Lioness that was killed by hunters the Beast was of a wonderful bigness such a one as was never seen about her was a great cry of the Hunters and of other neighbours which had flocked thither to see the monster not wondering so much at her quantity as that by opening of her belly they found within her eight whelps whereat Apollonius wondring a little told his companions that they-travelling now into India should be a year and eight moneths in their journey for the one Lion signified by his skill one year and the eight young ones eight moneths The truth is that a Lion beareth never above thrice that is to say six at the first and at the most afterwards two at a time and lastly but one because that one proveth greater and fuller of stomach then the other before him wherefore nature having in that accomplished her perfection giveth over to bring forth any more Within two moneths after the Lioness hath conceived the whelps are perfected in her womb and at six moneths are brought forth blinde weak and some are of opinion without life which so do remain three dayes together untill by the roaring of the male their father and by breathing in their face they be quickned which also he goeth about to establish by reason but they are not worth the relating Isidorus on the other side declareth that for three dayes and three nights after their littering they do nothing but sleep and at last are awaked by the roaring of their father so that it should seem without controversie they are senseless for a certain space after their whelping At two moneths old they begin to run and walk They say also that the fortitude wrath and boldness of Lions is conspicuous by their heat the young one containeth much humidity contrived unto him by the temperament of his kinde which afterwards by the driness and calidity of his complection groweth viscous and slimie like bird-lime and through the help of the animal spirits prevaileth especially about his brain whereby the nerves are so stopped and the spirits excluded that all his power is not able to move him untill his parents partly by breathing into his face and partly by bellowing drive away from his brain that viscous humor these are the words of Physiologus whereby he goeth about to establish his opinion but herein I leave every man to his own judgment in the mean season admiring the wonderful wisdom of God which hath so ordered the several natures of his creatures that whereas the little Partridge can run so soon as it is out of the shell and the duckling the first day swim in the water with his dam yet the harmful Lions Bears Tygres and their whelps are not able to see stand or go for many moneths whereby they are exposed to destruction when they are young which live upon destruction when they are old so that in infancie God clotheth the weaker with more honor There is no creature that loveth her young ones better then the Lioness for both shepherds and hunters frequenting the mountains do oftentimes see how irefully she fighteth in their defence receiving the wounds of many Darts and the stroaks of many stones the one opening her bleeding body and the other pressing the bloud out of the wounds standing invincible never yielding till death yea death it self were nothing unto her so that her young ones might never be taken out of her Den for which cause Homer compareth Ajax to a Lioness fighting in the defence of the carcass of Patroclus It is also reported that the male will
lead abroad the young ones but it is not likely that the Lion which refuseth to accompany his female in hunting will so much abase his noble spirit as to undergoe the Lionesses duty in leading abroad the young ones In Pangius a mountain of Thracia there was a Lioness which had whelps in her den the which den was observed by a Bear the which Bear on a day finding the den unfortified both by the absence of the Lion and the Lioness entred into the same and slew the Lions whelps afterward went away and fearing a revenge for her better security against the Lions rage climed up into a tree and there sat as in a sure castle of defence at length the Lion and the Lioness returned both home and finding their little ones dead in their own bloud according to natural affection fell both exceeding sorrowful to see them so slaughtered whom they both loved but smelling out by the foot the murderer followed with rage up and down untill they came to the tree whereinto the Bear was ascended and seeing her looked both of them gastly upon her oftentimes assaying to get into the tree but all in vain for nature which adorned them with singular strength and nimbleness yet had not endued them with power of climbing so that the tree hindring them from revenge gave unto them further occasion of mourning and unto the Bear to rejoyce at her own cruelty and deride their sorrow Then the male forsook the female leaving her to watch the tree and he like a mournful father for the losse of his children wandred up and down the mountain making great moan and sorrow till at the last he saw a Carpenter hewing wood who seing the Lion coming towards him let fall his Axe for fear but the Lion came very lovingly towards him fawning gently upon his breast with his forefeet and licking his face with his tongue which gentleness of the Lion the man perceiving he was much astonished and being more and more embraced and fawned on by the Lion he followed him leaving his Axe behind him which he had let fall which the Lion perceiving went back and made signes with his foot to the Carpenter that he should take it up but the Lion perceiving that the man did not understand his signes he brought it himself in his mouth and delivered it unto him and so led him into his