rather from God himself In the same fashion they enter the lists with land and water Toads and kill them in single fight For not only Pliny and Albertus the Philosopher mention this but also Erasmus in his Dialogue of friendship relates how a certain Monk who slept with open mouth and had a Toad hanging at his lip escaped by assistance of the Spider Oft-times also they enter the stage with the winged Hornet that hath a strong sting and fibres almost of horn who straight by main force breaks through their webs as great rich men do with the Laws yet at last he is wrapt in a more tenacious glew and pays for breaking open their houses and conquer'd in single duel he becomes subject to the Spider I must not passe by their temperance that was once proper to Man but now the Spiders have almost won it from them Who is there now if age will let him who will be content with the love of one and doth not deliver up himself body and soul to wandring lust But the Spider so soon as they grow up choose their mates and never part till death Moreover as they are most impatient of corrivals so they set upon any Adulterers that dare venture upon their Cottages and bite them and drive them away and oft-times justly destroy them Nor doth any one of them attempt to offer violence to the female of another or to assault her chastity So great command have they of their affections so faithful and entire are they in their conjugal love like Turtles If you respect their houshold government what is there more frugal more laborious or more cleanly to be seen in the whole world For they will not suffer the least thread to be lost or placed in vain and they ease themselves by interchangeable work for when the female weaves the male hunts if either be sick the other supplies both offices that they may deserve alike So sometimes the female hunts and the male weaves and this at any time when the one wants the others assistance for we cannot think them so void of mutual love that living so faithful in Matrimony the one should not lend a helping hand to the others necessities and so by mutual courtesie they continues their friendship amongst themselves The female at home being now learned from her Parents to spin and weave as she is wont to do with us she begins her webs and her belly contains all the matter of them whether it be for that at a certain time her entrails are so corrupted as Democritus said or that there is a kinde of woolly fruitfulnesse in her as there is in the Silk-worm Yet Aristotle will have the matter to be without like a thin shell which is drawn in length by spinning and weaving or after the manner of those that shoot out their bristles as the Porcupine However it be they lose not the least end of a thred but they undertake all by providence Their love to their young ones no man can rightly describe but he that loves his children himself For by mutuall incubation they foster their Egges and raise up and increase the heâ—t of them and thouhg oft-times they produce three hundred young ones yet they bring them all up alike to labour sparingnesse discipline and weaving and love them all alike I have oft wondred at their cleanlinesse when I have seen those that were weak and sick to go down to the bottome of their Web out of their dens and exonerate their bellies lest by the filth of their excrements their houses or Web or threds should be polluted And these things shall suffice for their civill and oeconomicall vertues Now let us proceed to their art of making Nets which is so offensive to Pallas for the Scholar exceeded her Mistris in the curiosity of her work First therefore we shall consider the clammy stuffe that drawes like Bird-lime which loseth not its tenaciousnesse by drinesse nor by moysture we said from Pliny that she drawes this stuffe out of her belly But seeing that the males weave also I think on good grounds with our friend Bruerus that it is drawn out of the entrails behinde And since it cannot be exhausted we may wonder at the infinite and endlesse power of God and adore it for it were next to madnesse to assign this to bodily or naturall causes Those Spiders are held to be the best Artificers that work in Autumn and are called Holei they draw a thred that is smaller then any linnen or silk and farre lighter and so pure saith Aelianus that the whole Web wrapt together will scarce make one thred as great as a linnen thred though it be never so small Edwardus Monimus described these both Males and Females very elegantly Heptam l. 7. in these words He hunts at home But she doth weave within her tender loom And jugler-like she from her belly casts Great clewes of yarn and thred which while it lasts She works to make her Nets and every part She frames exactly by Dedalian art Her Web is fastened to the beam the threds Are parted by fit lines at severall heads She works from Centre to circumference The Web is made on both sides for defence Pervious lest when the East-winde doth set Strong it might break this tender wâ—rke and yet The strongest Flie may be held in this Net No sooner can a Flie but shake her thread The male runs to the Centre and his head Peeps forth to catch what comes so is he fed The variety of their Nets is so great that it is not called amisse the Goddesse of a thousand works some of them are looser some thicker some triangular others square some Diamond figures for the commodity of the swiftnesse of hawking But that which is round is commonly wrought between two trees or Reeds and oft times in divers windowes hanged fast with ropes and sail-yards Good God what great reason judgement art what admirable wisdome and beauty she shews Truly we may not suppose amisse to say that Euclides learned to make his figures from hence and Fishermen their Nets for from whence else could they fetch such an example of so curious and laborious a Mistresse So finely is her work besmeared and made so round and exact and so equally ballanced and she doth so work her body in place of a weight and spindle that she may well be compared with Minerva but that the comparison makes me afraid Also the work is so firm though it appear so weak that it will hold Hornets endure force of windes and dust being fallen into it it rather yeelds than breaks or is hurt The manner of her Net-work is this First she drawes her semidiameters to the places circumabient most fit for her work then with no compasse but by a naturall skill of her feet she makes 44 circles with her thread from the center to the circumference by equall parts more distant one from the other Moreover that is worth our
out of Athens by reason of the Persians war in Greece and so they sailed with him to Salamine and as they sailed by the way he commanded one of them to be cast into the Sea who continued swimming after the Ship untill he dyed for which cause his Master buryed him When Gelon the Syracusan in his sleep had a fearful dream that he was strucken with fire from Heaven and with impression of fear cryed out very lamentably his Dog lying beside him and thinking that some peril or theef was doing violence to his Master he presently leaped up to the bed and with scratching and barking awaked him and so was he delivered from a horrible fear by the barking of his Dog The Tyrians which have the best and the first purple in the world are said in History to have it by the first occasion of Hercules Dog Hercules falling in love with a Nymph called Tyro and travelling toward her with his Dog he saw the purple fish creeping upon a stone the hungry Dog caught the fish to eat it and having devoured it his lips were all dyed or coloured with the same when the Virgin Nymph saw that colour upon the Dogs lips she denyed the love of Hercules except he could bring her a garment of that colour whereupon the valiant man knowing by what occasion the Dogs lips received such a tincture went and gathered all the purple fishes and worms he could finde and pressing their blood out of them therewithal coloured a garment and gave it to the Nymph for reward whereof he possessed the Virgin being by this means the first inventor of the Phoenician tincture Among these are to be remembred those loving Dogs who either have fought for their Masters and so defended them or else declared them that murdered their keepers or that which is more admirable leaped into the burning fires which consumed the dead bodies of their nourishers Such an one was the Dog of Calvus who being slain in a certain civil War at Rome and his enemies coming about him to cut off his head his poor Dog interposed his body betwixt the blows and would not suffer any foe once to touch his Masters carcass untill by more then six hundred souldiers the Dog was cut in pieces so living and dying a most faithful companion and thankful friend to him that fed him The like was in a Dog of Darius the last King of the Persians after he was slain by Besus and Narbazanes in the battel against Alexander so did the Dog of Silanien fight for his Master against theeves and when he was slain he departed not from the body but kept it warily from Dogs Birds or wilde Beasts sitting upon his privy parts and covering them untill the Roman Captains came and buryed it But most admirable was the love of a certain Dog to his Master punished with death for the fact against Germanicus Among other this Dog would never go from the prison and afterward when his Masters dead body was brought in the presence of many Romans the Cur uttered most lamentable and sorrowful cryes for which cause one of the company threw unto him some meat to see if that would stop his mouth and procure silence but the poor Dog took up the meat and carryed to his masters mouth not without the singular passion of the beholders at last the body was taken up and cast into the river Tiber the poor Dog leaped in after it and endeavoured by all the means his weakness could afford to keep it from sinking in the presence of an innumerable multitude which without tears could not look upon the loving care of this brute beast The Dogs of Gelon Hieron Lysimachus Pyrrhus King of Epirus Polus the Tragoedian and Theodorus leaped into the burning fires which consumed their masters dead bodies Nicias a certain Hunter going abroad in the Woods chanced to fall into a heap of burning coals having no help about him but his Dogs there he perished yet they ran to the high ways and ceased not with barking and apprehending the garments of passengers to shew unto them some direful event and at last one of the travellers followed the Dogs and came to the place where they saw the man consumed and by that conjectured the whole story The like did the Dogs of Marius Caesarinus for by howling they procured company to draw him out of a deep Cave whereinto he was fallen on Horse-hack and had there perished being alone except his Hounds had released him But that Dogs will also bewray the murtherers of their friends and masters these stories following may evidently manifest As King Pyrrhus by chance travelled in his Countrey he found a Dog keeping a dead corps and he perceived that the Dog was almost pined by tarrying about the body without all food wherefore taking pity on the beast he caused the body to be interred and by giving the Dog his belly full of meat he drew him to love him and so led him away afterward as Pyrrhus mustered his souldiers and every one appeared in his presence the Dog also being beside him he saw the murtherers of his master and so not containing himself with voyce tooth and nail he set upon them the King suspecting that which followed examined them if ever they had seen or known that Dog they denyed it but the King not satisfied charged them that surely they were the murtherers of the Dogs Master for the Dog all this while remained fierce against them and never barked before their appearance at the last their guilty consciences brake forth at their mouths and tongues end and so confessed the whole matter The like was of two French Merchants which travelled together and when they came into a certain Wood one of them rose against the other for desire of his money and so slew him and buryed him His Dog would not depart from the place but filled the Wood with howlings and cries the murtherer went forward in his journey the people and Inhabitants neer the said Wood came and sound both the murdered corps and also the Dog which they took up and nourished till the Fair was done and the Merchants returned at which time they watched the high wayes having the Dog with them who seeing the murtherer instantly made force at him without all provocation as a man would do at his mortal enemy which thing caused the people to apprehend him who being examined confessed the fact and received condign punishment for so foul a deed To conclude this discourse with one memorable story more out of Blondus who relateth that there was a certain woman neer Paris who was beloved of two young men one of them on a day took his staffe and his Dog and went abroad as it was thought of purpose to go to his love but it happened that by the way he was murthered and buryed and the Dog would not depart from the grave of his Master at the last he
silent and cease wondering at the amphitheatricall fights of the Romans which were made with seats and scaffolds to behold Playes and sights and where were presented to the Spectators the bloudy fights of Elephants Bears and Lions sithence a small Spider dare challenge to the field and fight hand to hand with a black and blew Serpent and not only to come down to him in daring wise but also victoriously to triumph over him entirely possessing all the spoyl Who would not marvail that in so small or in a manner no body at all which hath neither bones nor sinnewes nor flesh nor scarce any skin there could be so great force such incredible audacity and courage such sharp and hard bitings and invincible fury Surely we must conclude necessarily that this cannot proceed altogether from their valiant stomacks but rather from GOD himself In like sort they dare buckle with Toads of all sorts both of the land and water and in a singular combate overthrow and destroy them which thing not only Pliny and Albertus do recite and set down for a certain truth but Erasmus also in his Dialogue entituled De Amicitia maketh mention of reporting how a certain Monk lying fast asleep on whose mouth a foul Toad sate and yet by the Spiders means was freed from all hurt Yea they dare enter the combat with winged and stinged Hornets having not soft but stiffe bodies and almost as hard as horn who although she many times breaketh through their Cobwebs with main strength as rich men undoe and make a way through Lawes with Gold and by that means many times scape scot-free yet for all that at length being over-mastered hand to hand in single combat and intangled and insnarled with the binding pastinesse and tenacious glewish substance of the Web she payeth a deer price for her breaking into anothers house and possession yeelding at length to the Spiders mercy I will not omit their temperance a vertue in former ages proper only to men but now it should seem peculiar to Spiders For who almost is there found if age and strength permit that contenteth himself with the love of one as he ought but rather applyeth his minde body and wandering affections to strange loves But yet Spiders so soon as they grow to ripenesse of age do choose them Mates never parting till death it self make the separation And as they cannot abide Corrivalls if any Wedlock-breakers and Cuckold-makers dare be so snappish to enter or so insolently proud as to presse into anothers house or Cottage they reward him justly with condigne punishment for his temerarious enterprize and flagitious fact First by their cruell bitings then with banishment or exile and oftentimes with death it self So that there is not any one of them that dare offer villany or violence to anothers Mate or seek by any means unlawfully to abuse her There is such restraint such strict orders such faithfull dealing uprightnesse of conscience and Turtle love amongst them Further if you look into their house-keeping you shall finde there is nothing more frugall then a Spider more laborious cleanly and fine For she cannot abide that even the least end or piece of her thred to be lost or to be placed and set to no use or profit and they ease and relieve themselves by substitutes that supply their rooms and take pains for them for whilest the Female weaveth the Male applyeth himself to hunting if either of them fall sick and be weak then one of them doth the work of both that their merits and deserts may be alike So sometimes the Female hunteth whilest the Male is busie about Net-making if the one stand in need of the others help and furtherance But yet commonly the Female-Spider being instructed of her Parents when she was young and docible the art of spinning and weaving which custome was amongst us also in times past beginneth the Cobweb and her belly is sufficient to minister matter enough for such a piece of work whether it be that the nature or substance of the belly groweth to corruption at sun-set and appointed time as Democritus thought or whether there be within them a certain lanigerous fertility naturally as in Silk-worms Aristotle is of opinion that the matter is outward as it were a certain Shell or pill and that it is unwound loosened and drawn out by their fine weaving and spinning But howsoever it be certain it is they will not by their good wills lose the least jot of a threds end but very providently see to all though never so little The love they bear to their young breed is singular both in the care they have for their fashioning and framing to good orders and for their education otherwise for the avoidance of idlenesse For the Male and Female do by turns sit upon their Egges and so by this way interchangeably taking courses they do stirre up quicken move and encrease naturall and lively heat in them and although it hath been sundry times observed that they have brought forth three hundred young ones at once yet do they train them up all alike without exception to labour parsimony and pains-taking and inure them in good order to fashion and frame all things fit for the weaving craft I have often wondred at their cleanlinesse when to keep all things from nastinesse or stinking I have beheld with mine eyes those that were lean ill-favoured and sickly to come glyding down from the upper to the lower part of their buildings and there to exonerate nature at some hole in the Web lest either their shop work-house or frame might be distained or annoyed And this is sufficient to have spoken of their politicall civil and domesticall vertues Now will I proceed to discourse of their skill in weaving wherewith Pallas was so much offended for the Scholar excelled her Mistres and in fine cunning and curious workmanship did farre surpasse hers First then let us consider the matter of the Web whose substance is tough binding and glutinous pliant and will stick to ones fingers like Bird-lime and of such a matter it is compounded as it neither loseth his clamminesse and fast-holding quality either by siccity or moysture The matter whereof it is made is such as can never be consumed wasted or spent whilest they live and being so endlesse we must needs here admire and honour the never ending and infinite power of the great God for to seek out some naturall reason for it or to ascribe it to naturall causes were in my minde meer madnesse and folly The Autumnall Spiders called Lupi or Hâ—lci Wolves or Hunters are thought to be the most artificiall and ingenious For these draw out a thred finer and thinner then any Silk and of such a subtilty that their whole Web being folded together will scarce be so heavy as one fine thred of Linnen being weighed together Edovardus Monimius hath very finely and eloquently described both the Males and Females Heptam lib. 7. in these words
his wit to rail at Christian Religion even as he lacerated and rent his first profession so was he rent in pieces by Dogs and Heraclitus the Philosopher of Athens having been long sick and under the hands of Physitians he oftentimes anointed his body with Bugils sewet and on a day having so anointed himself lying abroad sleeping in the Sun the Dogs came and for the desire of the fat tore his body in pieces I cannot here forget that memorable story of two Christian Martyrs Gorgonius and Dorotheus which were put to death under Diocletian in the ninth persecution and when they were dead their carkases were cast unto hungry Dogs of this kinde kept for such purposes yet would not the Dogs once so much as stir at them or come neer to touch them and because we may judge that the ravening nature of these creatures was restrained by divine power We also read that when Benignus the Martyr by the commandment of Aurelian was also thrown alive to be devoured of these Dogs he escaped as free from their teeth as once Daniel did from the Lyons den I may also adde unto these the Dogs of Alania and Illyria called Mastini who have their upper lips hang over their neather and look fierce like Lyons whom they resemble in neck eyes face colour and nails falling upon Bears and Boars like that which Anthologius speaketh of that leaped into the Sea after a Dolphin and so perished or that called Lydia slain by a Boar whose Epitaph Martial made as followeth Amphitheatrales inter nutrita magistros Venatrix silvis aspera blanda domi Lydia dicebar domino fidissima dextro Qui non Erigones mallet habere Canem Nec qui Dictaea Cephalum de gente secutus Luciferâ— pariter venit ad astra deae Non me longa dies nec inutilis abstulit aetas Qualia Dulychio fata fuere cani Fulmineo spumantis apri sum dente perempta Quantus erat Calydon aut Erymanthe tuus Nec queror infernas quamvis cito rapta per â—mbras Non potui fato nobiliore mori There be in France certain great Dogs called Auges which are brought out of Great Britain to kill their Bears Wolves and wilde Boars these are singularly swift and strong and their leaders the better to arm them against the teeth of other Beasts cover some of their parts with thick clouts and their necks with broad collars or else made of Badgers skins In Gallia Narbon they call them Limier and the Polonians call all made Dogs for the Wolf and such like Beasts Vislu and peculiarly for the Bear and Bore Charzii for Hares and Fowl Pobicdnizcii and Dogs of a middle scantling betwixt the first and the second Psii Gray-hounds are the least of these kindes and yet as swift and fierce as any of the residue refusing no kinde of Beast if he be turned up thereunto except the Porcupine who casteth her sharp pens into the mouth of all Dogs The best Gray-hound hath a long body strong and reasonable great a neat sharp head and splendent eyes a long mouth and sharp teeth little ears and thin gristles in them a straight neck and a broad and strong breast his fore-legs straight and short his hinder-legs long and straight broad shoulders round ribs fleshy buttocks but not fat a long tail strong and full of sinews which Nemesian describeth elegantly in these verses Sit cruribus altis Costarum sub fine decenter prona carinam Renibus ampla satis validis diductaque coras Sit rigidis multamque gerat sub pectore lato Quae sensim rursus sicca se colligat alvo Cuique nimis inblles fluitent in cursibus aures Elige tunc cursu facilem facilemque recursu Dum superant vires dum laeto flore juventus Of this kinde that is a way the best to be chosen among the whelps which weigheth lightest for it will be soonest at the game and so hang upon the greater beasts hindering their swiftness untill the stronger and heavier Dogs come to help and therefore besides the marks or necessary good parts in a Gray-hound already spoken of it is requisite that he have large sides and a broad midriffe or film about his heart that so he may take his breath in and out more easily a small belly for if it be great it will hinder his speedy course likewise that he have long legs thin and soft hairs and these must the Hunter lead on the left hand if he be a foot and on the rigâ—â— hand if he be on Horseback The best time to try them and train them to their game is at twelve months old howbeit some hunt them at ten months if they be males and at eight months if they 〈◊〉 female yet is it surest not to strain them or permit them to run any long course till they be twenty months old according to the old verse Libera tâ—â—c primum consuescant colla ligari Iam cum bis denos Phoebe reparaverit ortus Sed parvos vallis spatio septove novelli Nec cursus virtute parem c. Keep them also in the leam or slip while they are abroad untill they see their course I mean the Hare or Deer and loosen not a young Dog till the game have been on foot a good season lest if he be greedy of the prey he strain his limbs till they break When the Hare is taken divide some part thereof among your Dogs that so they may be provoked to speed by the sweetness of the flesh The Lacedemon Gray-hound was the best breed they were first bred of a Fox and a Dog and therefore they were called Alopecides these admit copulation in the eight moneth of their age and sometime in the sixt and so continue bearing as long as they live bearing their burthen the sixth part of a year that is about sixty days one or two more or less and they better conceive and are more apt to procreation while they are kept in labour then when they lie idle without hunting And these Lacedemon Dogs differ in one thing from all other Dogs whatsoever for whereas the male out-liveth in vulgar Dogs of all Countries the female in these the female out-liveth the male yet the male performeth his labour with more alacrity although the female have the sharper sense of smelling The noblest kinde of Dog 〈…〉 or the H 〈…〉 eep â—ome unless they be led abroad and seldom bark they are the best which 〈…〉 for which cause they use this artificial invention to stretch their necks they dig a deep hole in the earth wherein they set the Gray-hounds meat who being hungry thrusteth down his head to take it but 〈…〉 ng it to be paâ—â— his reach stretcheth his neck above the measure oâ— nature by custom whereof 〈◊〉 neck is very â—uch lengthened Other place the Gray-hound in a ditch and his meat above him and so he reacheth upward which is more