cave where the young whelps lay all embrewed in their own bloud and then led him where the Lionesse did watch the Bear she therefore seeing them both coming as one that knew her husbands purpose did signifie unto the man that he should consider of the miserable slaughter of her young whelpes and shewing him by signes that he should look up into the tree where the Bear was which when the man saw he conjectured that the Bear had done some grievous injury unto them he therefore took his Ax and hewed down the tree by the roots which being so cut the Bear tumbled down headlong which the two furious Beasts seeing they toar her all to pieces And afterwards the Lion conducted the man unto the place and work where he first met him and there left him without doing the least violence or harm unto him Neither do the old Lions love their young ones in vain and without thanks or recompence for in their old age they requite it again then do the young ones both defend them from the annoyances of enemies and also maintain and feed them by their own labor for they take them forth to hunting and when as their decrepit and withered estate is not able to follow the game the younger pursueth and taketh it for him having obtained it roareth mightily like the voice of some warning piece to signifie unto his elder that he should come on to dinner and if he delay he goeth to seek him where he left him or else carryeth the prey unto him at the sight whereof in gratulation of natural kindness and also for joy of good success the old one first licketh and kisseth the younger and afterward enjoy the booty in common betwixt them Admirable is the disposition of Lions both in their courage society and love for they love their nourishers and other men with whom they are conversant they are neither fraudulent nor suspicious they never look awry or squint and by their good wils they would never be looked upon Their clemency in that fierce and angry nature is also worthy commendation and to be wondered at in such Beasts for if one prostrate himself unto them as it were in petition for his life they often spare except in extremity of famine and likewise they seldom destroy women or children and if they see women children and men together they take the men which are strongest and refuse the other as weaklings and unworthy their honor and if they fortune to be harmed by a Dart or stone by any man according to the quality of the hurt they frame their revenge for if it wound not they only terrifie the hunter but if it pinch them further and draw bloud they increase their punishment There is an excellent story of a Souldier in Arabia who among other his colleagues rode abroad on geldings to see some wilde Lions now geldings are so fearful by nature that where they conceive any fear no wit or force of man is able by spur and rod to make him to come near the thing it feareth but those which are not gelded are more bold and couragious and are not at all afraid of Lions but will fight and combate with them As they road they saw three Lions together one of the Souldiers seeing one of them stray and run away from his fellowes cast a Dart at him which fell on the ground neer the Lions head whereat the Beast stood still a little and paused and afterward went forward to his fellowes At last the Souldier road betwixt him and his fellowes which were gone before and run at his head with a spear but missed it and fell from his Horse to the earth then the Lion came unto him and took his head in his mouth which was armed with a Helmet and pressing it a little did wound him taking of him no more revenge then might requite the wrong received but not the wrong intended for generally they hurt no more then they are harmed There is an obscure Author that attributeth such mercy and clemency to a Beast which he calleth Melosus for he persecuteth with violence and open mouth stout men and all whom he is able to resist but yet is afraid of the crying of children It is probable that he mistaketh it for the Lion for besides him I have not read of any Beast that spareth young children Solinus affirmeth that many Captives having been set at liberty have met with Lions as they returned home weak ragged sick and disarmed safely without receiving any harm or violence And in Lybia the people
in the plain ground but are easily killed by a man except they get into the earth with their teeth they bite deep for they can sheer asunder wood with them like Beavers they eat or live upon fruits and especially being tamed when they are young they refuse not bread flesh fish or pottage and above all they desire milk butter and cheese for in the Alpes they will break into the little Cottages where milk is kept and are oftentimes taken in the manner sucking up the milk for they make a noise in sucking of milk like the pig In the moneth of May they are much delighted to eat Hornets or Horse-flies also they feed upon wilde Sagapen of the meddow and seeded Cabages and while they are wilde in the Mountains they never drink the reason is as I suppose because in the Summer time they eat moist green herbs and in all the Winter time they sleep Towards the feast of Saint Michael the Archangel and of Gallus they enter into their Caves and as Pliny saith they first of all carry provision of Hay and green Herbs into their Den to rest upon wherein their wit and understanding is to be admired for like Beavers one of them falleth on the back and the residue load his belly with the carriage and when they have laid upon him sufficient he girteth it fast by taking his tail in his mouth and so the residue draw him to the Cave but I cannot affirm certainly whether this be a truth or a falsehood For there is no