stone and the Paederos Jewel With this Ivory they made images and statues for their Idol gods as one for Pallas in Athens for Esculapius in Epidaurus for Venus under the name of Vrania by Phidias whereupon she was called Elephantina for Apollo at Rome and therefore Pausanias wondereth at the Grecians that spared no cost for the vain worship of their gods for they brought of the Indians and Ethiopians Ivory to make their Images with more pomp and ostentation besides of Ivory they make the hafts of knives and also the best combs and Solomon as appeareth 3 Reg. 10. had a throne of Ivory covered all over with gold for the costs and charge whereof he could not expend 〈…〉 lesse then thirty thousand talents The greatness of these appeareth by their use for Polybius reporteth by the relation of Galussa a Noble man and a great traveller in Africa that with them they made posts for houses and racks to lay their Cattels meat upon and likewise folds to enclose them Apelles made an Ink of Ivory which was called Elephants inke and he painted therewith It hath been affirmed by Aelianus and some writers following Pliny that these teeth are horns and that Elephants are horned beasts which errour rose upon the occasion of these words of Pliny Elephantos arietes candore tantum cornibus assimilatis in Santonum littore reciprocatos destituit Oceanus where Aelianus finding a resemblance betwixt Rams and Elephants in their white horns was contented to apply that name to them both which appertaineth only to one for Pliny himself lib. 18. sheweth his meaning by another like speech of their whetting their horns upon trees and Rhinocerotes upon stones for except he had named horns in the first place it might have been questioned whether Rhinocerotes had any horns but rather teeth in the second place But whatsoever were the words or opinion of Pliny it is most certain that after Herodotus and other ancient writers it is safer to call these teeth then horns and I will briefly set down the reasons of Philostratus that will have them to be teeth and afterward of Grapaldus Aelianus and Pausanias that would make them horns and so leave the Reader to consider whether opinion he thinketh most agreeable to truth First that they are not horns it is alleadged that horns fall off and grow every year again especially of Harts and grow forth of their heads but teeth which are called Fannae or Gang-teeth standing out of the mouth fall off together and are given for weapon and defence to beasts and such are an Elephants Again a horn hath a certain line or circle neer the root which is covered every year but this cometh up like a stony substance without all circle or cover and therefore it cannot be a horn Moreover those creatures are said to have horns that have cloven hoofs this hath no cloven hoof but only five distinct fingers upon a foot Lastly all horned beasts have an empty hollowness in their horns except Harts but this is found and full thoroughout except a little passage in the middle like a hole into a tooth and thus say they which will have them called teeth Now on the contrary those which will have them horns maake these arguments First as the Elks have their horns grow out of their eye-lids the Rhinocerotes or Ethiopian Buls out of their nose so as it is not unnatural for the Elephant to have his horns grow out of his mouth Again horns fall off and come again in old beasts but teeth do not so and therefore these are horns and not teeth the power of fire cannot alter teeth but these teeth break if you go about to change their porportion or figure but horns of Oxen and Elephants may be stretched bended altered straightned and applyed to what fashion soever you will Again teeth grow out of the gums and cheek-bone as it is apparent but horns grow out of the scull and temples and so do the Elephants as by observation every man may discern Lastly as nature hath given another shape and greater proportion of body to Elephants then to any other beasts so also it is not unreasonable that it vary in the placing of his horns for they grow downward and the very mole and quantity of his body is sufficient to arme him against the fear of death Thus they argument for the horns of Elephants The Poets have a prety resemblance of dreams comparing true dreams to horns and false dreams to Ivory because falshood is ever more burnished then naked and ragged truth And besides the eye of man is translucent and containeth in it a horny substance and by the eye we alway receive the best assurance but by the mouth signified by teeth are many falshoods vented and for that horns turn upward to heaven the fountain of truth but the teeth of an Elephant grow downward towards the earth the mother of error And for this cause Aeneas by Virgil and Homer is said to come in at the horny gate of Somnus and to go forth at the Ivory Virgils Verses are these Sunt geminae Somni portae quarum altera fertur Cornea qua veris facilis datur exitus umbris Altera candenti perfecta nitens Elephanto Sed falsa ad coelum mittunt insomnia manes His ubi dum natum Anchises unaque Sibyllam Prosequitur dictis portaque emittit eburna And here we will leave and prosecute no further this discourse of their horns and teeth but proceed to the other outward parts of this beast The tongue is very small though broad his trunck called Proboscs and Promuscis is a large hollow thing hanging from his nose like skin to the groundward and when he feedeth it lyeth open like the skin upon the bill of a Turkey-cock to draw in both his meat and drink using it for a hand and therefore improperly it is called a hand For by it he receiveth of his keeper whatsoever he giveth him with it he overthroweth trees and wheresoever he swimmeth through it he draweth breath It is crooked gristly and inflexible at the root next to the nose within it hath two passages one into the head and body by which he breatheth and the other into his mouth whereby he receiveth his meat and herein is the work of God most wonderful not only in giving unto it such a divers proportion and anatomy but also giving him reason to know this benefit of it that so long as he is in the water and holdeth up that trunck he cannot perish With this he fighteth in war and is able to take up a small piece of money from the earth with it he hath been seen to pull down the top of a tree which twenty four men with a rope could not make to bend With it he driveth away his Hunters when he is chased for he can draw up therein a great quantity of water and shoot it forth again to the amazement and
overthrow of them that persecute him The Moors say that he hath two hearts one wherewithal he is incensed and another whereby he is pacified But the truth is as Aristotle in the dissection of the heart observed there is a double ventricle and bone in the heart of an Elephant He hath a Liver without any apparent gall but that side of the Liver being cut whereon the gall should lie a certain humour cometh forth like a gall Wherefore Aelianus saith he hath his gall in his maw-gut which is so full of sinews that one would think he had four bellies in this receiveth he his meat having no other receptacle for it His intrails are like unto a Swines but much greater His Liver four times so great as an Oxes and so all the residue except the Milt He hath two pappes a little beside his brest under his shoulders and not between his hinder legs or loins they are very small and cannot be seen on the side The reasons hereof are given first that he hath but two pappes because he bringeth forth but one at a time and they stand under his shoulders like an Apes because he hath no hoofs but distinct feet like a mans and also because from the breast floweth more aboundance of milke The genital part is like a Horses but lesser then the proportion of his body affordeth the stones are not outwardly seen because they cleave to his reins But the female hath her genital betwixt her thighes the forelegs are much longer then the hinder legs and the feet be greater His legs are of equall quantity both above and beneath the knees and it hath ancle bones very low The articles do not ascend so high as in other creatures but kept low neer the earth He bendeth his hinder legs like a mans when he sitteth but by reason of his great weight he is not able to bend on both sides together but either leaneth to the right hand or to the left and so sleepeth It is false that they have no joints or articles in their legs for when they please they can use bend and move them but after they grow old they use not to lie down or strain them by reason of their great weight but take their rest leaning to a tree and if they did not bend their legs they could never go any ordinary and stayed pace Their feet are round like a Horses but so as they reach from the middle every way two spans length and are as broad as a bushel having five distinct toes upon each foot the which toes are very little cloven to the intent that the foot may be stronger and yet parted that when he treadeth upon soft ground the weight of his body presse not down the leg too deep He hath no nails upon his toes his tail is like an Oxes tail having a little hair at the end and the residue thereof peeled and without hair He hath not any bristly hairs to cover his back And thus much for their several parts and their uses There is not any creature so capable of understanding as an Elephant and therefore it is requisite to tarry somewhat the longer in expressing the several properties and natural qualities thereof which sundry and variable inclinations cannot choose but bring great delight to the Reader They have a wonderful love to their own Countrey so as although they be never so well delighted with divers meats and joyes in other places yet in memory thereof they send forth tears and they love also the waters rivers and marishes so as they are not unfitly called Riparii such as live by the rivers sides although they cannot swim by reason of their great and heavie bodies untill they be taught Also they never live solitary but in great flocks except they be sick or watch their young ones and for either of these they remain adventurous unto death the eldest leadeth the herd and the second driveth them forward if they meet any man they give him way and go out of his sight Their voice is called by the word Barrire that is to bray and thereupon the Elephants themselves are called Barri for his voice cometh out of his mouth and nostrils together like as when a man speaketh breathing wherefore Aristotle calleth it Raucity or hoarsness like the low sound of a Trumpet this sound is very terrible in battails as shall be afterward declared They live upon the fruits of Plants and roots and with their truncks and heads overthrow the tops of trees and eat the boughs and bodies of them and many times upon the leaves of trees he devoureth Chamaeleons whereby he is poisoned and dyeth if he eat not immediately a wilde Olive They eat earth often without harm but if they eat it seldom it is hurtful and procureth pain in their bellies so also they eat stones They are so loving to their fellows that they will not eat their meat alone but having found a prey they go and invite the residue to their feasts and chear more like to reasonable civil men then unreasonable brute beast There are certain noble Melons in Ethiopia which the Elephants being sharp smelling beasts do winde a great way off and by the conduct of their noses come to those Gardens of Melons and there eat and devour them When they are tamed they will eat Barlie either whole or ground of whole at one time is given them nine Macedonian Bushels but of Meal six and of drink either wine or water thirty Macedonian pints at at a time that is fourteen gallons but this is observed that they drink not wine except in war when they are to fight but water at all times whereof they will not tast except it be muddy and not clear for they avoid clear water loathing to see their own shadow therein and therefore when the Indians are to passe the water with their Elephants they chuse dark and cloudy nights wherein the Moon affordeth no light If they perceive but a Mouse run over their meat they will not eat thereof for there is in them a great hatred of this creature Also they will eat dryed Figs Grapes Onions Bulrushes Palmes and Ivy leaves There is a Region in India called Phalacâ—us which signifieth Balde because of an herb growing therein which causeth every living thing that eateth thereof to lose both horn and hair and therefore no man can be more industrious or wary to avoid those places then is an Elephant and to forbear every green thing growing in that place when he passeth thorough it It will forbear drink eight dayes together and drink wine to drunkenness like an Ape It is delighted above measure with sweet savours ointments and smelling flowers for which cause their keepers will in the Summer time lead them into the medowes of flowers where they of themselves will by the quickness of their smelling chuse out and gather the sweetest flowers and put them
the weaker against the sury of their persecutors being better able to fight then the foremost whom in natural love and policy they set farthest from the danger Mutiuc which had been thrice Consul affirmeth that he saw Elephants brought on shore at Puteoli in Italy they were caused to go out of the Ship backward all along the bridge that was made for them that so the sight of the Sea might terrifie them and cause them more willingly to come on land and that they might not be terrified with the length of the bridge from the continent Pliny and Solinus affirm that they will not go on shipboard untill their keeper by some intelligible signe of oath make promise unto them of their return back again They sometimes as hath been said fight one against another and when the weaker is overcome he is so much abased and cast down in minde that ever after he feareth the voice of the conquerour They are never so fierce violent or wilde but the sight of a Ram tameth and dismayeth them for they fear his horns for which cause the Egyptians picture an Elephant and a Ram to signifie a foolish King that runneth away for a fearfull sight in the field And not only a Ram but also the gruntling clamour or cry of Hogs by which means the Romans overthrew the Carthaginians and Pyrrhus which trusted overmuch to their Elephants When Antipater besieged the Megarians very straitly with many Elephants the Citizens took certain Swine and anointed them with pitch then set them on fire and turned them out among the Elephants who crying horribly by reason of the fire on their bodies so distempered the Elephants that all the wit of the Macedonians could not restrain them from madness fury and flying upon their own company only because of the cry of the Swine And to take away that fear from Elephants they bring up with them when they are tamed young Pigges and Swine ever since that time When Elephants are chased in hunting if the Lions see them they run from them like Hinde-calves from the Dogs of Hunters and yet Iphicrates sayeth that among the Hesperian or western Ethiopians Lions set upon the young Calves of Elephants and wound them but at the sight of the mothers which come with speed to them when they hear them cry the Lions run away and when the mothers finde their young ones imbrued in their own bloud they themselves are so inraged that they kill them and so retire from them after which time the Lions return and eat their flesh They will not indure the savour of a Mouse but refuse the meat which they have run over in the river Ganges of India there are blew Wormes of sixty cubits long having two armes these when the Elephants come to drink in that river take their trunks in their hands and pull them off There are Dragons among the Ethiopians which are thirty yards or paces long these have no name among the inhabitants but Elephant-killers And among the Indians also there is as an inbred and native hateful hostility between Dragons and Elephants for which cause the Dragons being not ignorant that the Elephants feed upon the fruits and leaves of green trees do secretly convey themselves into them or to the tops of rocks covering their hinder part with leaves and letting his head and fore part hang down like a rope on a suddain when the Elephant cometh to crop the top of the tree she leapeth into his face and diggeth out his eyes and because that revenge of malice is too little to satisfie a Serpent she twineth her gable like body about the throat of the amazed Elephant and so strangleth him to death Again they marke the footsteps of the Elephant when he goeth to feed and so with their tails net in and entangle his legs and feet when the Elephant perceiveth and feeleth them he putteth down his trunck to remove and untie their knots and gins then one of them thrusteth his poisoned stinging head into his Nostrils and so stops up his breath the other prick and gore his tender belly-parts Some again meet him and flie upon his eyes and pull them forth so that at the last he must yeeld to their rage and fall down upon them killing them in his death by his fall whom he could not resist or overcome being alive and this must be understood that forsomuch as Elephants go together by flocks and herds the subtil Dragons let the foremost passe and set upon the hindmost that so they may not be oppressed with multitude Also it is reported that the bloud of an Elephant is the coldest blood in the world and that Dragons in the scorching heat of Summer cannot get any thing to cool them except this bloud for which cause they hide themselves in rivers and brooks whither the Elephants come to drink and when he putteth down his trunck they take hold thereof and instantly in great numbers leap up unto his ear which is naked bare and without defence whereout they suck the blood of the Elephant untill he fall down dead and so they perish both together Of this blood cometh that ancient Cinnabaris made by commixture of the bloud of Elephants and Dragons both together which alone is able and nothing but it to make the best representation of blood in painting Some have corrupted it with Goats-blood and call it Milton and Mimum and Monocroma it hath a most rare and singular vertue against all poisons beside the unmatchable property aforesaid These Serpents or Dragons are bred in Taprobana in whose heads are many pretious stones with such naturall seals or figurative impressions as if they were framed by the hand of man for Podisippus and Tzetzes affirm that they have seen one of them taken out of a Dragons head having upon it the lively and artificial stampe of a Chariot Elephants are enemies to wilde Buls and the Rhinocerots for in the games of Pompey when an Elephant and a Rhinoceros were brought together the Rhinoceros ran instantly and whet his horn upon a stone and so prepared himself to fight striking most of all at the belly of the Elephant because he knew that it was the tenderest and most penetrable part of the body The Rhinoceros was as long as the Elephant but the legs thereof were much shorter and as the Rhinocerotes sharpen their horns upon the stones so do the Elephants their teeth upon trees the sharpness of either yeeldeth not to any steel Especially the Rhinocerot teareth and pricketh the legs of the Elephant They fight in the woods for no other cause but for the meat they live upon but if the Rhinocerot get not the advantage of the Elephants belly but set upon him in some other part of his body he is soon put to the worst by the sharpness of the Ivory tooth which pierceth through his more then buffe-hard skin not to be pierced with any dart with
place as may be and let him bleed well then fire every knot one by one taking the knot in your left hand and pulling it so hard as you can from his body to the intent you may better pierce the knot with a blunt hot Iron of the bigness of a mans fore-finger without doing the body any hurt and let out the matter leaving none unburn'd be it little or much That done anoint every knot so burned with Hogs-grease warmed every day once until the coars be ready to fall away and in the mean time prepare a good quantity of old Urine and when you see the coars ready to fall boil the Urine and put therein a little Copperas and Salt and a few strong Nettles and with that water being warm wash out all the coars and the corruption That done fill every hole immediately with the powder of fleck't lime continuing thus to do every day once until the holes be closed up and if any be more ranker then other fill those with Verdigrease and during this cure let the Horse be thinly dieted that is to say with straw and water only unless it be now and then to give him a loaf of bread for the lower he be kept the sooenr he will be whole And in any wise let his neck be yoked in an old bottomless pail or else with short staves to keep him from licking the sores and the less rest he hath the better Or do thus Take a good great Dock-root clean scraped and cut thereof five little rundles or cakes to be used as followeth First with a knife make a slit right down in the Horses fore-head three inches long then with a Cornet loosen the skin within the flesh so as you may easily put therein five rundles of Dock that is to say two on each side of the slit one above another and put the fift rundle in the very midst betwixt the other four that done fasten to each of the slits two short Shoomakers ends to serve as laces to tie in the foresaid rundles so as they may not fall out and clense the sore every day once for the vertue of the root is such as it will draw all the filthy matter from any part of the body yea though the Farcin be in the hinder-legs which matter is to be wiped away from time to time and new roots be thrust into the slit according as you see it needful Of the Farcion THe Farcion is a vilde disease ingendered of ill bloud flegmatick matter and unkindely feeding it appeareth in a Horse like unto little knots in the flesh as big as a Hasel-nut the knots will encrease daily and inflame Impostume and break and when the knots amount to threescore they will every night after breed so many more till they have over-run the Horses body and with the poyson which is mighty and also strong soon bring him to his death This disease is very infectious and dangerous for some Horses yet if it be taken in any time it is easie to be holpen The cure thereof is in this manner Take a sharp Bodkin and thrust it through the neather part of his nose that he may bleed or if you will to let him bloud in the neck-vein shall not be amiss then feel the knots and as many as are soft lance them and let them run then take strong Lye Lime and Allum and with the same bathe all his sores and it shall in short space cure him There is also another manner of curing this disease and that is thus Take a sharp lance-knife and in the top of the Horses fore-head just between his eyes make a long slit even to the skull then with a blunt instrument for the purpose lose the flesh from the scalp a pretty compass then take Carret-roots cut into little thin round pieces and put them between the skin and the skull as many as you can then close up the wound and once a day anoint it with fresh Butter This is a most sure and approved way to cure the Farcion for look how this wound thus made shall rot waste and grow sound so shall the Farcion break dry up and be healed because all the poyson that feedeth the disease shall be altogether drawn into the fore-head where it shall die and waste away The only fault of this cure is it will be somewhat long and it is a foul eye-sore until it be whole Some use to burn this sorance but that is naught and dangerous as who so proves it shall finde A most approved medicine to cure the Farcion TAke of Aqua-vitae two spoonfuls of the juyce of Herb of grace as much mingle them together then take of Plegants or Bals of Flax or Tow and sleep them therein and stop them hard into the Horses ears then take a needle and a thread and stitch the tips of his two ears together by means whereof he cannot shake out the medicine and use him thus but three several morning and it will kill any Farcion whatsoever for it hath been often approved Another medicine of the same SLit every hard kernel with a sharp knife and fill the hole with an Ointment made of old Lard Sope and gray Salt for that will eat out the coar and cause it to rot and so fall out of the own accord Of the Canker called of the Italian Il Cancro A Canker is a filthy creeping Ulcer fretting and gnawing the flesh in great breadth In the beginning it is knotty much like a Farcine and spreadeth it self into divers places and being exulcerated gathereth together in length into a wound or fore This proceedeth of a melancholy and filthy bloud ingendered in the body which if it be mixt with Salt humors it causeth the more painful and grievous exulceration and sometime it cometh of some filthy wound that is not cleanly kept the corrupt matter whereof cankereth other clean parts of the body It is easie to be known by the description before The cure whereof according to Martin is thus First let him bloud in those veins that be next the fore and take enough of him Then take of Allum half a pound of green Copperas and of white Copperas of each one quartern and a good handful of Salt boil all these things together in fair running water from a pottle to a quart And this water being warm wash the sore with a cloth and then sprinkle thereon the powder of unsleck't lime continuing so to do every day once the space of fifteen days and if you 〈◊〉 that the lime do not mortifie the ranck flesh and keep it from spreading any further then take of black Sope half a pound of Quick-silver half an ounce and beat them together in a pot until the Quick-silver be so well mingled with the Sope as you can perceive none of the Quick-silver as it And with an Iron slice after that you have washed the sore with the Strong-water aforesaid cover the wound with this Ointment
attributeth this to her right foot The like is attributed to a Sea-calf and the fish Hyaena and therefore the old Magicians by reason of this exanimating property did not a little glory in these beasts as if they had been taught by them to exercise Diabolical and praestigious incantation whereby they deprived men of sense motion and reason They are great enemies to men and for this cause Solinus reporteth of them that by secret accustoming themselves to houses or yards where Carpenters or such Mechanicks work they learn to call their names and so will come being an hungred and call one of them with a distinct and articulate voice whereby he causeth the man many times to forsake his work and go to see the person calling him but the subtile Hyaena goeth further off and so by calling allureth him from help of company and afterward when she seeth time devoureth him and for this cause her proper Epithet is Aemula â—â—cis Voyce-counterfeiter There is also great hatred betwixt a Pardall and this Beast for if after death their skins be mingled together the hair falleth off from the Pardals skin but not from the Hyaenaes and therefore when the Egyptians describe a superiour man overcome by an inferiour they picture these two skins and so greatly are they afraid of Hyaenaes that they run from all beasts creatures and plaâ—es whereon any part of their skin is fastened And Aelianus saith that the Ibis bird which liveth upon Serpents is killed by the gall of an Hyaena He that will go safely through the mountains or places of this beasts abode Rasis and Allertus say that he must carry in his hand a root of Colloquintida It is also believed that if a man compasse his ground about with the skin of a Crocodile an Hyaena or a Sea-calf and hang it up in the gates or gaps thereof the fruits enclosed shall â—ot be molested with hail or lightning And for this cause Mariners were wont to cover the tops of their sails with the skins of this Beast or of the Sea-calf and Horns saith that a man clothed with this skin may passe without fear or danger through the middest of his enemies for which occasion the Egyptians do picture the skin of an Hyaena to signifie fearless audacity Neither have the Magicians any reason to ascribe this to any praestigious enchantment seeing that a Fig-tree also is never oppressed with hail nor lightning And the true cause thereof is assigned by the Philosophers to be the bitterness of it for the influence of the heavens hath no destructive operation upon bitter but upon sweet things and there is nothing sweet in a Fig tree but only the fruit Also Columella writeth that if a man put three bushels of â—eed grain into the â—kin of this Beast and afterward sow the same without all controversie it will arise with much encrease G 〈…〉 worn in an Hyaenaes skin seven dayes instead of an Amulet is very soveraign against the biting of mad dogs And likewise if a man hold the tongue of an Hyaena in his hand there 〈◊〉 Dog that dareth to seize upon him The skin of the forehead or the bloud of this Beast resisteth all kinde of Witchcraft and Incantation Likewise Pliny writeth that the hairs layed to Womens lips maketh them amorous And so great is the vanity of the Magicians that they are not ashamed to affirm that by the tooth of the upper jaw of this Beast on the right side bound unto a mans arme or any part thereof he shall never be molested with Dart or Arrow Likewise they say that by the genital of this beast and the Article of the back-bone which is called Atlantios with the skin cleaving unto it preserved in a House keepeth the family in continual concord and above all other if a man carry about him the smallest and extreme gut of his intrails he shall not only be delivered from the Tyrany of the higher powers but also foreknow the successe and event of his petitions and sutes in Law If his left foot and nails be bound up together in a Linnen bag and so fastened unto the right arme of a Man he shall never forget whatsoever he hath heard or knoweth And if he cut off the right foot with the left hand and wear the same whosoever seeth him shall fall in love with him besides the Beast Also the marrow of the right foot is profitable for a Woman that loveth not her Husband if it be put into her nostrils And with the powder of the left claw they which are anointed therewith it being first of all decocted in the bloud of a Weasil do fall into the hatred of all men And if the nails of any beast be found in his maw after he is Ilain it signifieth the death of some of his hunters And to conclude such is the folly of the Magiâ—ians that they believe the transmigration of souls not only out of one man into another but also of man into beasts And therefore they affirm that their men Symis and religious votaries departing life send their souls into Lions and the religious women into Hyaenaes The excrements or bones coming out of the excrements when it is killed are thought to have virtue in them against Magical incantations And Democritus writeth that in Cappadocia and Mesia by the eating of the hearb Therionarcha all wilde beasts fall into a deadly sleep and cannot be recovered but by the aspersion of the urine of this beast And thus much for the first kinde now followeth the second The Second kinde of HYAENA called Papio or Dabuh THis Beast aboundeth near Caesarea in quantity resembling a Fox but in wit and disposition Wolf the fashion is being gathered together for one of them to go before the flock 〈…〉 or howling and all the rest answering him with correspondent tune In hair it resembleth a 〈◊〉 and their voices are so shrill and sounding that although they be very remote and far off yet do men hear them as if they were hard by And when one of them is slain the residue flock about his carcase howling like as they made funeral lamentation for the dead When they grow to be very hungry by the constraint of famine they enter into Graves of men â—nd eat their dead bodies Yet is their flesh in Syria Damascus and Berâ—tus eaten by men It is â—alled also Randelos Abenâ—â—m Aldabha Dabha Dabah and Dhoboha which are derived from the He 〈…〉 ew word Deeb or Deeba Dabuh is the Arabian name and the Africans call him Lesâ—ph his feet and 〈…〉 gs are like to a mans neither is it hurtful to other Beasts being a base and simple creature The 〈…〉 olour of it is like a Bear and therefore I judge it to be Aâ—â—â—oâ—â—on which is ingendered of a Bear and 〈◊〉 Dog and they bark only in the night time They are exceedingly delighted with Musick such 〈◊〉 is
parts like a fish and his fore-part like a Goat according to these verses Tum gelidum valido de pectore frigus anhelans Corpore semifero magno capricornus in or be Wherefore by the signes Cancer and Capricornus the Ancients were wâ—nt to understand the descending and ascending of the soul that is to say by the Cancer or Crab which goeth backward the souls descent by Capricorst because the Goat climbeth the souls ascent and therefore they place it in the Zoduck where the Sun after the short days beginneth to ascend for no other cause then for that which I have rehearsed The Epithers that are given unto this Capricorn do also belong unto the Ibex such as are these moist cold swift horn-beaâ—er watery snowy wool-bearer tough bristly cared horrible fierce tropick frowning showring threatning black and such like To return therefore unto the Ibex although I do not dislike the opinion of them which take it to be a wilde Goat yet I have reserved it into this place because of many eminent differences as may appear by the story First these are bred in the Alpes and are of an admirable celerity although their heads be loaded with such horns as no other Beasts of their stature beareth For I do read in Eusiathius that their horns are sixteen palms long of five spans and one palm and sometimes â—eaven spans such was the horn consecrated at Delos being two cubits and a span long and six and twenty pounds in weight This Beast saith Polybius in his neck and hair is like a Buck-goat bearing a beard under his chin of a span long as thick as a Colts tail and in other parts of his body resembleth a Hart. These Beasts inhabit and keep their abode in the tops of those Mountains where the ice never thaweth or dissolveth for it loveth cold by nature otherwise it would be blinde for cold is agreeable to the eye sight and beauty It is a noble Beast and very fat In the small head and lean legs it resembleth a Hart the eyes are very fair and bright the colour yellowish his hoof cloven and sharp like wilde Goats It far excelleth a wilde Goat in leaping for no man will believe how far off or what long space it will leap except he saw it For there is no place so steep or cragged that if it afford him but so much space as his foot may stand on but he will pass over it with a very few jumps or leaps The Hunters drive them to the smooth and high Rocks and there they by enclosing them take them in ropes or toils if they cannot come near them with shot or swords When the Beast seeth his hunter which descendeth to him by some Rock he observeth very diligently and watcheth if he can see any distance or space betwixt him and the Rock yea but so much as his eye-sight can pierce through and if he can then he leapeth up and getteth betwixt the Hunter and the Rock and so casteth him down head-long and if he can espy no distance at all then doth he keep his standing until he be killed in that place The hunting of this Beast were very pleasant but that it is encumbred with much labour and many perils and therefore in these days they kill them with guns The Inhabitants of Valuis neer the River Sedunus take them in their infancy when they are young and tame them and until they be old they are contented to go and come with the tame Goats to pastune but in their older and 〈◊〉 age they return to their former wilde nature Aristotle affirmeth that they couple or engender together not by leaping upon each other but standing upright upon their hinder legs whereunto I cannot consent because the joynts and nerves of their hinder-legs will not be stretched to such a copulation and it may be that he or his relator had seen them playing together as Goats do standing upright and so took that gesture in their pastime for carnal copulation The female hath lost 〈◊〉 then the male but a greater body and her 〈◊〉 are very like to a wilde Goats When this Beast feeleth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of her death and perceived in that her end by some wound or course of nature approacheth and is at hand it is reported by the Hunters that the ascendeth to the top of some Mountain or high Rock and there fasteneth one of her horns in the same sleep place going round continually and never standing still until she have worn that horn asunder whereby she stayeth her self and so at length at the instant or point of death breaking her horn falleth down and perisheth And because they the among the Rocks it falleth out seldom that their bodies are found but many times when the Snow falleth from the Mountains in great and huge masses it meeteth wish a living 〈◊〉 and other wilde Beasts and to oppressing them 〈…〉 veth them down to the foot of the Hils or Mountains as it doth trees and small houses which are built upon the sides of them In Creet they make bows of the horns of these Beasts And concerning their taking it is not to be forgotten how the Hunter which persueth her from one rock to another is forced many times for the safegard of his own life to forsake his standing and to observe the Beast when it maketh force at him and to rid himself from danger of death by leaping upon his back and taking fast hold on his horns whereby he escapeth In the house of Pompey where the memorable Forrest of Gordianus was painted there were among other Beasts two hundred Ibices which Pompey gave unto the people at the day of his triumph for to make spoil thereof at their own pleasure The M 〈…〉 es of the Ibex Some do commend the bloud of the Ibex to be a very good remedy against the stone of the bladder being used in this manner First they divide it in parte and put one part of the bloud and about some six parts of Wine Apiat and Hony mixed together and do 〈…〉 them both together luke-warm and afterwards they reserve it in a clean vessel and the third day in the morning they give it unto the party to drink who is grieved and then they put him into a Bath about noon time and in the evening and this order is to be obse 〈…〉 for three days together for it will come to pass that in that space the Stone will be dissolved and turned into sand gravel and so by that means will have vent together with the urine There is also by the dung of the aforesaid Beast an excellent remedy against the Sciatica or Hip-gout by which that most excellent Physitian Ausonius himself was healed and many other lying desperate of remedy which is this to gather the dung of this Beast in the seventeenth day of the Moon neither is it any great matter whether you gather it in some part
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
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
seeing the Emperor was delighted with the Beasts of Marius and would now and then make mention of the Mule at length it came to a common jest to call a double diligent servant Mulus Mari 〈…〉 s. The Italians do commonly call those men Mules which are base born and not by lawful marriage Concerning the disposition of Mules it is well observed by Aristotle that Mules are always tame and if at any time they be more wilde they abate their untameable 〈…〉 re by drinking of Wine because by the operation of the Wine their heels and hard parts do resolve and grow soft by the same reason that Ape◠by drinking of Wine Mose their nails and men accustomed to drunkenness fall into palsies for there is such a dispersing and discussing nature in Wine that it dissolveth all nerves and hard things in the bodies of Beasts even as water dissolveth hard fruits and Pease and Vinegar maketh lead as soft as an Egge that it may be drawn through a Ring and such is the nature of Mules that after they have drunk Wine they feel themselves disarmed and therefore give over to resist because by kicking backwards they receive more harm then they give and thus the guiltiness of their own weakness maketh them gentle against their wills for otherwise they hate mankinde and are nothing so tractable as Horses For Varro saith that they have so much confidence in their heels that by them alone they kill Wolves when they come among them Mules were wont to be used for plowing and for carrying both of men and burthens but now in most parts of Europe Judges and great Princes ride upon them until they be old and then they sell them to the poor men who turn them into the Mountains where they suffer them to run wilde till their hoofs be hardned for long travails and then they take them up again They have been also accustomed to ploughing according to these verses Quantum mularum sulcus praecedit in arvo Tantum is praecurrit For the Mules did plough more speedily and come to the lands end more quickly then either the Ox or Horse And Martiall saith that they were used in Carts to draw Timber according to these verses Vixque datur longas Mulorum vincere mandras Quaeque trahi multo marmora fune vides They were also used in race at the games of Olympus as we have already shewed in the story of the Horse but that custom dyed quickly because that the Arcadians could not endure Mules The price of Mules was great for Crispine saith Juvenul gave six thousand pieces of mony for a Mule and yet he saith it was not well worth six pound the verses of Juvenal are these Crispinus Mulum sex millibus emit Aequantem sane paribus sestertia libris Vt perhihent qui de magnis majora loquuntur The Cappadocians payed to the Persians every year besides Silver and Gold fifteen hundred Horses two thousand Mules and fifty thousand Sheep but the Medians payed twice so much The dwarfish Mules called Ginni were also much set by not for use but only for delight as dwarfs are kept in Noblemens houses When Pysistratus the son of Hippocrates first of all affected Tyranny at Athens and laboured to get the government to himself as he came out of his Countrey being drawn with a Chariot by Mules he wounded himself and his Mules very grievously and so drave them into the Market place shewing his wounded body and Beasts unto the Athenians telling them that so he was wounded by his enemies and that he escaped death very narrowly but if it pleased them to grant him a gard of souldiers to defend his body he would take revenge upon their and his enemies whereunto they yeelded and he having gotten a Band of Souldiers under that pretence presently took upon him the government and Soveraignty To conclude this story of Mules I do read in Aelianus that Serpents do love to feed on the flesh of dead Mules and two things are very eminent in the nature of Mules one of their understanding and the other of their friendship Concerning the first Plutarch relateth this story of a Mule that was accustomed to carry Salt who upon a season going through a water fell down underneath his burden so that the Salt took wet afterwards the Beast perceived how by that means his extream load melted away and so became lighter and lighter afterward the Mule grew to this custom that whensoever he came loaded with Salt over that water he fell down in it for the easing of his carriage his Master perceiving his craft on a day he loaded him with Wool and Spunges and so the Beast coming over the water fell down as he was wont to do with his Salt and coming out of the water he felt his load to grow heavier then it was wont to do in stead of lessening whereat the Beast much mused and therefore never afterward durst lie down in the water for fear of the like increase of his load The other observation of their love and friendship ariseth from the Proverb Mutuum Muli scabunt that is Mules scratch one another and help one another in their extremity from whence cometh our proverb O 〈…〉 good turn asketh another and the Latine proverb Senes mutuum fricant old men rub one another which did arise upon this occasion as Adrian the Emperour so passed a long on a day by a bath he saw an old Souldier in the bath rubbing himself upon a Marble stone for want of a man to help him whereupon in pity of his case he gave him maintenance for himself and a man afterwards other old Souldiers seeing how well their fellow had sped went likewise into the bath before the Emperors eyes and rubbed themselves upon the Marble thinking to get as much favour and liberty as their fellow had gotten but the Emperor seeing them and perceiving their fetches bid them rub one another and thereupon came that proverb And thus much fot the natural discourse of Mules now followeth the medicinal The Medicines of the Mule The dust wherein a Mule shall turn or rowl himself being gathered up and spread or sprinkled upon the body of any one who is ardently and fervently in love will presently asswage and quench his inflaming desire A man or woman being poysoned and put into the belly of a Mule or Camel which is new killed will presently expel away the force of the venom or poyson and will confirm and make strong their decayed spirits and all the rest of their members For as much as the very heat of those Beasts is an Antidote or preservative against poyson The skin or hide of a Mule being put unto places in any ones body which are burned with fire doth presently heal and cure the same it doth also heal sores and grievous ulcers which are not come unto Impostumes The same is an excellent remedy for those whose feet are worn
the appointment and direction of his Keeper When he is angry he beateth the ground with his foot and they were wont to hang a board of a foot broad wherein were droven many sharp nails with the points towards the head so that when the Beast did offer to fight with his own force he woundeth his fore-head They were wont also to hang a shrimp at the horn of the Ram and then the Wolf will never set upon their flocks And concerning their horns which are the noblest parts of their body most regarded yet I must speak more for there was wont to be every year amongst the Indians a fight betwixt men wilde Beasts Bulls and tame Rams and a murtherer in ancient time was wont to be put to death by a Ram for by art the Beast was so instructed never to leave him till he had dashed out his brains It is reported of a Rams horns consecrated at Delos brought from the coast of the red Sea that weighed twenty and six pounds being two cubits and eight fingers in length There was a Ram in the flocks of Poricles that had but one horn whereupon when Lampon the Poet had looked he said Ex duabas quae in urbe vigetent factionibus fore ut altera obscurata ad anum Periclem apud quem visum foret portentum resideret civitatis potentia That whereas there were two contrary raging factions in the City it should happen that Pericles from whose possessions that monster came should obscure the one and take the whole government of the City It is reported by Rasis Albertus that if the horns of a Ram be buryed in the earth they will turn in to the herb Spirage for rottenness and putrefaction is the mother of many creatures and herbs There was as Aristotle reporteth in his Wonders a childe born with a Rams head and it is affirmed by Ovid that Medea inclosed an old decrepit Ram in a brazen vessel with certain kinde of medicines and afterwards at the opening of the said vessel she received a young Lamb bred upon the Metamorphofis of his body Concerning Phrixus whereof we have spoken in the former part of our discourse of the Sheep there is this story He was the son of Athaman and Nepheles Afterward his mother being dead he feared the treachery of his mother in law and step-dame Inus and therefore with his sister Helle by the consent of their Father he swam over a narrow arm of the Sea upon the back of a Ram carrying a golden fleece which before that time his Father had bestowed upon him His sister Helle being terrified with the great roaring of the water fell off from the Rams back into the Sea and thereof came the name of Hellespont of Helle the Virgin and Pontus the Sea but he came lately to Colchis to King Aetes where by the voyce of a Ram who spake like a man he was commanded to offer and dedicate him to Jupiter surnamed Phryxus and also that golden fleece was hanged up and reserved in the Temple of Colchis until Jason by the help of Medea aforesaid did fetch it away and the Ram was placed among the Stars in his true shape and was called Phrixeus of Phrixus who was the Father of the Phrygian Nation Of this fabulous tale there are many explications and conjectural tales among the learned not unprofitable to be rehearsed in this place Coelius and Palaephatus say that the Ram was a ship whose badge was a Ram provided by Athaman for his son to sail into Phrygia and some say that Aries was the name of a man that was his foster-father by whose counsel and charge he was delivered from his step-mother Inus Other say that there was a Book of parchment made of a Rams skin containing the perfect way to make gold called Alchimy and thereby Phrixus got away But in Athens there was reserved the Image of this Phrixus offering the Ram upon which he was born over the Sea to the God Laphystius and whereas there are in Colchis certain Rivers out of which there is gold growing and oftentimes found whereupon some of them have received their name as Chrysorrhoa and the men of that Countrey said to be greatly inriched thereby they gave occasion of all the Poetical fictions about the golden fleece There are in some places of Africk certain Sheep whose wooll hath the colour of gold and it may be that from this occasion came the talk of golden fleeces It is said that when Atreus reigned in Peloponnesus he vowed to Diana the best whatsoever should be brought forth in his flock and it fortuned that there was yeaned a golden Lamb and therefore he neglecting his vow did not offer it but shut it up in his chest Afterward when he gloryed and boasted of that matter his brother Thyestes greatly envyed him and counterfeiting love to his wife Acrope received from her the golden Lamb. Then being in possession thereof â—he contradicted Atreus before the people affirming that he that had the golden Lamb ought to be King and to reign among them and so laid a wager of the whole Government or Kingdom thereof with Atreus whereunto he yeelded but Jupiter by Mercury discovered the fraud and to Thyestes took him to flight and the Lamb was commanded to be offered to the Sun and so I conclude this discourse with the verses of Martial Mollia Phryxei secuisti colla mariti Hoc meruit tunicam qui tibi saepe debit And seeing that I have entered into the discourse of these Poetical fables or rather riddles which seem to be outwardly cloathed with impossibilities I trust that the Reader will give me leave a little to prosecute other Narrations as that Neptune transforming himself into a Ram deceived and defloured the Virgin Bisalpis and the Ancients when they swore in jest and merriment were wont to swear by a Ram or a Goose When the Gyants waged war with the Gods all of the Gods as the Poets write took unto them several forms and Jupiter the form of a Ram whereof Ovid writeth he was called Jupiter Ammonius Vnde recurâ—â—â— Nunc quoque formatis Lybis est cum cornibus Ammon 〈…〉 There be some that say that at what time Hercules desired very earnestly to see Jupiter whereunto he was very unwilling yet he cut off a Rams head and pulled off his thick woolly rough skin and put it upon him and so in that likeness appeared to Hercules and for this cause the Thebanes to this day do not kill rams but spare them like sanctified things except one once in a year which they sacrifice to Jupiter and say that Jupiter was called Ammonius aries because that his answers were mystical secret and crooked like a Rams horn Now concerning the sacrificing of Rams we know that God himself in his Word permitted the same to the people of the Jews and therefore it cannot be but material