reason that leadeth the Author thereunto but that some of them have been found bald on the back But this is certain when the Snow begins to cover the Mountains then do they enter into their Dens and shut up close the passages with sticks grass and earth both so hard and so thick that it is easier to break the solid ground then the mouths of their Caves and so being safely included both from the fear of the Hunters from rain snow and cold there they live until the Spring without all manner of meat and drink gathered round together like a Hedgehog sleeping continually and therefore the people inhabiting the Alpes have a common proverb to express a drowsie and sleepy fellow in the German tongue thus Er musse syuzyt geschlaffen haben wie ein murmelthier in Latine thus Necesse habet certum dormiendo tempus consumere instar mutis Alpini He must needs sleep a little like the Mouse of the Alpes They sleep also when they be tamed but it hath been found by experience that when a tame one hath been taken a sleep and laid in a warm barrel upon Hay the mouth being shut and closed to keep out rain and snow at the opening thereof it was found dead and the reason was because it lacked breath and therefore this is most wonderful that in the Mountains notwithstanding the close stopping of the mouth of their Caves yet they should not be deprived of refrigeration that is fresh air for expiration and respiration But this is to be considered that after they have been long tamed they sleep not so much as when they are wilde for I think that their continual eating of raw and green herbs ingendereth in them so many humors as cannot be dispersed without a long continuing sleep but afterwards when they are dieted with such meat as is provided for the nourishment of man they are eased of the cause and so the effect ceaseth During the time that they sleep they grow very fat and they are not awaked very easily except with the heat of the Sumor fire or a Hot-house Now the manner of their taking while they are wilde is thus In the Summer time when they go in and out of their Caves they are taken with snares set at the mouth thereof but in the Winter time when they go not abroad then also are Inhabitants forced to another devise for then in the Summer time they set up certain pillars or perches near the mouth of their Den whereby they may be directed when the snow doth cover the Mountains For the pillars or poles stand up above the snow although the snow be very deep Then come the Inhabitants upon round pieces of wood in the midst of the Winter fastned to their shooe-soles over the deep snow with their pyoners and diggers and cast away the snow from the den and so dig up the earth and not only take the beasts but carry them away sleeping and while they dig they diligently observe the frame and manner of the stopping of the Mouses den For if it be long and deep if is a sign of a long and a hard Winter but if they be shallow and thin of the contrary so coming upon them as we have said they take them and carry them away asleep finding always an odd number among them and they diligently observe that whilest they dig there be no great noise or that they bring not their fire too near them For as Stumpsius saith Experrecti enim capi non possunt nam utcunque strenue fodiat venator ipsi fodiendo simul retrocedunt pedibus quam effoderint terram rejiciendo fossorem impediunt That is to say If they be once awaked they can never be taken for howsoever the Hunter dig never so manfully yet they together with him dig inward into the Mountains and cast the earth backward with their feet to hinder his work Being taken as we have said they grow very tame and especially in the presence of their keepers before whom they will play and sport and take lice out of their heads with their fore-feet like an Ape Insomuch as there is no beast that was ever wilde in this part of the world that becometh so tame and familiar to man as they yet do they always live in the hatred of Dogs and oftentimes bite them deeply having them at any advantage especially in the presence of men where the Dogs dare not resist nor defend themselves When they are wilde they are also killed asleep by putting of a knife into their throat whereat their fore-feet stir a little but they die before they can be awaked Their bloud is saved in a vessel and afterwards the Mouse it self is dressed in hot scalding water like a Pig and the hair thereof plucked off and then do they appear bald and white next to that they bowel them and take out their intrails afterwards put in the bloud again into their bellies and so seethe them or else salt them and hang them up in smoke and being dressed after they are dryed they are commonly eaten in the Alpine Regions with Rapes and Cabbages and their flesh is very fat not a fluxible or loose fat like the fat of Lambs but a solid fat like the fat of Hogs and Oxen. And the flesh hereof is commended to be profitable for Women with childe and also for all windiness and gripings in the belly not only