banished her into the Island of Pharus which was full of all manner of Serpents and yet taking pity on her for her simplicity gave her a certain herb whereby she drove away all Serpents For it is said when the Serpents and venomous Beasts do but smell the same herb they instantly hide their heads in the earth Helen coming into that Island planted the same there and was therefore called by the Inhabitants after her own name Helenium which the skilful Herborists at this day affirm to grow in Pharus Unto this discourse of the taming of Serpents I may add yet more strange things if any thing be strange in the nature of this world And those are some Histories of the familiarity of Men Women and Serpents Alexander was thought to be begotten of a Serpent for it is said that on a time there was found a great Serpent upon his Mother Olympia as she was sleeping and some say for the honour both of the Mother and the Son that this Serpent was Jupiter turned into the likeness of a Serpent as we read he changed himself into many other shapes And the like story unto this is alledged of Soipio Africanus his mother who long time remained barren without the fruit of the womb insomuch as P. Scipio her husband utterly despaired of posterity It hapned one day as she was in her bed her husband being absent there came a great Snake and lay beside her even in the presence of the servants and family who being mightily astonished thereat cryed out with loud voyces for fear whereat the woman awaked and the Snake slid away invisibly P. Scipio hearing this report at his return home went to the Wizards to understand the secret or signification of this prodigie who making a sacrifice gave answer that it betokened prolification or birth of children and thereupon followed the birth of Scipio Africanus We read also in Plutarch of certain Serpents lovers of young Virgins who after they were taken and insnared shewed all manner of lustful vitious and amorous gestures of uncleanness and carnality and by name there was one that was in love with one Aetolia a Virgin who did accustom to come unto her in the night time sliding gently all over her body never harming her but 〈…〉 one glad of such acquaintance tarryed with her in that dalliance till the morning and then would depart away of his own accord the which thing being made manifest unto the Guardians and Tutors of the Virgin they removed her unto another Town The Serpent missing his love sought her up and down three or four days and at last met her by chance and then he saluted her not as he was wont with fawning and gentle sliding but fierce assaulted her with grim and austere countenance flying to her hands and binding them with the spire of his body fast to her sides did softly with his tail beat upon her backer parts Whereby was collected some token of his chastisement unto her who had wronged such a Lover with her wilful absence and disappointment It is also reported by Aelianus that Egemon in his verses writeth of one Aleva a Thessalian who feeding his Oxen in Thessaly near the Fountain Haemonius there fell in love with him a Serpent of exceeding bigness and quantity and the same would come unto him and softly lick his face and golden hair without doing him any manner of hurt at all These and such like things do evidently prove that Serpents are not only involuntarily tamed by Men but also willingly keep quarter with them yeelding to the first Ordinance of the Creator that made them subjects and vassals to men And thus much shall suffice to have spoken in this place concerning the first cteation of Serpents Of the natural Generation of SERPENTS and their several Originals IT being thus cleared that Serpents were at the beginning created by GOD and are ruled by men it now followeth that we should in the next place talk of the matter of their beginning and the means of their continuance ever since their Creation First therefore it is most plain in Genesis that the Earth by the vertue of the Word of GOD did produce all Creeping things and among them Serpents but since that time they have engendered both naturally and also prodigiously As concerning their constitution it is held to be most cold above all other living Creatures and therefore Pliny writeth that they have neither heat nor bloud nor sweat Hereunto subscribeth Galen and Rasis yet Avicen seemeth to affirm the contrary Mercurial decideth this controversie and proveth that Serpents are extreamly cold and their bodies outwardly moist First because those which are stung and poysoned by Serpents are oppressed with an unnatural cold which overcometh natural heat and distendeth all their parts vexing them intolerably Secondly there can be assigned no other reason why these Creatures hide themselves four moneths in the year but only their natural cold making them so tender as they are altogether unfit to endure any external frigidity Thirdly if a man take a Snake or a Serpent into his handling in the midst of Summer and warmest part of the year yet shall he perceive that they are cold in a palpable manner being alive which is not a quality competible to any other creature Fourthly seeing that bloud is the proper and native seat of all heat in natural living bodies Serpents having a very small quantity of bloud must also have a smaller proportion of heat and therefore it followeth unavoidably that the eminency of their temperament is cold in the highest degree above all other living Creatures And that their bodies be outwardly moist it appeareth saith Isidorus by this that when they slide along upon the Earth which way soever they go they leave behinde them in their train or path a slimy humour By this therefore it is confirmed that they are of the Earth and of the Water as afterward we shall shew in the description of their kindes But yet there are prodigious beginnings of Serpents whereof some seem to be true and other to be fabulous The first sort are those which Pliny affirmeth to be engendred of the marrow in the back-bone of a man and that indifferently out of the dead bodies of good and evill men Yet some more modest thinking it unreasonable that the remnants of a good meek man should beget or be turned into so barbarous venomous and cruel a nature rather taking it for granted that peace and quietness is the reward of such persons attribute these beginnings or alterations to the bodies of wicked men as a just deserved punishment of their former evils that the reversions of their bodies should after death turn into Serpents whom they resembled being alive in the venomous fraud of their spirits Of this Ovid speaketh Sunt quae cum clauso putrefacta est Spina sepulchro Mutari credunt humanas angue medullas Which may be thus Englished Some think
was in the Countrey to fetch water where a great Serpent came and killed them at last Cadmus not finding their return went likewise to the same Fountain where he he found all his men slain and the Serpent approaching to assail him but he quickly killed it Afterward he was admonished by Pallas to strew the teeth of the same Serpent upon the ground which he performed and then out of those teeth saith Ovid arose a multitude of Armed men who instantly fell to fight one with the other in such cruel and bloudy manner that at the last there were but five of them all left alive which five by the will of Pallas were preserved to be the Fathers of the people of Thebes And so Apolio 〈…〉 us faigneth that with the help of men bred of Serpent teeth came Jason to obtain the Golden Fleece They faign also that Achelous when he strove with Hercules about Deianira turned himself into divers shapes and last of all into a Serpent or as some say into a River So likewise Cadmus afore-said being overcome with the sight and sense of his own miseries and the great calamities that befell to his Daughters and Nephews forsook Thebes and came into Illyrium where it is said that he earnestly desired of the Gods to be turned into a Serpent because a Serpent was the first original of all his extremities Antipater faigneth Jupiter to be turned into a Serpent and Medusa refusing the love of Neptune is also faigned by Ovid to be turned into a Serpent when he writeth Hanc pelagi rector templo vitiasse Minervae Dicitur aversa est castos Aegide vultus Nota Jovis texit neve hoc impune fuisset Gorgoneum crinem turpes mutavit in Hydros Nunc quoque ut attonitos formidine terreat hostes Pectore in adverso quos fecit sustinet angues In English thus It is reported how she should abus'd by Neptune be In Pallas Church from which foul fact Joves daughter turn'd her eye And left it should unpunisht be she turnd her seemly hair To loathsome Snakes the which the more to put her foes in fear Before her breast continually she in her hand doth bear Pterius writeth that the myrtle rod was not lawful to be brought into the Temple of Hecate and that a Vine branch was extended over the head of her sign and whereas it was not lawful to name Wine they brought it into her Temple under the name of milk and that therein continually lived harmless Serpents The reason of all this was because that her own Father Faunus fell in love with her whom she resisted with all modesty although she were beaten with a Myrtle rod and made to drink Wine but at last the beastly father was transformed into a Serpent and then he oppressing her with the spires of his winding body ravished her against her minde These and such like stories and Fables are extant about the beginnings of Serpents all which the Reader may consider to stir up his minde to the earnest and ardent meditation of that power that of stones can make men of Rocks water of water Wine and of small Rods great Serpents Then thus having expressed the Original of Serpents in their Creation it followeth now to add the residue of this Chapter about their generation It is a general rule that all Beasts wanting feet and have long bodies perform their work of carnal copulation by a mutual embracing one of the other as Lampreys and Serpents And it is certain that two Serpents in this action seem to be one body and two heads for they are so indivisibly united and conjoyned together and the frame of their body is altogether unapt for any other manner of copulation When they are in this action they send forth a rank savour offensive to the sense of them that do perceive it And although like unto many fishes they want stones yet have they two open passages wherein lyeth their generative seed and which being filled provoketh them to their venereal lust the seed it self being like a milky humor and when the female is under the male she hath also her passages to receive the seed as it were into the cells of her womb and there it is framed into an Egge which she hideâ—h in the earth an hundred in a cluster about the quantity of a Birds egg or a great bead such as are used some-time by women And this is general for all Serpents except Vipers who lay no Egges but hatch in their wombs their young ones as we shall shew at large in their particular history The Serpent having laid her Egge sitteth upon them to hatch them at several times and in a year they are perfected into young ones But concerning the supposed copulation of Serpents and Lampreys I will not meddle in this place reserving that discourse to the History of Fishes and now only it sufficeth in this place to name it as a feigned invention although Saint Ambrose and other ancient Writers have believed the same yet Aihenaeus and of late days P. Jovlus have learnedly and sufficiently declared by unanswerable arguments the clean contrary The Serpents love their Egges most tenderly and do every one of them know their own even among the confused heaps of the multitude and no less is their love to their young ones whom for their safeguard sometime they receive into their mouths and suffer them to run into their bellies And thus much for the generation of Serpents Of the Names of Serpents and their several parts of Anatomy BY Serpents we understand in this discourse all venomous Beasts whether creeping without legs as Adders and Snakes or with legs as Crocodiles and Lizards or more neerly compacted bodies as Toads Spiders and Bees following herein the warant of the best ancient Latinists as namely Cornelius Celsus Pliny and Apuleius do call Lice Serpents in that their relation of the death of Pherecydes the Syrian who was the Praeceptor of Pythagoras of whom it is said Serpentibus periisse to have perished by Serpents when on the contrary it is manifested he was killed by Lice Aristotle and Galen define a Serpent to be animal sanguineum pedibus orbatum oviparum that is a bloudy Beast without feet yet laying egges and so properly is a Serpent to be understood The Hebrews call a Serpent Nachasch Darcon and Cheveia by the Chaldees so also Thanintus and Schephiphon by the Hebrews as Rabbi Solomon Munster and Pagnine write The Grecians Ophidi and Ophis although this word do also signifie a Viper in particular even as the Latine Serpens or Serpula do sometime a Snake and sometime an Adder The Arabians Haie and Hadaie for all manner of Serpents And Testuh or Tenstu or Agestim for Serpents of the Wood likewise Apartias and Atussi The Germans Ein schlang which word seemeth to be derived from Anguis by an usual figure and after the German fashion preposing Sch. The French call it Vn serpent the
the ancient Galles were wont to anoint their arrows with the juyce of white Hellebore with which they they did great mischief Pliny affirmeth the same to be used of the Scythian Nation The Scythians saith he do anoint their Arrow-heads with the corrupt poysonous and filthy stained dreggy bloud of Vipers and with Mans bloud mixed together so that the wound seemeth to be incurable And to this alludeth Quintus Serenus Cuspide non quisquam longa neque caede sarissae Fulmine non gladii volucris nec felle sagittae Quà m cito Vipereo potis est affligier ictu Quare aptam dicamus opem succosque manentes Which may be thus Englished There is no Man with Spear or Launces point Sharp edge of Sword or swift Arrows might To kill so soon as Vipers force doth dint Then fit is the aid and means that it acquite There is a certain kinde of people to whom it is naturally given either by touching or sucking to cure the wounding of venomous Serpents called Psylli a people of Lybia and Marsi people of Italy bordering upon the Samnites and Aequiculania and those that were called by the Ancient Writers Ophiogenes which dwelt about Hellespont as both Pliny Aelianus and Aeneas Sylvius do witness Callias in his tenth Book of the history which he wrote of Agathocles the Syracusan saith that if any man were bitten of a Serpent if either a Lybian by birth or any Psyllus whose body was accounted venom to Serpents was either purposely sent for or came that way by chance and saw the wound but indifferently and not very sore tormenting the Patient that if he did lay but a little of his spittle upon the biting or stroke that presently the aking and pain would be mitigated But if he found the sick Patient in great and intolerable anguish and pain he took this course iâ— his curation that first he would suck and draw up into his mouth a great deal of water and first riâ—se and wash his own mouth therewith and after this pouring it all out of his own mouth into a cup he would give it to the poor wounded person to sup off Lastly if the malignity and strength of the venom had crept and spread it self very far and deep into the body so that there was danger of death then would he strip himself stark naked and so lie and spread his body upon the naked body of the sick person and so by this way of touching break the malice and quality of the poyson and give perfect cure to the man For more confirmation hereof Nicander Colophonius is sufficient auâ—hority whose verses I will here describe Audivi Libycos Psyllos quos aspera Syrtis Serpentumque ferax patria alit populos Non ictu inflictum diro morsuve venenum Laedere quin laesis ferre opem reliquis Non vi radicum proprio sed corpore juncto Which is in English thus The people Psylli bred in Lybia Land Neer Syrtes where all Serpents do abound Are never stung nor bitten by that band Vnto their harm or any bodies wound But straight one naked man anothers burt doth heal No roots but bodies vertue danger doth repeal Some of the Greeks have left in writing that the Idolatrous Priests and Prelates of the God Vulcan that dwelt in Isle Lemnos had a special vertue given them to cure those who were wounded by Serpents whereupon it is said that Philoctetes being wounded by a Serpent before the Altar of Apollo went thither to be remedied of his hurt Cornelius Celsus saith flatly that the people called Psylli had no such peculiar gift in healing them that were hurt of Serpents either by sucking or touching the place but being boldly adventurous had presumed thereby to attempt and do that which others of less courage had no stomach to do for whosoever durst be so confident as to follow their example should be himself out of danger and assure the other safe and free from fear of further hurt Galen in his book De Theriaca ad Pisonem manifestly sheweth that the Marsi who lived in his days had no such special quality against the poyson of Serpents but that with their crafty dealing and knavish tricks they beguiled the common people For saith he those Juglers and Deceivers do never hunt Vipers at any convenient time but long after the prime of the year and Spring wherein they cast their skins when as they are weak and have lost their strength and are very faint then do they take them and so by long use and continuance teach them and inure themselves one to another and bring it so to pass that they wil feed them with strange and unaccustomed meats to their nature yea they will permit them to tast of flesh and constrain them to be continually gnawing and biting of the same that by their so labouring and striving their poyson may by little and little be spent and purged out of their bellies Besides all this they give them a kinde of bread made of milk and flour that by this means the holes in their teeth may be stopped and so by this laborious course of dieting them they bring the matter so about that their bitings are very weak and do small annoyance to any that they strike at So that the seers and lookers on account it a thing exceeding common reason and nature and blaze it abroad for a miracle Matthiolus also a Physitian of late days agreeth with him in this point affirming expresly that these kinde of trumperies and crafty fetches are much put in practise in these times by such bold and impudent Quacksalvers Mountebanks and couseners of plain Countrey people who dare face it out lie faign and cog that they are descended from the race and linage of Saint Paul wherein they shew themselves notorious lyers c. Thus far Matthiolus Serpents do sometimes creep into the mouths of them that are fast asleep whereupon a certain Poet saith Non mihi tunc libeat dorso jacuisse per herbdnt Which may be Englished thus Then would I not upon the grass Lie on my back where Serpents pass For if a man sleep open mouthed they slily convey themselves in and winde and roll them round in compass so taking up their lodging in the stomach and then is the poor wretched man miserably and pitifully tormented his life is more bitter then death neither feeleth he any release or mitigation of his pain unless it be by feeding this his unwelcome guest in his guest-chamber with good store of milk and such other meats as Serpents best like of The only remedy against this mischief is to eat good store of Garlick as Erasmus in his Dial. De Amicitia saith Cardan saith how that it was reported for a certain that a Viper entring into a Mans mouth being asleep and gaping with his mouth the venomous Worm was expelled only with burning of Leather and so receiving the stinking fume at his mouth the Viper not enduring it he
escaped with life But of this more in our discourse of the Viper A certain man called Cissâ—s being very devout in the service and much addicted to the worship of the God called Serapis being treacherously wound in and intrapped by the crafty wiliness of a certain woman which first he loved and afterward marryed when by her means he had eaten some Serpents egges he was miserably vexed and torn and rent with disquiet and torment through all his body so that he seemed to be in great hazard of present death Whereupon forthwith repairing and praying heartily to this his God for his help and deliverance he received answer that he must go and buy a live Lamprey and thrust his hand into the vessel or place where it was kept and preserved which he forthwith did and the Lamprey caught fast hold on his hand biting hardly and holding fast by the teeth and at length when she was pulled from her fast hold the sickness and grievous torment of his body was plucked away and he freely delivered from that threatning danger Thus far Aelianus The Conclusion of this General Discourse of SERPENTS HAving thus discoursed of the medicinal qualities in Serpents and the remedies which Almighty GOD in nature hath provided against their venom now for a conclusion I will add some other natural uses of them and shut up all in Moralities and in sundry ways to take them There were certain Amazons as Pierius noteth that in their warlike preparations and Arms did use the skins of Serpents And to the intent that this may not seem strange the Tragladytes did â—at Serpents and Lyzards for they lived in Caves in stead of Houses and their voyce was not a significant voyce but a kinde of scrietching like gnashing And for these causes Serpents are very much afraid of any one of this Nation Likewise certain of the Candeans were called Ophiophagi that is Eaters of Serpents and one part of the people of Arabia eat Snakes But in India Ethiopia and an Island in the Ocean found out by Jambolus there are Serpents which are harmless and their flesh very sweet and pleasant to be eaten So are there in Macinum a Province of Asia In Manzi in the upper India and Caraia they sell the flesh of Serpents in open Markets These Serpents are called Juanae and the common people are forbidden to eat them because they are very delicate even as Pheasants Partridges and Peacocks are in France Yet is there but one way to dress them which is to roul them in Lard and so to seethe them For first they bowel them then wash them and fold them up together round putting them into a pot no bigger then to receive their quantity upon them they cast Pepper with water and so seethe them upon wood and coals that will not smoak With this Lard there is made a broth sweeter then any Nectar which they use in many banquets of great account But for the taking of Serpents I will yet add one or two more experiments wherein the Ancients revenged themselves upon these irreconcileable enemies of Mankinde They did use to set into the earth a deep pot whereinto all venomous creatures would gather and hide themselves then came they suddenly and stopped the mouth of that vessel whereby they inclosed all that were taken and so making a great fire cast the said pot of venomous Serpents into the same which consumed them all Otherwise they took a living Serpent and digged in the earth a deep Well or pit so sleep as nothing at the bottom could climbe up to the top thereof into this pit they would cast this Serpent and with her a brand of fire by means whereof the enclosed Serpent would fall a hissing for her life at the hearing whereof her fellows of the same kinde were thereby easily invited to come at her call to give her relief as we have shewed elsewhere who finding the noise in the bottom of the pit do slide down of their own accord whereby they likewise intrap themselves in the same pit of destruction But the Juglers or Quack-salvers take them by another course for they have a staffe slit at one end like a pair of tongs those stand open by a pin now when they see a Serpent Viper Adder or Snake they set them upon the neck neer the head and pulling forth the pin the Serpent is inevitably taken and by them loosed into a prepared vessel in which they keep her and give her meat It is reported that if a Serpent be strucken with a Reed she standeth still at the first blow as if she were astonished and so gathereth herself together but if she be so strucken the second or third time as one delivered from her astonishment and fear she recollecteth her wits and strength and slideth away The like observation unto this is that of the Ancients that a Serpent cannot be drawn out of her den by the right hand but by the left for they say if one lay hold on her tail by the right hand she will either slide farther into the earth from him or else suffer herself to be pulled in pieces never turning again and therefore saith mine Author Non cedit trahenti sed elabitur fugiens aut certe abrumpitur she yeeldeth not to him that draweth her but slideth away flying from him or else suffereth herself to be pulled in pieces in the combate The sundry Hieroglyphicks statues figures Images and other moral observations about Serpents are next here to be expressed which the Ancients in their Temples Shields Banners Theatres and publique places had erected for their honours and dignity And first of all in the Temple of Delphos near the Oracle there was placed the Serpent which provoked Apollo to fight with him wherein it was by him slain And the Hermopolitans did reserve the Image of Typhon in a Sea-horse whereupon sat fighting a Hawk and a Serpent by the Sea-horse they signified the Monster Typhon by the other beasts as namely the Hawk and the Serpent how by this principality and government which he had gotten by violence he troubled both himself and others Hercules had in his shield certain Serpents heads pictured with these verses Bis sena hic videas stridentibus effera flammis Colla venenato vultu maculosa draconum Tum magis offenso spirantia gutture virus Quam magis Alcides effuso sanguine pugnat Which may be Englished thus Of Dragons heads twise six here maist thou see Raging amongst the flames with poysoned spotted face Casting most venom forth when they enraged be As when Alcides saw his bloud distil apace And so Virgil saith of Aventinus Clypeoque imsigne parentum Centum angues cinctamque gerit Serpentibus Hydram That is to say His shield an hundred Snakes his Fathers crest An Hydra in their compass is entest Oscus which raigned among the Tyrrhenians gave in his Standard and Coat of Arms a Serpent Now the