the flesh to be eaten in meat but also the fat to be anointed upon the belly or navil And for this cause it is used to procure sleep and to strengthen decayed and weak sinews the flesh is always better salted then fresh because the salt drieth up the overmuch humidity and also amendeth the gravity and ranckness of the savour but whether it be salt or whether fresh it is always hard to be digested oppressing the stomach and heating the body overmuch The ventricle or maw of the Mouse Alpine is prescribed to be laid upon the belly against the Colick If the hands of a man be anointed with the fat of this beast it is said he shall be the better able to endure cold all that day after Also the same fat being drunk up in warm broath by a woman in travail are believed to accelerate and hasten her delivery Certain Horse-leeches in the cure of that disease which they call the Worms which are certain ulcers rising in the body do mingle this fat with other medicines which are very drying or stiptick And Mathaeolus doth prescribe it for the softning and mollifying of contracted nerves and joynts in the body By the discourse aforesaid it doth appear that of these Alpine Mice there are two kindes one great like a Badger and the other in stature of a Hare or Cony This lesser seemeth to be proper to Germany which there they call Embdor of the Latine word Emptra a Mouse of the Mountain The story whereof I thought good to express being short out of Stumpsius and Agricola The males and females say they of this kinde do gather together wilde corn which groweth among the Rocks in the Summer time against the Winter and carry the same into the holes of the earth where their lodging is Now the female in this kinde is crafty and more apt to devour the male on the other side more thrifty and sparing wherefore he driveth his female out of the Den in the Winter time and stoppeth the mouth of his Cave to forbid her entrance but she getteth behinde the same and diggeth a secret hole whilest the male lyeth at the mouth asleep she consumeth the whole store behinde him wherefore in the Spring time she cometh forth very fat and comely and he very lean And therefore in my opinion the makers of emblems may very well describe an unthrifty Wife that consumeth her Husbands wealth by the picture of this female as by the picture of the Ass behinde Ocnus biting asunder the cord that he weaveth as we have shewed before in the History of the Ass These beasts give themselves much to sleep and when they are awake they are never idle but always carrying into their Den straw hay sticks rags or pieces of cloth wherewith they fill their mouth so full that it may receive no more and if they meet with any thing which is too big for their mouth by the help of their feet they draw and rowl it to their own Den. Whereas they are nourished tame in houses it it is observed that they are a neat and cleanly kinde of beast for they never defile their lodgings with their excrements but seek out some secret corner wherein they both render urine and empty their bellies With their teeth the gnaw wood and make holes in bords so large as their bodies may pass through and while they live they have a very ranck and strong savour like a Mouse especially in the Summer time while they are lean and before they grow fat for such is the nature of this beast that in the Summer time they labour and grow lean but in the Winter time they sleep and grow fat And thus much for the Alpine Mouse Of the DORMOUSE THe Dormouse is called in Latin Glis and in Greek Myoxes the reason of the Latine name Glis is taken from gliscere which signifieth to grow fat according to the saying of Columella Paleis vero quibus fere omnes regiones abundant Asinus gliscit that is to say an Ass groweth fat by eating chaffe which aboundeth in all Countries This word Glis signifieth not only a beast but a piece of fat earth and also a Thistle whereupon Sylvaticus made this verse Glis animal glis terra tenax glis lappavocatur The Italians call it Lo Galero Lo Gliero or Giero the Spaniards Liron the French likewise Liron and Rat Liron and Vngloyer and Vngratvel the Germans Eingreul the Helvetians Ein rell or Rel 〈◊〉 or Gros haselmus but our English Dormouse seemeth to be a compounded word of Dormiens 〈◊〉 that is a sleeping Mouse The Polonians call him Seurez But concerning his name Myoxus there is some question among the Authors For Saint Jerom writing upon the eleventh chapter of Leviticus and the 66. Chapter of Esay translateth Akbar the Hebrew word for a Mouse Glirem a Dormouse and he giveth this reason because all the Countries of the East meaning Graecia do say that Myoxus is a Dormouse And this Myoxus by Epiphanius in his Anchoret is alleadged to prove the resurrection Myoxus saith he Animal semestre moritur rursus post tempore suo reviviscit The Dormouse at half a year old dyeth and after her full time reviveth again And in his Book against Heresies he speaketh thus to Origen Tradunt naturae rerum experti Myoxum latitare foetus suo simul in eodem loco multos parere quinque amplius Viperas autem hos venari si invenerit totum latibulum ipsa Vipera quum non posset omnes devorare pro una vice ad sacietatem edit unum aut duos reliquorum vero oculos expungit cibos affert excaeatosque enutrit donec voluerit unumquemque eorum devorare Si vero contigerit ut aliqui inexperti in hos incidant ipsosque in cibum sumant venenum sibi ipsis sumunt eos qui à Viperae veneno sunt enutriti Sic etiam ô tu Origenes à Graeca doctrina mente excaecatus venenum his qui tibi crediderunt evomuisti factus es ipsis in edulium venenatum it a ut per quae ipse injuria affectus es per ea plus injuria afficeris The Philosophers which are cunning in the nature of things do write that the Dormouse doth lie hid and bring forth many young ones in the same place where he lyeth five or more at a time and the Vipers do hunt these to destroy them now if the Viper finde their nest because she cannot eat them all at one time at the first she filleth her self with one or two and putteth out the eyes of the residue and afterwards bringeth them meat and nourisheth them being blinde until the time that her stomach serveth her to eat them every one But if it happen that in the mean time any man chance to light upon these Viper-nourishedblinde-Dormice and to kill and eat them they poyson themselves through the venom which the Viper hath