in the flesh which if it do very deep then death hath sometimes followed as Nicander writeth in his Theriacis In like manner the people of the old World that we may prove the sting of Bees to be converted to some good use did as Suidas writeth punish those persons who were found guilty of cousenage and deceitfull counterfeiting of merchandize after this sort First they stripped the offender stark naked anoynting his body all over with Honey then setting him in the open Sun with his hands and feet fast bound that by this means being tormented with Flies Bees and scorching beams of the Sun he might endure punishment pain and death due to his lewd and wicked life With which kinde of punishment and torture the Spaniards do grievously vex the poor naked Islanders of America at this day now called the West-Indies who are under their rule and government not for justice sake as those Ancients did but for satisfaction and fulfilling of their barbarous wills and beastly tyranny that they might seem to be more cruell then cruelty it self Nonius faith that if the herb Balm called Apiastrum be beaten and anoynted with Oyl upon the stinged place that there will ensue no hurt thereby Florentius counselleth the gatherer of Honey to anoynt himself with the juice of Marsh-mallowes for by that means he may safely and without fear take away the Combes But the juice of any Mallow will do as much and especially if it be mixed with Oyl for it both preserveth from stinging and besides it remedieth the stinged But admit that Bees by their stinging do vexe and disease us yet notwithstanding the dead Bees so found in the Honey do speedily bring cure to that hurt if they be duly applyed abating and taking away all the pain and poyson What should I say No Creature is so profitable none lesse sumptuous GOD hath created them and a little money and cost will maintain them and small provision will content them They live almost in all places yea even in Forrests Woods and Mountains both rich and poor by their good husbandry do gather good customs and pensions by them they paying as all men know very large rents for their dwelling houses and yet for all their tribute they pay a man need neither keep one servant the more for the gathering of it nor set on pot the oftner Merula saith that Varro gathered yeerly five thousand pound weight of Honey and that in a small Village of Spain not exceeding one acre of ground he was wont to gain by Honey there gathered ten thousand Sesterties which is of our English Coyn about fifty pounds We are furnished also out of their work-houses or Shops with Waxe Sandracha Bee-glew Combs and dregs of Wax which no Common-wealth can well spare To speak nothing of the examples of their vertues and noble properties being no lesse wholsome for the soul then these others are for the good provision and maintenance of our life and for nourishment of our bodies necessary and commodious Now for the conservation of Bees it is very meet as Pliny writeth that we come by them lawfully and by honest means that is either by gift or by buying of them for being taken away by theft they will not prosper with us even as the hearb called Rue being stolne will very hardly or never grow Furthermore to keep these good pay-masters and to make them in love with you you must remove from their Hives mouthes unlucky mischievous and deceitfull people and idle persons that have nothing to do causing them to stand further off As also all those that are distayned with whoredome or infected with the disease called Gonorrhoea or the fluxe of menstrues bathes or any thing that smelleth of smoak mud dung or ordure of Cattell men or beasts houses of Office sinks or kitchens Mundifie and correct the air oftentimes infected with the breath and vapour of Toads and Serpents by burning of Balm Thyme or Fennel having great care to keep them neat clean and quiet Destroy all Vermine and seekers to prey upon their Honey robbers pillers and pollers and if at any time they be sick give them physick Now the signs of their unhealthinesse as of all other living creatures are known by three things that is from the action offended the outward affect of the body and excrements For their cheerfulnesse being gone sluggish dulnesse a giddy and vertiginous pace often and idle standing before the mouth of the Hive lack of strength wearinesse lithernesse languishing and want of spirit to do any businesse detestation of Flowers and Honey long watchings and continuall sleepings unaccustomed noyses and hummings are sure arguments that Bees are not in good health As also if they be somewhat rough not fine and trim dry and unpleasant in handling not soft harsh and rugged not delicate and tender if their Combes be infected with any manner of filthy corrupt and noysome savour and that their excrements melt stink and be full of worms carrying dead carkases daily out of their houses that they have no regard to their Bees and Bee-hives it is a certain token that they are sick and that some epidemicall generall Pestilence or plague rageth amongst them whereof that famous Poet Virgil hath very elegantly but confusedly touched some part in the fourth Book of his Georgicks in these following Verses Si verò quoniam lapsus Apibus quoque nostris Vita tulit tristi languebunt corpâ—rae morbo I 〈…〉 non dubiis poteris cognâ—seere signis Continuo est agris aliâ—s color horrida vultum Deformat maties tum corporalucâ— câ—rentum Exportant tectis tristia funera ducunt Aut illae pedibus connexa ad limina pendent Aut intus clausis cunctantur in aedibus omnes Ignavaeque fame contracto frigore pigrae Tum sonus auditur gravior tractimque susurrant Frigidus at quando silvis immurmurat auster Vt mare solicitum stridet refluentibus undis Aestuat aut clausis rapidus fornacibus igniâ— In English thus The life of Bees is subject unto fall Their bodies languish with diseases sad This by undoubted signs discern you shall Their bodies then with other colour is clad A leannesse rough doth then deform their face Then doth the living bring dead bodies out And for their fellowes make a funerall place Mourning sad exequies their dwellings all about Or else with feet in feet they hang upon The threshold of their Hive or else abide Close within doors not looking on the Sun Tell sloth by cold and famine their life up dry'd Then also is their sound and voice more great Drawing solt like a Southern winde in woods Or fire enclosed in burning furnace heat Or as in t ' Sea falls back the sliding flouds And so the sicknesses of Bees being evidently known plainly perceived and cured they will live many yeers although Aristotle Theophrastus Pliny Virgil Varro Columella Cardan and finally all Authors would make us beleeve that they seldome attain to nine years
of them then he is to adventure upon a man in compleat Armour and therefore all the people plant great store of these and also bear them in their hands when they travail There be many who in the hunting and prosecuting of these Crocodiles do neither give themselves to run away from them nor once to turn aside out of their common path or road but in a foolish hardinesse give themselves to combat with the Beast when they might very well avoid the danger but many times it hapneth that they pay dearly for their rashnesse and repent too late the too much reputation of their own manhood for whiles with their spears and sharp weapons they think to pierce his sides they are deceived for there is no part of him penetrable except his belly and that he keepeth safe enough from his enemies blunting upon his scales no lesse hard then plates of Iron all the violence of their blows and sharpnesse of weapons but clubs beetles and such like weapons are more irksome to him when they be set on with strength battering the scales to his body and giving him such knocks as doth dismay and astonish him Indeed there is no great use of the taking of this Serpent nor profit of merchandize cometh thereby his skin and flesh yeelding no great respect in the world In ancient time they took them with hooks baited with flesh or else inclosed them with nets as they do fishes and now and then with a strong Iron instrument cast out a boat down in the water upon the head of the Crocodile And among all other there is this one worthy to be related The Hunter would take off the skin from a Swines back and therewithal cover his hook whereby he allured and inticed the Serpent into the midst of the River and there making it fast he went afterward to the next watering place and there holding another Hog did beat and smite him till he cryed ardently with which voyce or cry the Crocodile being moved goeth presently to the bait and swalloweth it up and maketh after the noise at last coming to the land the Hunter with valiant courage and diligence casteth mud and dirt into his eyes and so blindeth him that he may oppresse and kill him with ease Leo Afric relateth also this means or way to take Crocodiles There be many Trees planted upon the banks of Nilus unto one of these there is a long and strong rope tyed and at the end of the same there is fastened a hook of a cubit long and a finger in quantity unto this hook for a bait is tyed a Ram or a Goat which being set close to the River and tormented with the hook upon which it is fastened cryeth out amain by hearing of whose voyce the hunger-greedy Crocodile is raised out of his den and invited as he thinketh to a rich prey so he cometh although it self of a trecherous nature yet suspecteth not any other and swalloweth the bait in which he findeth a hook not to be digested Then away he striveth to go but the strength of the rope stayeth his journey for as fast as the bait was to the rope and hook so fast is he also ensnared and tyed unto it which while he waveth and straineth to unloose and break he wearyeth himself in vain And to the intent that all his strength may be spent against the tree and the rope the Hunters are at one end thereof and cause it to be cast to and fro pulling it in and now letting it go again now terrifying the Beast with one noise and fear and anon with another so long as they perceive in him any spirit of moving or resistance so being quieted to him they come and with clubs spears beetles staves and such manner of instruments pierce through the most tenderest parts of his body and so destroy him Peter Martyr hath also other means of taking Crocodiles Their nature is that when they goe to the land to forrage and seek after a prey they cannot return back again but by the same footsteps of their own which they left imprinted in the sand whereupon when the Countrey people perceive these footsteps instantly with all the hast they can make they come with spades and mattocks and make a great ditch and with boughs cover the same so as the Serpent may not espy it and upon the boughs they also again lay sand to avoid all occasion of deceit or suspicion of fraud at his return then when all things are thus prepared they hunt the Crocodile by the foot untill they finde him then with noises of bells pans kettels and such like things they terrifie and make him return as fast as fear can make him run towards the waters again and they follow him as neer as they can until he falleth into the ditch where they come all about him and kill him with such instruments or weapons as they have prepared for him and so being slain they carry him to the great City Cair where for their reward they receive ten pieces of gold which amounteth to the value of ten nobles of our English coin There have been some brought into that City alive as P. Martyr affirmeth whereof one was as much as two Oxen and two Camels could bear and draw and at the same time there was one taken by this devise before expressed which had entered into a Village in Saetum neer Nilus and swallowed up alive three young Infants sleeping in one Cradle the said Infants scarcely dead were taken again out of his belly and soon after when no more tokens of life appeared they were all three buryed in a better and more proper grave of the earth Then also there was another slain and out of his belly was taken a whole Ram not digested nor any part of him consumed and the hand of a woman which was bitten or torn off from her body above the wrist for there was upon the same a Bracelet of Brasse We do read that Crocodiles have been taken and brought alive to Rome The first that ever brought them thither was Marcus Scaurus who in the games of his aedility brought five forth and shewed them to the people in a great pond of water which he had provided only for that time and afterward Heliogabalus and Antoninus Pius The Indians have a kinde of Crocodile in Ganges which hath a horn growing out of his nose like a Rhinocerot unto this Beast they cast condemned men to be devoured for in all their executions they want not the help of men seeing they are provided of Beasts to do the office of Hang-men Aurelius Festivus writeth that Firmus a Tyrant of Egypt being condemned to Nilus to be devoured by Crocodiles beforehand bought a great quantity of the fat of Crocodiles and so stripping himself stark naked laid the same over his body so he went among the Crocodiles and escaped death for this savage Beast being deceived with the savour of its own
and to go away with him Pindus also being no less glad of the company of the Dragon did daily give unto him the greatest part of his hunting as a deserved price and ransome of his life and conquest of such a Beast Neither was he unrequited for it for Fortuâ—e so favoured his game that whether he hunted fowls of the air or beasts of the earth he still obtained and never missed So that his fame for hunting procured him more love and honor then ever could the Imperial Crown of his Countrey For all young men desired to follow him admiring his goodly personage and strength the Virgins and Maids falling in love contended among themselves who should marry him the wives forsaking their husbands contrary to all womanly modesty rather desired his company then the society of their husbands or to be preferred among the number of the Goddesses Only his Brethren inraged against him sought all means to kill and destroy him Therefore they watched all opportunities lying in continual ambush where he hunted to accomplish their accursed enterprise which at last they obtained for as he followed the game they enclosed him in a narrow straight neer to a Rivers side where he had no means to avoid their hands they and their company being many and he alone wherefore they drew out their swords and slew him When he saw no remedy but death he cryed out aloud for help whose voyce soon came to the ears of the watchful Dragon for no Beast heareth or seeth better out he cometh from his den and finding the murtherers standing about the dead body he presently surprized and killed them so revenging the quarrel of Pindus and then fell upon the dead body of his friend never forsaking the custody thereof until the neighbours adjoyning to the place taking knowledge of the fact came to bury the bodies But when they came and saw the Dragon among them they were afraid and durst not come neer but stood afar off consulting what to do till at last they perceived that the Dragon began to take knowledge of their fear who with an admirable curtesie of nature perceiving their mourning and lamentation for their dead friend and withall their abstinence from approaching to execute his exequies or funerals began to think that he might be the cause of this their terror and far standing off from the dead bodies wherefore he departed taking his farewell of the body which he loved and so gave them leave by his absence to bestow upon him an honourable burial which they performed accordingly and the River adjoyning was named by the name of pindus-Pindus-death By which story may appear that these savage Dragons are made loving and tame to men by good turns and benefits bestowed upon them for there is no nature which may not be overcome by kindenesse And yet I may not leave this matter thus nor from these two examples alone conclude the practise and possibility of love betwixt Men and Dragons I will therefore add some three or four examples more There was a Dragon the lover of Aetholis as Plutarch writeth who came unto her every night and did her body no harm but gently sliding over her played with her till morning then also would he depart away assoon as light appeared that he might not be espyed The Maidens friends came to the knowledge hereof and so removed her far away to the intent the Dragon might come no more at her and thus they remained asunder a great while the Dragon earnestly seeking for the Maiden wandered far and neer to finde her out At last he met with her and not saluting her gently as he was wont flew upon her binding her hands down with the spire of his body hissing softly in her face and beating gently with his tail her back-parts as it were taking a moderate revenge upon her for the neglect of his love by her long absence Another like story unto this is reported by Aelianus of a great Dragon which loved a fair Woman beloved also of a fair Man the Woman oftentimes did sleep with this Dragon but not so willingly as with the Man wherefore she forsook the habitation of her place for a month and went away where the Dragon could not find her thinking that her absence might quench his desire But he came often to the place where he was wont to meet with the woman and not finding her returned quietly back again and came again another time at last he grew suspicious and like a lover failing in his expectation grew very sorrowful and so continued till the month was exspired every night visiting the accustomed place At last the woman returned and the Dragon presently met with her and in an amorous fashion full of suspicion and jealousie winding about her body did beat her as you have heard in the former story and this saith Aelianus happened in Judea in the days of Hered the King There was a little Dragon-whelp bred in Arcadia and brought up familiarly with a little boy from his infancy until the Boy became a young Man and the Dragon also became of great stature so that one of them loved another so well as Man and Beast could love together or rather two play-fellows from the Cradle At last the friends of the Boy seeing the Dragon grow so great in so short a space began to be suspicious of him whereupon they took the bed wherein the Boy and the Dragon were lodged and carryed the same into a far remote place of Woods and Wildernesse and there set down the bed with the Boy and the Dragon together The boy after a little while returned and came home again to his friends the Dragon wandered up and down in the Woods feeding upon herbs and poyson according to his nature and never more cared for the habitation of men but rested contented with a solitary life In the length of time it came to passe that the boy grew to be a perfect man and the Dragon also remained in the Wood and although absent one from the other yet mutually loving as well as ever It hapned that this young man travelled through that place where the Dragon was lodged and fell among theeves when the young man saw their swords about his ears he cryed out and the Dragons den being not far off his cry came to the Dragons ears who instantly knowing the voyce of his play-fellow answered the same with another at whose hissing the theeves grew afraid and began to run away but their legs could not carry them so fast as to escape the Dragons teeth and claws for he came speedily to release his friend and all the theeves that he could find he put to cruel death then did he accompany his friend out of the place of peril and returned back again to his den neither remembering wrath for that he was exposed to the Wildernesse and there left by his play-fellow nor yet like perverse men forsaking their old friend in danger They
they set their Grab-hooks unto them to loose them for the day before they remembred that a Ship was cast away in the same place and therefore they thought that it might be the Nets were hanged upon some of the tacklings thereof and therein they were not much deceived for it happened that finding the place whereupon the Net did stay they pulled and found some difficulty to remove it but at last they pulled it up and found it to be a chair of beaten gold At the sight hereof their spirits were a little revived because they had attained so rich a booty and yet like men burdened with wealth especially the old man conceived new fears and wished he were on land lest some storm should fall and lay both it and them the second time in the bottom of the Sea So great is the impression of fear and the natural presage of evill in men that know but little in things to come that many times they prove true Prophets of their own destruction although they have little reason till the moment of perill come upon them and so it fell out accordingly in this old man for whilest he feared death by storms and tempests on the Sea it came upon him but by another way and means For behold the Devill entred into the hearts of his two servants and they conspired together to kill the old man their Master that so between themselves they might be owners of that great rich chair the value whereof as they conceived might make them Gentlemen and maintain them in some other Countrey all the days of their life For such was the resolution that they conceived upon the present that it would not be safe for them to return home again after the fact committed lest they should be apprehended for murder as they justly deserved their Master being so made away by them The Devill that had put this wicked motion into their mindes gave them likewise present opportunity to put the same in execution depriving them of all grace pity and piety still thrusting them forward to perform the same So that not giving him any warning of his death one of them in most savage and cruel manner dashed out his brains and the other speedily cast him into the Sea And thus the fear of this old man conceived without all reason except superstition for the sight of a Fiery-drake came upon him in a more bloudy manner then he expected but life suspected it self and rumors of peril unto guilty consciences such as all we mortal men bear are many times as forcible as the sentence of a Judge to the heart of the condemned prisoner and therefore it were happy that either we could not fear except when the causes are certain or else that we might never perish but upon premonition And therefore I conclude with the example of this man that it is not good to hold a superstitious fear lest God see it and being angry therewith bring upon us the evill which we fear But this is not the end of the story for that Fire-drake as by the sequel appeareth proved as evill to the servants as he did to the Master These two sons of the Devill made thus rich by the death of their Master forthwith they sailed towards the Coast of France but first of all they broke the Chair in pieces and wrapped it up in one of their Nets making account that it was the best fish that ever was taken in that Net and so they laid it in one end of their Bark or Fisher-boat And thus they laboured all that night and the next day till three or four of the clock at what time they espyed a Port of Britain whereof they were exceeding glad by reason that they were weary hungry and thirsty with long labour always rich in their own conceit by the gold which they had gotten which had so drawn their hearts from God as they could not fear any thought of his judgement And finally it so blinded their eyes and stopped their ears that they did not see the vengeance that followed them nor hear the cry of their Masters bloud Wherefore as they were thus rejoycing at the sight of land behold they suddenly espyed a Man of War coming towards them whereat they were appalled and began to think with themselves that their rich hopes were now at an end and they had laboured for other but yet resolved to die rather then to suffer the booty to be taken away from them And while they thus thought the Man of War approached and hailed them summoning them to come in and shew what they were they refused making forward as fast to the Land as they could Wherefore the Man of War shot certain Muskets at them and not prevailing nor they yeelding sent after them his Long-boat upon the entrance thereof they fought manfully against the assaylants until one of them was slain and the other mortally wounded who seeing his fellow kill'd and himself not likely to live yet in envy against his enemy ran presently to the place where the Chair lay in the Net and lifting the same up with all his might cast it from him into the Sea instantly falling down after that fact as one not able through weaknesse to stand any longer whereupon he was taken and before his life left him he related the whole story to them that took him earnestly desiring them to signifie so much into England which they did accordingly and as I have heard the whole story was printed and so this second History of the punishment of murder I have related in this place by occasion of the Fiery-drake in the History of the Dragon A second cause why poyson is supposed to be in Dragons is for that they often feed upon many venomous roots and therefore their poyson sticketh in their teeth whereupon many times the party bitten by them seemeth to be poysoned but this falleth out accidentally not from the nature of the Dragon but from the nature of the meat which the Dragon eateth And this is it which Homer knew and affirmed in his verses when he described a Dragon making his den neer unto the place where many venomous roots and herbs grew and by eating whereof he greatly annoyeth mankinde when he biteth them Os de Drakoon espi Xein oresteros andra menesi Bebrocos kaka pharmaka Which may be thus Englished And the Dragon which by men remains Eats evill herbs without deadly pains And therefore Aelianus saith well that when the Dragon meaneth to do most harm to men he eateth deadly poysonful herbs so that if he bite after them many not knowing the cause of the poyson and seeing or feeling venom by it do attribute that to his nature which doth proceed from his meat Besides his teeth which bite deep he also killeth with his tail for be will so begirt and pinch in the body that he doth gripe it to death and also the strokes of it are so strong that either
Bees full wilde or Locusts spoylers bred But yet to look upon all horrible in seams For why the cruel Bore they shew in head They keep in rocks and stony places of the houses and earth making their dens winding and hanging according to these Verses Rimosas colit illa Petras sibique aspera tecta Et modice pendens facit inflexumque cubile In English thus The chinks of Rocks and passages in stone They dwell wherein their lodgings bare A little hanging made for every one And bending too their sleepy harbours are It is said that Canobus the Governour of Menelaus chanced to fall upon this Serpent in revenge whereof Helen his charge the wife of Menelaus broke his back-bone and that ever since that time they creep lamely and as it were without loyns which fable is excellently thus described by Nicander Quondam animosa Helene cygni Jovis inclyta proles Eversa rediens Troia nisi vana vâ—tustas Huic indignata est generi Pharias ut ad oras Venit adversi declinans flamina venti Fluctivagam statuit juxta Nili ostia classem Namque ubi nauclerus se fessum forte Canobus Sterneret et bibulis fusus dormiret arenis Laesa venenosos Hâ—morrhois impulit ictus Illatamque tulit letali dente quietem Protinus oâ—iperae cernens id filla Ledae Oppressae medium serpenti fervida dorsum Infregit tritaeque excussit vinculae spinae Quae fragili illius sic dempta è corpore fugit Et graciles Haemorrhoiae obliquique Cerastae Ex hoc clauda trahunt jam foli tempore membra Which may be Englished thus Once noble Helen Joves childe by Swan-like shape Returning back from Troy destroyed by Grecian war If that our ancients do not with fables us beclap This race was envied by Pharias anger farre When to his shores for safety they did come Declining rage of blustring windy seas Water-biding-Navy at Nilus mouth gan run Where Canobus all tyred sainted for some ease For there this Pilot or Master of the Fleet Did hast from boat to sleep in â—rery sand Where he did feel the teeth of Hemorrhe deep Wounding his body with poyson deaths own hand But when egge-breeding Ledaes wench espyed This harm she prest the Serpents back with stroke Whereby the bands thereof were all 〈◊〉 Which in just wrath for just revenge she broke So ever since out of this Serpents fr 〈…〉 And body they are taken which is the cause That Cerasts and lean Haemorrhs are ever 〈◊〉 Drawing their parts on earth by natures lawes They which are stung with these Haemorrhs do suffer very intolerable torments for out of the wound continually floweth bloud and the excrements also that cometh out of the belly are bloudy or sometimes little rouls of bloud in stead of excrements The colour of the place bitten is black or of a dead bloudy colour out of which nothing floweth at the beginning but a certain watery humour then followeth pain in the stomack and difficulty of breathing Lastly the powers of the body are broken and opened so that out of the mouth gums ears eyes fingers ends nayls of the feet and privy parts continually issueth bloud untill a cramp also come and then followeth death as we read in Lucan of one Tellus a young noble man slain by this Serpent described as followeth Impressit dentes Haemorrhois aspera Tullo Magnanimo juveni miratorique Catonis Vâ—que solet pariter totis se effundere signis Coricii pressura croci sic omnia membra Emisere simul rutilum pro sanguine virâ—s Sanguis erant lachrymae quâ—cunque foramina novit Humor ab iis largus manat cruor ora redundant Et patulae nares sudor rubet omnia plenis Membra fluunt venis totum est pro vulnere corpâ—s In English thus The Haemorrhe fierce in noble Tullus fastened teeth That valiant youth great Catoes scholar deer And as when Saffron by Corycians skeeth Is prest and in his colour on them all appear So all his parts sent forth a poyson red In stead of bloud Nay all in bloud went round Bloud was his tears all passages of it were sped For out of mouth and ears did bloud abound Bloud was his sweat each part his vein out-bleeds And all the body bloud that one wound feeds The cure of this Serpent in the opinion of the Ancients was thought impossible as writeth Dioscrides and thereof they complain very much using only common remedies as scarification â—stions sharp meats and such things as are already remembred in the cure of the Dipsas But besides these they use Vine-leaves first bruised and then sod with Honey they take also the head of this Serpent and burn it to powder and so drink it or else Garlick with Oyl of Flower-de-luce they give them also to eat Reisins of the Sun And besides they resist the eruption of the bloud with plaisters laid to the place bitten made of Vine-leaves and Honey or the leaves of Purslane and Barley-meal But before their urine turn bloudy let them eat much Garlick stamped and mixed with Oyl to cause them to vomit and drink wine delayed with water then let the wound be washed with cold water and the bladder continually fomented with hot Spunges Some do make the cure of it like the cure of the Viper and they prescribe them to eat hard Egges with Salt fish and besides the seed of Radish the juice of Poppy with the roots of Lilly also Daffadil and Rue Trefolie Cassia Opoponax and Cinnamon in potion and to conclude the flowers and buds of the bush are very profitable against the biting of the Haemorrhe and so I end the history of this Serpent Of the Horned SERPENT THis Serpent because of his Horns although it be a kinde of Viper is called in Greek Rerastes and from thence cometh the Latine word Cerastes and the Arabian Cerust and Cerustes It is called also in Latine Ceristalis Cristalis Sirtalis and Tristalis All which are corrupted words derived from Cerastes or else from one another and therefore I think it not fit to stand upon them The Hebrewes call it Schephiphon the Italians Cerastes the Germans En geâ—urnte schlâ—â—g the French Vn Ceraste un serpent Cornu that is a horned Serpent and therefore I have so called it in English imitating herein both the French and Germans I will not stand about the difference of Authors whether this Serpent be to be referred to the Asps or to the Vipers for it is not a point materiall and therefore I will proceed to the description of his nature that by his whole history the Reader may choose whether he will account him a subordinate kinde unto others or else a principall of himself It is an African Serpent bred in the Lybian sandy seas places not inhabited by men for the huge Mountains of sands are so often moved by the windes that it is not only impossible for men to dwell there but also very dangerous and perilous to travel through them for
his famous success in hunting and that afterward the Goddess taking pity on him translated him into heaven Others write again that he had his eyes put out by Oenopion and that he came blind into the Island Lemnos where he received a horse of Vulcan upon which he rode to the Sun-rising in which journey he recovered again his eye-sight and so returning he first determined to take revenge upon Oenopion for his former cruelty Wherefore he came into Greet and seeking Oenopion could not finde him because he was hid in the earth by his Citizens but at last coming to him there came a Scorpion and killed him for his malice rescuing Oenopion These and such like fables are there about the death of Orion but all of them joyntly agree in this that Orion was slain by a Scorpion And so saith Anthologius was one Panopaeus a Hunter There is a common adage Cornix Scorpium a Raven to a Scorpion and it is used against them that perish by their own inventions when they set upon others they meet with their matches as a Raven did when it preyed upon a Scorpion thus described by Alciatus under his title Justa ultio just revenge saying as followeth Raptabat volucer captum pede corvus in auras Scorpion audacipraemia parta gulae Ast ille infuso sensim per membra veneno Raptorem in stygias compulit ultor aquas O risu res digna aliis qui fata parabat Ipse periit propriis succubuitque dolis Which may be Englished thus The ravening Crow for prey a Scorpion took Within her foot and therewithall aloft did flie But he impoyson'd her by force and stinging stroke So ravener in the Stygian Lake did die O sportfull game that he which other for bellyes sake did kill By his own decreis should fall into deaths will There be some learned Writers who have compared a Scorpion to an Epigram or rather an Epigram to a Scorpion because as the sting of the Scorpion lyeth in the tayl so the force and vertue of an Epigram is in the conclusion for vel acriter et salse mordeat vel jucunde dulciter delectes that is either let it bite sharply at the end or else delight pleasingly There be many wayes of bringing Scorpions out of their holes and so to destroy and take them as we have already touched in part unto which I may adde these that follow A perfume made of Oxe-dung also Storax and Arsenick And Pliny writeth that ten Water-crabs beaten with Basil is an excellent perfume for this purpose and so is the ashes of Scorpions And in Padua they use this art with small sticks or straw they touch and make a noyse upon the stones and morter wherein they have their nests then they thinking them to be some flies for their meat instantly leap out and so the man that deluded them is ready with a pair of tongs or oâ—â—er instrument to lay hold upon them and take them by which means they take many and of them so taken make Oyl of Scorpions And Constantius writeth that if a mans hand be well anoynted with juice of Radish he may take them without danger in his bare hand In the next place we are to proceed to the venom and poyson of Scorpions the instrument or sting whereof lyeth not only in the tail but also in the teeth for as Ponzettus writeth Laedit scorpius morsu et ictu the Scorpion harmeth both with teeth and tail that is although the greatest harm do come by the sting in the tayl yet is there also some that cometh by their biting This poyson of Scorpions as Pliny out of Apollodorus writeth is white and in the heat of the day is very fervent and plentifull so as at that time they are insatiably and unquenchably thirsty for not only the wilde or wood Scorpion but also all other are of a hot nature and the symptomes of their bitings are such as follow the effects of hot poysons and therefore saith Rasis all their remedies are of a cold quality Yet Galen thinketh otherwise and that the poyson is cold and the effects thereof are also cold For which cause Rondeletus prescribeth Oyl of Scorpions to expell the stone and also the cure of the poyson is by strong Garlick and the best Wine which are hot things And therefore I conclude that although Scorpions be most hot yet is their poyson of a cold nature In the next place I think it is needfull to expresse the symptomes following the striking or stinging of these venemous Scorpions and they are as Aetius writeth the very same which follow the biting or poyson of that kinde of great Phalanx Spider called also Teragnatum and that is they are in such case as those persons be which are smitten with the Falling sicknesse He which is stung by a Scorpion thinketh that he is pressed with the fall of great and cold hayl being so cold as if he were continually in a cold sweat and so in short space the poyson disperseth it self within the skin and runneth all over the body never ceasing untill it come to possesse some predominant or principall vitall part and then followeth death For as the skin is small and thin so the sting pierceth to the bottom thereof and so into the flesh where it woundeth and corrupteth either some vein or arterie or sinew and so the member harmed swelleth immediately into an exceeding great bulk and quantity and aking with insufferable torment But yet as we have already said there is a difference of the pain according to the difference of the Scorpion that stingeth If a man be stung in the lower part of his body instantly followeth the extension of his virile member and the swelling thereof but if in the upper part then is the person affected with cold and the place smitten is as if it were burned his countenance or face distorted glewish spots about the eyes and the tears viscous and slimy hardnesse of the articles falling down of the fundament and a continuall desire to egestion foaming at the mouth coughing convulsions of the brain and drawing the face backward the hair stands upright palenesse goeth over all the body and a continuall pricking like the pricking of needles Also Gordomus writeth that if the prick fall upon an artery there followeth swouning but if on a nerve there speedily followeth putrefaction and rottennesse And those Scorpions which have wings make wounds with a compasse like a bow whose succeeding symptomes are both heat and cold and if they hurt about the canicular dayes their wounds are very seldome recovered The Indian Scorpions cause death three moneths after their wounds But most wonderfull is that which Strabo relateth of the Albenian Scorpions and Spiders whereof he saith are two kindes and one kinde killeth by laughing the other by weeping And if any Scorpion hurt a vein in the head it causeth death by madnesse as writeth Paracelsus When an Oxe or other beast is
faltereth and stammereth not being able to sound their words or to pronounce directly their talk is idle they wander and rove up and down in great perplexity their heart being tormented tossed and turmoiled with an extraordinary kind of furious passion The Spider that is found in the pulse called Ervum which is very like to Tares or Vetches produceth by his venom the same evil effects that the former doth and if Horses or other beasts do by chance devour any of them their bodies are so inflamed by means of their unquenchable thirstinesse the poyson causeth that many times they burst asunder in the midst If the Cranocalaptes wound any man as Pliny assureth us it is not long before death it self do succeed And yet Nicander and Aetius hold the contrary and would make us believe that his hurt is soon remedyed without any great ado yet herein they do consent that if any be hurt with any Spider of this kinde there will follow a great pain of the head coldnesse swimming and giddinesse of the brain much disquietnesse of the whole body and pricking pains of the stomach But notwithstanding all this saith Nicander the patient is soon remedied and all these above rehearsed passions quickly appeased and brought to an end The Sclerocephalus as it much resembleth the Cranocalaptes Spider in form and proportion so in his force effect and violence they are much alike causing the same symptomes accidents and passions as the former The wound that the Spider called Ragion inflicteth is very small so that a man can hardly discern it with his eyes but yet if one be hurt therewith the lower part of the eyes and the eye-lids wax very red Besides the patient feeleth a shivering cold or chilnesse in his loins with weaknesse and feeblenesse in the knees yea the whole body is taken with a great quaking cold and the sinews by means of the violence and rancknesse of the poyson suffer a Convulsion The parts serving to generation are made so impotent and weak as that they are not able to retain the seed nor yet to contain their urine which they void forth much like in colour to a Spiders-web and they feel the like pain as they do which are stung with Scorpions Of the the wounding of the Star-spider feeblenesse and weaknesse followeth so that one cannot stand upright the knees buckle sleep and shaking drousinesse seizeth upon the hurt parts and yet the worst of all is the blewish Spider for this bringeth dimnesse of the eye-sight and vomiting much like unto Spiders and cobwebs in colour fainting and swounding weaknesse of the knees heavy sleeps and death it self If a man be wounded of the Tetragnathian Spider the place waxeth whitish with an intolerable vehement and continual pain in it and the member it self withereth and pineth away even to the very joints Finally the whole body by receiving any wholesome sustenance is nothing at all relieved thereby yea and after a man hath recovered his health yet is he neverthelesse disquieted by much watching for a long time after as Actius writeth Nicander in expresse words confesseth that the Ash-coloured Tetragnath doth not by his biting infuse any venom or like hurt If the speckled Phalangie of Apulia which is usually known by the name of Tarantula do bite any one there will follow divers and contrary accidents and symptomes according to the various constitution different complexion and disposition of the party wounded For after they are hurt by the Tarantula you shall see some of them laugh others contrariwise to weep some will clatter out of measure so that you shall never get them to hold their tongues and othersome again you shall observe to be as mute as fishes this man sleepeth continually and another cannot be brought to any rest at all but runneth up and down raging and raving like a mad man There be some that imagine themselves to be some great Lords or Kings and that their authority Empire and signory extendeth it self far and wide and for that cause they will seem to charge others by vertue of their absolute and Kingly authority and as they tender their favours and will avoid their displeasure to see this or that businesse dispatched and with others again the contrary conceit so much prevaileth as by a strong imagination they cannot be otherwise disswaded but that they are taken prisoners that they lie in some deep dungeon or prison with bolts and shakels about their feet so many as their legs can bear or that their neck and feet lie continually in the stocks You shall see some of them to be cheerful quick of spirit and lively with dancing swinging and shaking themselves With others again you shall have nothing but sadnesse and heavinesse of minde brown-studies unaptnesse to do any thing as if one were astonyed so that nothing but numnesse and dulnesse of moving and feeling seemeth to pinch them being to see to very senselesse In conclusion as drunkennesse to sundry persons is not all one but much different according to the diversity of complexions and natural constitution of the brain so neither is the madnesse or frenzy sits of these persons all one that be infected with a Tarantulaes poyson but some of them are fearful silent ever trembling and quaking and others again are more fool-hardy rash presumptuous clamorous full of noise doing nothing else but call and cry out and some few seem to be very grave constant and stedfast that will not alter their purposes for a world of wealth But let them be affected either with this or that passion yet this is common to them all as well to one as to another that they are generally delighted with musical Instruments and at their sound or noise will so trip it on the toes dancer-like applying both their mindes and bodies to dancing and frisking up and down that during the time of any musical harmony they will never leave moving their members and limbs like a Jackanapes that cannot stand still And which is more strange they will use these motions and gestures when they are ready to depart this life through the lingering stay and vehement cruelty of the poysons operation and yet for all this though they be so neer unto death yet if they hear any musick they come again to themselves newly gathering their spirits and strength and with a greater alacrity promptnesse of minde and cheer they foot it as frolickly as ever they did or could have done And thus doing and dancing both day and night without any notorious intermission and by their continued sweating the poyson being dispersed into the pores of the skin and evaporated by insensible transpiration or breathing out are at length by this means recovered to their former health and state of body And if the Pipers and Fidlers cease playing with their musick though never so little a while before the matter of the poyson be in some part exhausted then will they make a recidivation and returning to their
ale was alway after one A better viâ—â—ded man was never none Without bake-meat was never his house Of fish and flesh and that so plenteouse It snewed in his house of meat and drink Of all dainties that men could think After the sundry seasons of the yeer So changed he his meat and his suppere Full many a fat Patrich had he in mâ—â— And many a Bream and many a Luce in flue Woe was his Cooke but his sawce ever were Poynant and sharp and ready all his gere His table d 〈…〉 aunt in his Hall alway Stood ready covered all the long day Nay hither they brought fat and crammed Capons Pheasants Quails Turtle-doves Larks and Nightingals I passe over Turbot or Byrt Gilt-heads Sturgion Salmonds Soals and the like for they were not unfurnished of all these and of other store of shell-fish as Lobsters Crevishes Oysters and whatsoever the Sea yeelded that might by love or money be purchased for I will not speak of a great number of River-fish and Fouls that are to be had about Peterborow Wittlesey-mare and those Fennish Countreys for thither he sent his people to purvay for him all that was rare and dainty Here was Red-wine White Claret Muscadell Rhenish sweet-wines harsh-wines wine of Falernum of the Islands of Creta Chio Madera and those that are called Baleares lying neer unto the Coast of Spain To speak nothing of their rear-suppers their fine Marchpanes and curious Confections made with sundry devises and exquisite skill of the Apothecary And to conclude there was no wanton fare unsought for no delicate Juncate no curious trimming and pickednesse that might gratifie no fair words and pleasant enticements fit to draw and allure nor no delectation whatsoever omitted that might seem to please this great Lady Podagra for you must understand she was none of the coursest sort of Ladies whereof there be many now adaies for all men know she was a Gentlewoman born both by the fathers and mothers side as being the daughter of Bacchus and Venus and all this I say was done to please both her and her two sweet Sisters Chiragra and Congra a pox take them all three and so I will let them go and come to the Spider who likewise being directed by some favourable Planet boldly and luckily trudged to the poor mans house Atque ibi miro Dogmate quidvâ— marem deceat deceatque marit am Addocet atque suo sese sudore saginat Which may be Englished thus And there by strange instructions and documents She teacheth male and female how to live That is both man and wife how to increase their rents Whilst she on her own sweat and fat doth thrive But some man may here object and say I see here no such great blessings of Lady Fortune more then besides a bare commendation and good hap in this their exchange of lodging and lodgers Yes surely very much not only because she spendeth her dayes more freely and safely from danger but also because as out of a high watch-tower she no longer beholdeth in the houses of poor persons lavish and needlesse prodigality banquettings quaffings rioting playes dancing dicing and whoring and a thousand vanities and villanies besides whereof she knew her self conscious and a privy witnesse unto whilst she lived in the Halls and Bowers of the rich and wealthier sort who when they had thrust clean from house and home and for ever banished the Spider the true School-mistresse of industry and frugality straightwayes the lazie Gowt called Podagra arrested them Had it not been better for them think you to have granted a dwelling place to a saving wise prudent and harmlesse little creature then to have given entertainment to such a base blockish companion and guest as the Gowt is Let not therefore rich covetous men wonder if many times they be tormented with this sore grief sith they will neither admit true Physitian nor physick I mean travail diligence industry moderation and pains-taking with the like Now to touch the rich and rare gifts and graces of the minde and other noble qualities and dispositions of Spiders I know not whether I should first begin with the commendation of their prudence justice fortitude temperance their Philanthropia Philoponia Autarkeia their humanity and love towards men their studious industry and love of labour their contentation as having sufficient and coveting no more then is allotted unto them Their wittinesse policy quickness and sharpnesse of sense their cleanly neatnesse with many other vertues or else her admirable cunning and skilfulnesse in their weaving trade Their prudence sagacity and wittinesse to conjecture things future appeareth in this one thing that when great abundance of rain flouds swelling and overflowings of Rivers are like shortly to come to passe and thereby to threaten houses they then begin to build their Webs higher by a great deal then their usuall custome heretofore hath been And this is another proof of the same in that they weave not at all in a clear Sun-shine-day or when it is fair and calm weather when Flies are most busie in flying about to and fro that they may be the better at leasure to give themselves to hunting and watching after them to take advantage and if any chance to light into their nets forthwith to seize upon them for their repast Again when houses are ready to drop down they with their Cobwebs first of all fall and get them away packing alter their climate to some other surer place and dwelling to rest in If any thing touch her body that is hard or painfull she immediately draweth up her legs round on a heap for this end as I think to feel the lesse pain and the better to provide for the health and safety of her head the directer and governer of the whole body for if any other part be hurt she can easily cure it Who hath manifested and made known this unto them Hath any Chaldean Star-gazer or figure-flinger by the sight and position of the starres shewed it unto them No certainly But a divine prudence and forefeeling knowledge originally inbred by Nature to eschew that which is hurtfull which is diffused into the Spider and as that famous Poet Virgilius hath excellently described Spirit us intus alit totesque infusa per artus Mens agitat molem In English thus Minde bred within infused in all limbs Minde moves the bodies lump and skins Furthermore so soon as they espy their enemy to be caught in their nets they do not first of all bite and prick him to death in any hostile manner but they seem with their feet gently and softly to stroke him yea even to intreat and allure him with tickling and as it were clipping and colling untill they have throughly insnarled him within their clammy and viscous gins and being at length wearied turmoiled and tired with strugling and striving in vain the silly Flie is made unable either to get away stir or resist So having made sure work with one
Tortoises one of the Earth a second of the Sea a third called Lutaria and the fourth called Swyda living in Sweet-waters and this is called by the Portugals Cagado and Gagado the Spaniards Galopag and the Italians Gaiandre de aqua There are of this kinde found in Helvetia neer to Zurick at a Town called Andelfinge but the greatest are found in the River Ganges in India where their shells are as great as tuns and Damascen writeth that he saw certain Embassadours of India present unto Augustus Caesar at Antiochia a Sweet-water Tortoise which was three cubits broad They breed their young ones in Nilus They have but a small Milt and it wanteth both a bladder and reins They breed their young ones and lay their Egges on the dry land for in the water they die without respiration therefore they dig a hole in the earth wherein they lay their Egges as it were in a great ditch of the quantity of a Barrel and having covered them with earth depart away from them for thirty days afterwards they come again and uncover their Egs which they finde formed into young ones those they take away with them into the water and these Tortoises at the inundation of Nilus follow the Crocodiles and remove their nests and egges from the violence of the flouds There was a magical and superstitious use of these Sweet-water Tortoises against Hail for if a man take one of these in his right hand and carry it with the belly upward round about his Vineyard and so returning in the same manner with it and afterward lay it upon the back so as it cannot turn on the belly but remain with the face upward all manner of Clowds should passe over that place and never empty themselves upon that Vineyard But such Diabolical and foolish observations were not so much as to be remembred in this place were it not for their sillinesse that by knowing them men might learn the weaknesse of humane wisdom when it erreth from the Fountain of all science and true knowledge which is Divinity and the most approved operations of Nature And so I will say no more in this place of the Sweet-water Tortoise Of the TORTOISE of the Sea IT were unproper and exorbitant to handle the Sea-tortoise in this place were it not because it liveth in both elements that is both the water and the land wherefore seeing the Earth is the place of his generation as the Sea is of his food and nourishment it shall not be amisse nor improper I trust to handle this also among the Serpents and creeping things of the earth Pliny calleth this Sea-tortoise Mus Marinus a Mouse of the Sea and after him Albertus doth so likewise The Arabians call it Asfulhasch and the Portugals Tartaruga and in Germany Meeâ—schiltkrott which the common Fisher-men call the Souldier because his back seemeth to be armed and covered with a shield and helmet especially on the fore-part which shield is very thick strong and triangular there being great veins and sinews which go out of his neck shoulders and hips that tie on and fasten the same to his body His fore-feet being like hands are forked and twisted very strong and with which it fighteth and taketh his prey and nothing can presse it to death except the frequent strokes of Hammers And in all their members except their quantity and their feet they are much like the Tortoises of the earth for otherwise they are greater and are also black in colour They pull in their heads as occasion is ministred to them either to fight feed or be defended and their whole shell or cover seemeth to be compounded of fine Plates They have no teeth but in the brims of their beaks or or snouts are certain eminent divided things like teeth very sharp and shut upon the under lip like as the cover of a Box and in the confidence of the sharp prickles and the strength of their hands and backs they are not afraid to fight with men Their eyes are most clear and splendent casting their beams far and near and also they are of white colour so that for their brightnesse and rare whitenesse the Apples are taken out and included in Rings Chains and Bracelets They have reins which cleave to their backs as the Reins of a Bugle or Ox. Their feet are not apt to be used in going for they are like to the feet of Seals or Sea-calves serving in stead of Oars to swim withall Their legs are very long and stronger in their feet and nails then are the claws of the Lion They live in Rocks and the Sea-sands and yet they cannot live altogether in the water or on the land because they want breathing and sleep both which they perform out of the Water yet Pliny writeth that many times they sleep on the top of the water and his reason is because they lie still unmoveable except with the Water and snort like any other Creature that sleepeth but the contrary appeareth seeing they are found to sleep on the land and the snorting noise they make is but an endeavour to breath which they cannot well do on the top of the water and yet better there then in the bottom They feed in the night-time and the mouth is the strongest of all other Creatures for with it they they crush in pieces any thing be it never so hard as a stone or such things they also come and eat grasse on the dry land They eat certain little Fishes in the Winter time at which season their mouth is hardest and with these Fishes they are also baited by men and so taken Pausanias writeth that in Africa that there are Maritine Rocks called Scelestae and there dwelleth among a creature called Scynon that is Zytyron a Tortoise and whatsoever he findeth on those Rocks which is stranger in the Sea the same he taketh and casteth down headlong They engender on the Land and the female resisteth the copulation with the male until he set against her a stalk or stem of some tree or plant They lay their Egs and cover them in the earth planing it over with their breasts and in the night-time they sit upon them to hatch them Their Egs are great of divers coloursâ— having a hard shell so that the young one is not framed or brought forth within lesse compasse then a year as Aristotle writeth but Pliny saith thirty days And for as much as they cannot by Nature nor dare for accident long tarry upon the land they set certain marks with their feet upon the place where they lay their Egs whereby they know the place again and are never deceived Some again say that after they have hid their Egs in the earth forty days the female cometh the just fortieth day not failing of her reckoning and uncovereth her Egs wherein she findeth her young ones formed which she taketh out as joyfully as any man would do Gold out of the
to be derived from the Greek Echidna At this day it is doubted whether they live in Italy Germany or England for if they doe they are not knowne by that name yet I verily think that we have in England a kinde of yellow Adder which is the Viper that Bellonius saw here for I my selfe have killed of them not knowing at that time the difference or similitude of Serpents but since I have perceived to my best remembrance that the proportion and voyce of it did shew that it was a Viper The most different kinds of Vipers are found in Aegypt and Asia Concerning the quantity that is the length and greatnesse of this Serpent there is some difference for some affirme it to be of a cubit in length and some more some lesse The Vipers in Europe are very small in comparison of them in Africa for among the Troglodytes as writeth Aelianus they are fifteen cubits long and Nearchus affirmeth as much of the Indian Vipers Aristobulus also writeth of a Viper that he saw one which was nine cubits long and one hand breadth some again as Strabo affirm that they have seen Vipers of sixteen Cubits long and Nicander writeth thus of the Vipers of Asia Fert Asia ultra tres longis qui tractibus ulnas Se tendant rigidum quales Bucarteron atque Arduus Aegagus celsus Cercaphus intra Se multos refovet In English thus Such as Asia yeelds in length as are three elles In Bucarteron steepy rough these Vipers flourish Hard Egagus and high Cercaphus cels Within their compasse many such do nourish Others there be in Asia sixteen foot long and some there beagain twenty as in the Golden Castiglia where their heads are like the heads of Kids There be some that make difference betwixt Echis and Echidna because one of them when it biteth causeth a convulsion and so doth not the other and one of them maketh the wound look white the other pale and when the Echis biteth you shall see but the impression of two teeth and when the Echidna biteth you shall see the impression of more teeth But these differences are very idle for the variety of the pain may arise from the constitution of the body or the quantity of the poyson and so likewise of the colour of the wound and it is already set down that the Echis or Male Viper hath but two Canine teeth but the other namely the Echidna hath four thus saith Nicander Masculus emittit notus color ipse caninos Binos perpetuo monstrat sed foemina plures Which may be englished thus The Male two canine teeth whose colour well is known But in the Female more continually are shown But yet the Male hath beside his Canine teeth as many as hath the Female and besides the Male is known from the Female as the same Nicander writeth because the Female when she goeth draweth her tail as though she were lame but the Male more manlike and nimble holdeth up his head stretcheth out his tail restraineth the breath of his belly setteth not up his Scales as doeth the Female and besides draweth out his body at length The Meate of these Vipers are green Hearbes and also sometimes living Creatures and namely Hore-flies Cantharides Pithiocampes and such other things as they can come by for these are fit and convenient meat for them Aristotle writeth that sometimes also they eat Scorpions and in Arabia they not onely delight in the sweet juyce of Balsans but also in the shadow of the same But above all kinds of drink they are most insatiable of wine Sometime they make but little folds and sometime greater but in their wrath their eies flame they turn their tailes and put forth their double tongue In the winter-time as we have said already they live in the hollow Rocks yet Pliny affirmeth that then also they enter into the earth and become tractable and tangible by the hands of man for in the cold weather they are nothing so fierce as they are in the hot and in the Sommer also they are not at all times alike furious but like to all other Serpents They are most outragious in the Canicular daies for then they never rest but with continual disquiet move up and down till they are dead or emptied of their poyson or feel an abatement of their heat Twice in the year they cast their skins that is to say in the Spring and in the Autumn and in the spring time when they come out of their hole or winter lodgings they help the dimnesse of their eye-sight by rubbing their eyes upon fennel But concerning their copulation and generation I find much difference among writers wherefore in a matter so necessary to be known I will first of all set down the opinion of other men aswell Historians as Poets and then in the end and conclusion I will be bold to interpose my own judgment for the better information of the Reader Herodotus in his Thalia writeth that when the Vipers begin to rage in lust and desire to couple one with another the Male cometh and putteth his head into the mouth of the female who is so insatiable in the desire of that copulation that when the male hath filled her with all his seed-genital and so would draw forth his head again she biteth it off and destroyeth her husband whereby he dieth and never liveth more but the female departeth and conceiveth her young in her belly who every day according to natures inclination grow to perfection and ripenesse and at last in revenge of their fathers death do likewise destroy their mother for they eate out her belly and by an unnatural issue come forth into the light of this world and this thing is also thus witnessed by Nicander Cum durum fugiens morsu ignescentis echidnae Frendit echis vel ubi fervente libidinis aestu Saevo dente sui resecat caput illa mariti Ast ubi post vegetam ceperunt pignora vitam Jam propinqua adsunt maturi tempora partus Indignam chari mortem ulciscentia patris Erosa miserae nascuntur matris ab alvo In English thus When the male Viper gnasheth avoyding females bite Whose fiery rage is all on ardent lust Yet when he burnes for copulation right Her cruel tooth doth Husbandhead off crush But yet alasse when seeds begins to live And birth of young ones ripen in her womb Then they for Fathers death a full revenge dâ— give Eating forth their wretched mothres strong Vnto this agreeth Galen Isidore Plutarch Aelianus and Lucan who writeth Viperei coeunt abrupto corpore nati That is to say The geniture of Vipers blood Engender breaking bodies good Pliny agreeth with the residue for the death of the Male in carnal copulation but he differeth in this about the Female affirming that when the young Vipers grow ripe and perfect in their Mothers belly she casteth forth every day one for three daies together
causeth in them a difference of poyson for those that live in the woods and eat Toades are not so vigorous or venemous but those that live in the mountaines and eat the roots of certain herbs are more poysonful and deadly And therefore Cardan relateth a story which he saith was cold him by a Phaenician that a Mountain-Viper chased a man so hardly that he was forced to take a tree unto the which when the Viper was come and could not climbe up to utter her malice upon the man she emptied the same upon the Tree and by and by after the man in the tree dyed by the savour and secret operation of the same But of the Arabian Vipers which haunt the Balsom-trees I have read that if at any time they bite they onely make a wound like the pricks of yron voide of poison because while they suck in the juyce of that tree the acerbity and strength of the venom is abated About the Mountain Helicon in Greece the poison also of Vipers is infirme and not strong so that the cure thereof is also ready and easie But yet for the nature of Vipers poison I can say no more then Wolphius hath said that it is of it self and in it selfe considered hot and his reason is because he saw a combat in a glasse betwixt a Viper and a Scorpion and they both perished one by the others poison Now he saith that it is granted the Scorpion to be of a cold nature and his poison to be cold therefore by reason of the antipathy whereby one died by the malice of another it must needs follow that the Viper is hot and her poison likewise of the same nature For a Serpent of a cold nature killeth not another of the same nature nor a hot Serpent one of his own kind but rather it falleth out clean contrary that the hot kill those that are cold and the cold Serpents the hotter All the Vipers that live neer the waters are of more mild and meek poison then others If there be any such but I rather beleeve there be none but that the same Author which wrote of the Vipers of the water did intend Serpents of the water But coneerning the poison of Vipers there is nothing reported more strange then that of Vincentius Belluacensis who writeth that if a man chance to tread upon the reynes of a Viper unawares it paineth him more then any venome for it spreadeth it self over all the body incurably Also it is written that if a woman with child chance to passe over a Viper it causeth her to suffer abortment and the Mushroms or Toade stooles which grow neere the dennes and lodgings of Vipers are also found to be venemous The Scythians also do draw an incurable and unresistable poison out of Vipers wherewithall they anoint the sharp ends of their darts and arrowes when they goe to warre to the end that if it chance to light upon their adversary he may never any more do them harm They make this poison in this manner They observed the littering places and time of the Vipers and then with strength and Art did take the old and young ones together which they presently killed and afterward suffered them to lie and rot or soake in some moist thing for a season then they took them and put them into an earthen pot filled with the bloud of some one man this pot of mans bloud and Vipers they stopped very close so as nothing might issue out at the mouth and then buried or covered it all over in a dunghil where it rotted and consumed a few daies after which they uncovered it again and opening it found at the top a kind of watery substance swimming that they take off and mixe it with the rotten matter of the Viper and hereof make this deadly poison We have shewed already that there is outwardly a difference betwixt the biting wound of the Male and the Female Viper for after the male hath bitten there appeareth but two holes but after the Female hath bitten there appeareth foure and this is also a great deal more deadly then is the biting of the male according to the verses of Nicander where he saith Porro ex Vipereo quod noris germine pejor Foemina quae veluti majori accenditurira Sic vehemente magis fert noxia vulnera morsu Et plus gliscenti se cauda corpore volvit Vnde citatior haec ictos mors occupat artus Which may be englished thus But of the Vipers brood the female is the worst Which as it were with greater wrath doth burn And therefore when she bites makes bodies more accurst Inflickting hurtful wounds to vehemency turnd Rowling her bulke and taile more oft about Whereby a speedier death doth life rid out But Avicen is directly contrary to this opinion and saith that as the bitings of male Dragons are more exitiall and harmful then are the females so is it betwixt the biting of the male and female Viper This contrarietie is thus reconciled by Mercuriall namely that it is true that the wounds which the female maketh by her biting being well considered is more deadly then the wounds which the male giveth yet for the proportion of the poison which the male venteth into the wound he maketh it is more deadly then is the females so that with respect of quantity they both say true which affirm either the one or the other But which soever is the greatest it skilleth not much for both are deadly enough as may appear by the common symptoms and signes which follow and also death Mathiolus reporteth a history of a Country-man who as he was mowing of grasse chanced to cut a Viper clean asunder about the middle or some-what nearer the head which being done he stood still and looked upon the dying dissevered parts a little while at last either presuming that it had no power left to hurt or thinking it was dead he took that part in his hand where-upon the head was the angry Viper feeling his adversaries warm hand turned the head about and bit his finger with all the rage force and venom that it had left so that the bloud issued out The man thus bitten for his boldnesse did hastily cast it away and began to suck the wound putting his hand to his mouth which when he had done but a little while he suddenly fell down dead The like story unto this is related by Amatus Lusitanus of another which more boldly then wisely did adventure to take a live Viper into his hand upon a wager of money but as the other so this paid for his rashnes for the angry Viper did bite him as did the former and he sucked his wound as did the Country-man and in like manner fell down dead By both which examples we may well see the danger of the Vipers poison so that if once it come into the stomack and touch the open passage where the vitall parts goe in
and out it never stayeth long but death followeth Wherefore Aetius saith well that sometimes it killeth within the space of seven houres and sometimes again within the space of three daies and that respite of time seemeth to be the longest if remedie be not had with more effectual speed The signes or effects of the Vipers biting are briefly these first there issueth forth a rotten matter sometimes blou dy and sometimes like liquid or molten fatnesse sometimes again with no colour at all but all the flesh about the sore swelleth sometimes having a red and sometime a pale hiew or colour upon it issuing also forth a corrupted mattery matter Also it causeth divers little blisters to arise upon the flesh as though the body were all scorched over with fire and speedily after this followeth putrefaction and death The pain that cometh by this Serpents wounding is so universal that all the body seemeth to be set on fire many pitiful noyses are forced out of the parties throat by sense of that pain turning and crackling of the neck also twinckling and wrying of the eyes with darknesse and heavinesse of the head imbecillity of the loynes sometimes thirsting intolerably crying out upon his dry throate and again sometimes freezing at the fingers ends at least so as he feeleth such a pain Moreover the body sweating a sweat more cold then snow it self and many times vomiting forth the bilious tumors of his owne belly But the colour going and coming is often changed now like pale lead then like black and anon as green as the rust of brasse the gums flow with bloud and the Liver it self falleth to be inflamed sleepinesse and trembling possesseth the body and several parts and difficulty of making urine with Feavers neezing and shortnesse of breath These are related by Aetius Aegineta Grevinus and others which work not alwaies in every body generally but some in one and some in another as the humors and temperament of nature doth lead and guide their operation But I marvail from whence Plato in his Symposium had that opinion that a man bitten and poisoned by a Viper will tel it to none but onely to those that have formerly tasted of that misery for although among other effects of this poison it is said that madness or a distracted mind also followeth yet I think in nature there can be no reason given of Platoes opinion except he mean that the patient will never manifest his grief at all And this howsoever also is confuted by this one story of Grevinus There was as he writeth a certain Apothecary which did keep Vipers and it happened one day as he was medling about them that one of them caught him by his finger and did bite him a little so as the prints of his teeth appeared as the points of needles The Apothecary onely looked on it and being busied either forgot or as he said afterward felt no pain for an hours space but after the hour first his finger smarted and began to burn and afterward his arm and whole body fell to be suddenly distempered therewith so as necessity constrayning him and opportunity offering it self he sent for a Physitian at hand and by his good advise thorow Gods mercy was recovered but with great difficulty for he suffered many of the former passions and symptoms before he was cured Therefore by this story either Plato was in a wrong opinion or else Grevinus telleth a fable which I cannot grant because he wrote of his own experience known then to many in the world who would quickly have contradicted it or else if he had consented to the opinion of Plato no doubt but in the relation of that matter he would have expressed also that circumstance Thus then we have as briefly and plainly as we can delivered the pains and torments which are caused by the poison of Vipers now therefore it followeth that we also briefly declare the vertue of such Medicines as we find to be applied by diligent and careful observations of many learned Physitians against the venom of Vipers First of all they write that the general rule must be observed in the curing of the poison of Vipers which is already declared against other Serpents namely that the force of their poison be kept from spreading and that may be done either by the present extraction of the poison or else by binding the wounded member hard or else by cutting it off if it be in finger hand or foot Galen reporteth that when he was in Alexandria there came to the City a Countryman which had his finger bitten by a Viper but before he came he had bound his finger close to the palm of his hand and then he shewed the same to a Physitian who immediatly cut off his finger and so he was cured And besides he telleth of another country-man who reaping of Corne by chance with his sickle did hurt a Viper who returned and did raze all his finger with her poisonfull teeth The man presently conceiving his own peril cut off his own finger with the same sickle before the poison was spred too far and so was cured without any other Medicine Sometime it hapneth that the bite is in such a part that it cannot be cut off and then they apply a Hen cut in sunder alive and laid to as hot as can be also one must first wash and anoint his mouth with oyl and so suck out the poison Likewise the place must be scarified and party fed and dieted with old Butter and bathed in milk or Seawater and be kept waking and made to walk up and down It were too long and also needlesse to expresse all the medicines which by naturall meanes are prepared against the poison of Vipers whereof seeing no reasonable man will expect that at my hands I will onely touch two or three cures by way of history and for others refer my Reader to Physitians or to the Latine discourse of Caronus In Norcheria the country of that great and famous Gentilis who translated Avicen there is a fountaine into which if any man be put that is stung or bitten by a Serpent he is thereof immediatly cured which Amatus Lusitanus approveth to be very natural because the continual cold water killeth the hot poison The same Author writeth that when a little maid of the age of thirteen yeeres was bitten in the heel by a Viper the legge being first of all bound at the knee very hard then because the maid fell distract first he caused a Surgeon to make two or three deeper holes then the Viper had made that so the poison might be the more easily extracted then he scarified the place and drawed it with cupping-glasses whereby was exhausted all the black blood and then also the whole leg over was scarified and blood drawn out of it as long as it would run of it own accord Then was a plaister made of Garlick and the sharpest Onions rosted which being mixed
part of which Virgil in 4. Geo. hath elegantly though somewhat confusedly touched in these verses following If Bees be sick for all that live must dye That may be known by signs most certainly Their body is discoloured and their face Looks wan which shewes that death comes on apace They carry forth their dead and do lament Hanging by th' door or in their hives are pent Hunger and cold consumes them you shall find They buz as doth 'i th woods the Southern wind Or doth the sea when that the waves return Or fire clos'd up in vaults with noise doth burn And thus their distempers being understood and cured they live to extreme age which Aristotle Theophrastus Pliny Virgil Varro Columella Cardan and all Authors whatsoever do conclude not to extend it self to nine years Although I saw it by experience and with no lesse delight to be otherwise at Hanworth in the Countesse of Somersets Bees before spoken of there are yet present witnesses who are worthy of belief which will attest it that there they have lived in the same place above the space of thirty years and almost four times a year have made out fresh flights or swarms of young ones Which reason doth induce me to believe that Bees in their own natural constitution are long lived and I do with Albertus alone make a question whether they may not live so long till they dye of old age Well I know they may be taken away by diseases or incursion of their enemies but if they had alwaies all those necessaries for their life and health by them and those things which should be destructory kept from them I should easily grant that they would live to a very exceeding great age if I did not altogether say they were immortal For they alone of all other creatures are fed with Honey that immortal Nectar dropt down from heaven and with that divine dew which is the soul and spirit of all herbs trees and plants gathered together into one body or masse of whose nature use and excellent vertue we shall speak in the following Chapter CHAP. IV. Of the use of Bees WHereas the most high God did create all other creatures for our use so especially the Bees not only that as mistresses they might hold forth to us a pattern of Politick and Oeconomick vertues and inform our understanding but that they might be able as extraordinary foretellers to foreshew the success and event of things to come for in the years 90 98 113 208. before the birth of Christ when as mighty huge Swarms of Bees did settle in the chief Market-place and in the Beast-market upon private Citizens houses and on the Temple of Mars there were at that time stratagems of enemies against Rome wherewith the whole State was like to be surprised and destroyed In the reign of Severus the Bees made Combes in his military Ensigns and especially in the camp of Niger Divers wars upon this ensued between both the parties of Severus and Niger and battels of doubtful event while at length the Severian faction prevailed The Statues also of Antonius Pius placed here and there all over Hetruria were all covered with swarms of Bees and after that setled in the Camp of Cassius what great commotions after followed Julius Capitolinus relates in his History At what time also through the treachery of the Germans in Germany there was a mighty slaughter and overthrow of the Romans P. Fabius and Q. Elius being Consuls in the camp of Drusus in the tent of Hostilius Rutilus a Swarm of Bees is reported to have sate so thick that they covered the rope and the spear that held up the Tent. M. Lepidus and Minut. Plancus being Consuls as also in the Consulship of L. Paulus and C. Metellus Swarms of Bees flying to Rome as the Augurs very well conjectured did foretell the near approach of the enemy Pompey likewise making war against Caesar when he had called his allies together he set his Army in order as he went out of Dyrrachium Bees met him and sate so thick upon his Ensigns that they could not be seen what they were Philistus and Aelian relate that while Dionysius the Tyrant did in vain spur his horse that stuck in the mire and there at length left him the horse quitting himself by his own strength did follow after his Master the same way he went with a Swarm of Bees sticking on his mane intimating by that prodigy that tyrannical government which Dionysius affected over the Countrey of the Galeotae In the Helvetian History we read that in the the year 1385. when Leopoldus of Austria began to march towards Sempachum with his Army a Swarm of Bees flew to the Town and there sate upon the tyles whereby the common people rightly foretold that some forain force was marching towards them So Virgil in 7. Aeucid The Bees flew buzzing through the liquid air And pitcht upon the top o' th' Lawrel tree When the Soothsayers saw this sight full rare They did foretell th'approach of th' enemie That which Herodotus Pausanias Dio Cassius Plutarch Julius Caesar Julius Cupitolinus and other Historians with greater observation then reason have confirmed Saon Acrephniensis when he could by no means finde the Oracle Trophonius Pausanias in his Boeticks saith he was led thither by a Swarm of Bees Moreover Plutarch Pausanias Aelian Alex. Alexandrinus Theocritus and Textor are Authors that Jupiter Melitaeus Hiero of Syracuse Plato Pindar Apius Comatus Xenophon and last of all Ambrose when their nurses were absent had Honey dropt into their mouthes by Bees and so were preserved Xenophon also in his Oeconomicks calls making of Honey the shop of Vertue and to it would have matrons and mothers of families go to be instructed The Poets willingly yeeld themselves to be compared with Bees who following nature as their only Mistress use no Art at all And so Plato affirms that Poets were never able by Art to finish any master-piece Insomuch that Pindar doth vaunt himself in this to be superior or to go beyond Bacchilides and Simonides in that he was taught by nature not by Art Bees unless provoked are harmlesse but being vext they will sting and that most shrewdly Such is the condition of Poets from whence are occasioned these verses of Archilochus He that doth move me quickly finds my sting I 'l make him cry and through the City ring Wherefore Plato in his Minos gives it as a rule to those that desire peace and quiet that they be very well advised how they intermeddle with Poets and Bees To conclude so many are their virtues worthy our imitation that the Aegyptians Greeks and Chaldeans took divers Hieroglyphicks from them as when they would express subjects obedient to their Prince they set it forth in figure of a Bee very singular in that virtue when a King loving to his subjects they portray it likewise and set it forth by a Swarm of Bees Other the like emblemes are to be
especially if the sting do yet stick fast in the flesh which if it go in very deep sometimes proves mortal as Nicander writes in his Theâ—iaca The Ancients that we may prove the sting of Bees to be converted to some good use as Suidas reports were wont to punish cheaters with them on this manner They strip the malefactor stark naked and besmeared his body all over with Honey which done and his hands and feet being bound they exposed him to the heat of the scorching Sun that what with the piercing raies beating upon his body what with the stinging of the Bees and flies and their often stabbing and wounding him he did at length suffer a death answerable to his life but if you would indeed resolve to go sting-free or at least heal your self being stung expell out of your minde idleness impiety theft malice for those that are defil'd with those vices they set upon to chuse as it were and out of natural instinct Beware also in especial manner you wear not red garments which might represent you to them to be a murtherer or man of bloud as also that you be not taken by them for an unchaste or unclean person which it seems they naturally know and abominate as hath been said before They which carry the bill of a Wood-pecker in their hands when they come near them although they do somewhat disturb their Swarms yet as Pliny saith the Bees will not hurt them Nonnius reports that if you rub and beat to powder the herb called Balm-mint or Balm-gentle their stings will not be able to hurt you Florentius gives in charge that he that is to gather the honey should annoint himself with the oyl or juice of Marshmallowes whereby he may take away the combs without danger But the juice of any Mallowes whatsoever will do the like and the better if they be rubbed with oyl for it doth both preserve from stinging and is a remedy to those that are stung But be it granted that diseases be contracted by their stingings yet 't is but taking a few of these Bees that are found dead in the Honey and let them be carefully applied and they presently cure them and take away all the venome and aking of them What shall I say God never created a creature lesse chargeable and more profitable They are bought for a very little money they will live in all places whatsoever even in woody and mountainous Countreys The poor as well as the rich gain a great return or revenue by keeping of them and yet need they not put more in the pot or keep a servant the more for them Merula reports that Varro rented out his stocks of Bees for 5000 l. of Honey and in Spain out of a little Village containing not above an Acre at most that he gained of the Honey there gathered 10000 Sestercies i. e. 50 l. of our English money in one year Besides all this we have from their shops or store-houses Wax Bee-bread Bee-glew Rosin Honey-combs such as no Common wealth can well be without not to repeat their virtues which are no less wholsome for the minde then those are profitable for the body and maintenance of life And first of all we will treat of Honey that immortal nectareal pleasant wholsome juice and principal of all works and operations CHAP. V. Of the Name Difference and Vse of Honey AT the first Honey had but one name called in the Hebrew Dabesch but since that strange and confused Polyglottology or speaking with divers tongues it was called of the inhabitants of Arabia Hel Han of the French Miel of the Italians Mele of the Dutch Honichâ—â—em of the Germans Honig of the English Honey the Greeks called it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from the admirable care and industry of the Bee in making of it as Eustachius notes from whence comes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Melitellum of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Porphiry This for the Name But what it is yet after all is much controve sed amongst the learned Some there are that fondly conceit it to be the spittle of the Planets or the gelly falling from the Stars others the purging of the Air or the sweat of the Heavens but in my judgement it may more properly be termed the Chylus of the Bees gathered from some sweet matter but having its perfection and consummation from their ventricles and afterwards by expuition or vomit cast out into the cells or Honey-combs Aristotle Pliny Avicen Seneca would have the Bees not be makers of the Honey but only gatherers of it for thus they write The Bees say they do gather the Honey from the dew of the air especially at the rising of certain Stars and from the conjunction of the Rain-bow for they make no Honey but Honey-combs only Galen also lib. 3. de Alim fac hath these words I remember saith he upon a time in Summer we gathered a great quantity of Honey from the leaves of the trees and then the Countrey in way of sport sang Jupiter rains Honey But then the night before had been exceeding cold as it could be in Summer by the strength whereof the sweet exhalations and vapours being drawn up by the Sun were congealed together Now with us this is a very rare accident but in Mount Libanus it happens every year and therefore they spread skins upon the ground under the trees and shake them and the Aerial Honey that falls from them they put up in pots and earthen vessels Now Honey as all other things do differ in substance or matter it is either Aerial or Terrestrial Aerial Hony is one thing Terrestrial another For in the moneths of May June and July a kinde of heavenly Ambrosia falls down upon the leaves of plants which they call honey dew but I rather mieldew very sweet in taste liquid pure and as sweet as sugar it self this being gathered and drank in the Bees I grant do ripen or bring to maturity but that they make any real mutation I constantly deny unlesse perchance you will say that the refining the dew is an alteration of the species Gal. lib. 3. de Alim fac affirms that the matter of Honey is not the very dew it self but something near of kin to it the which Bees gathering do cast up again into their cells but they do not change the species of the juice as Avicen also saith But this aerial dew of which this aerial Honey is gathered is of two sorts coagulated or thickned Manna and liquid of which the best Honey is made especially if it retain the same vertue it had when it first fell but falling from such a height and even with the very sliding of the fall by reason of the impurity of the air contracting defilement and being infected with the exhalation of the leaves and juice of the flowers upon which it lights it looseth much of that heavenly vertue although some remain and being so often shifted in the ventricles of the
Wasp hath but stinging so deadly and with such force that it leaves the weapon in the wound As a remedy to this Nicander commends the Pine tree Gum and the unctuous honey of the Tenthredo Parmeni in his Iambicks makes mention of this creature which in the time of vintage useth to eat the ripe Grapes Another of this sort is found in Assyria but of greater bulk Some of them build their nests spire wise out of clay like to glasse or salt fastening them to a stone or such like thing but so hard and thick that you can scarse pierce them with a dart For these they lay and bring forth little white worms covered over with a black membrane in another membrane they make wax in clay much paler in colour and in greater plenty than the Bees So Aristotle and Pliny Who indeed were very sparing in their relations concerning the Tenthredo Bombyx and Humble Bee either because their nature was not so well known to the generality of the Grecians or rather because they themselves were not so well vers'd in their History They are of little or no use Insomuch that the Greeks use to call an idle unprofitable man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. a man no better than a Humble Bee for such is this kinde of Bee even of no use at all Neverthelesse one Antisocraticus to shew his wit hath taken a great deal of pains to set forth the commendations of it A cup with a wide mouth making a great noise as they drank was in great request with the Ancients that so not only the brain might be intoxicated with the liquor but the ears also with the greatnesse of the noise They breed under stones hard to the ground they build their nests sometimes with two doors sometimes with three in which there is found a beginning of a certain course Honey and that as Albertus relates and Pennius saw not of any great quantity who once found so much as he could scarse hold in three handfuls The English Humble Bees have not all stings only some few of them but those that have do sting grievously the honey they make is not very sweet and withall some what waterish They fasten their wax as the Bees do to their hinder legs they couple tail to tail in the mean while holding fast by some plant or tree they continue long in the act of venery and all the time clapping with their wings they make a harsh noise as if they were singing a Bridal song CHAP. X. Of Flyes IN Hebrew Zebub in Arabick Dubene Aldubel in Illyrian Muscha in Spanish and Italian Mosca in French Mousche in High Dutch Flieg m' uck in Low Dutch Vliegh mugge in English a Fly from flying or scaping away for it signines both in Scottish Flee in Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is to suck deeply or to mutter the Fly doth both Latine Musca Not as proceeding from Muscus Moss as some do fondly dream but from Musculus a muscle for taking off his wings you shall see that his head is full of shewes his body soft his tail tendinous Hence the diminutive muscula in Boethius who thus elegantly cries out Quid homine imbecillius quem morsus muscularum necat VVhat so frail as man whom the smallest Fly is able to bite to death Now the frame both of its body and minde we describe thus out of Lucian and others The great Fly is the least of winged Insects insomuch that it may be compared to the least Fly or Flee only he is so much bigger than they as the Bee is bigger than he It hath wings not such as other things that flie have but made of little skins as the Locusts Grashoppers and Bees are but a very great deal softer as an Indian Garment is softer than those of Greece If any man observe the Fly when he opens his wings in the Sun he may perceive them painted with variety of colours as the Peacocks are He doth not slie straight forward as the Bats do nor skipping as the Locusts nor making a noyse as the VVasp but winding in and out to what part of the air soever he pleaseth to move himself Neither doth he flie quietly and in silence but with singing and melody not so hard hearted and cruel as the gnat or little Flyes not as Bees and Wasps with a grave harshnesse making a horrible and terrible murmuring yea so far doth the Fly exceed all these in sweetness of sound as he flieth as the small Pipe doth the Trumpet and Cymbal or as still musick is sweeter then the loud He hath a very little head bound to his neck turning every way not compacted and fastened to his shoulders as the Locusts is His eyes stand out very much shining as if set in horn His breast is very firm and well compacted He hath six feet growing out of his body not as the Wasps fast bound or tyed to it he goeth only with four of them the other two so emost serve in stead of hands as you see him commonly go upon four feet in the other two holding up something or other that he hath gotten to feed on to his mouth as men do and as we do His belly is slender answerable to his breast having broad girdles and scales He doth not sting with a sting as the Bee and the Wasp do but with his mouth and snout like the Elephant and he eats and takes up things with it and sticking in a concave vessel he holds it in the top of his snout out of this comes forth a tooth with which he pricks o◠bites he drinks nothing but milk and bloud the which he draws forth of those he stings with very little or no pain at all but only with a kinde of titillation or tickling The light like Truth he doth exceedingly rejoyce in and doth behave himself honestly therein and civilly Yea the Fly doth so covet the light that many times with the Spider or Spinner he loseth his life for his pains at night he goes to rest as honest folk use to do and makes no noise He does nothing in the dark counting it unbeseeming for him to do any thing privately or to be guilty of that fact which if done in the light would be a disgrace and disparagement to him I can assure you it is no little understanding that he hath also whereby he doth escape the wiles of his treacherous enemy the Spider for he marks him as he lies in wait for him and looks upon him and so declines his force lest he should be taken in his net and be destroyed I must not speak of his prowesse and valour for in that he may seem to surpasse man himself Homer the Prince of Poets when he did endevour to set forth and commend the gallantry of the bravest noble man doth not compare his strength to that of the Lion Leopard wilde Boar or the like but to the undaunted courage and confidence of
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
Sclerocephalus is like to this in form and forces and effects the same things as also the Scolecium We said that the downy Phalangium drives away barrenness if it be carried about one but whether it be violently venomous I know no man that hath determined it The spotted or Phalangium of Apulia doth produce divers and contrary symptomes according to the complexion of him that is wounded and his present disposition For some laugh some cry some speak faulteringly others are wholly silent this man sleeps the other runs up and down alwaies waking this man rejoyceth is merry and moves up and down that is sad slothful dull some think themselves to be Kings and command all some are sad and think they are in captivity and fettered lastly as men drunk are not of one quality so are these that are mad some are fearful silent trembling some are bold clamoâ—ous constant This is common to them all to delight in musical instruments and to apply their mindes and bodies to dancing and leaping at the sound of them Lastly when by continuance of the disease and the vehemency of it they seem next unto death yet when they hear musick they recollect their spirits and they dance with greater chearfulness every day These dancings being continued night and day at length the spirits being agitated and the venome driven forth by insensible transpiration they grow well But if the Musicians upon any cause do but leave off playing before the fuel of this mischief be spent the sick fall into the same disease that they were first oppressed with We must admire this most above other things that all those that are stung with the the Tarantula dance so well as if they were taught to dance and sing as well as if they were musically bred In Italy it was first invented and custome hath taken it up to call such as are bitten Tarantati or Tarantulati Cardanus against faith and experience denieth that musick can restore any that are bitten yet we heard the same thing fell out at Basil from Felix Platerus Theodore Zuingerus our most famous and dear Masters and we read the same in Matthiolus Bellunensis Ponzettus and Paracelsus And if the sweet musick of pipes could help mad horses and pains of the hips as Asclepiades writes why may it not help those are stung with a Tarantula Some there are that assign to this disease some I know not what small deity as superintendent over it they call him St. Vitus that had formerly great skill in singing he being called upon and pacified with musick as he is the patron of musick cures them so that men superstitiously impute that to him which they should do to musick and dancing Bellonius reports that the Cretian Phalangium induceth the like mischiefs and the pain and wound of it is also cured by musick It is no wonder the Ancients described not these two kindes of Phalangia because they knew them not nor did the shew the waies how to cure their stingings Dioscorides writes thus of the common bitings of the Phalangia The symptomes that follow their bitings are commonly these The place stung looketh red but neither swels nor waxeth hot but it is something moist when it growes cold the whole body quakes the hams and groins are stretched out there is a collection made in the loins they are often urged to make water and they sweat with very great pain and labour to go to the stool and cold sweat runs down every where and tears trickle down from their darkned eyes Aetius adds further They are kept waking they have frequent erection of the yard their head pricks sometimes their eyes and their legs grow hollow Their belly is unequally stretched out with winds and their whole body swels chiefly their face their gums their tongues and tonsils they bring forth their words foolishly and gaping sometimes they are troubled with difficulty to make water they are pained in their secrets they make urine like water and full of cobwebs The part affected is pricked and swels which Dioscorides denied before and it is moderately red So saith Aetius from whom Paulus Actuarius Ardoynus differ but little Gal. 3. de loc affec c. 7. hath it thus The bitings saith he of the Phalangia are scarce to be seen it first affects only the skin and from the superficies of it it is carried by the continuity of the fibres to the brain and into the whole body for the skin comes from the membranes and they from the nerves and the brain this is clear because by presently binding of it on the farther parts they are preserved from the venome that is near to them In Zacinthus they that are bit by the Phalangia are otherwise affected and more grievously in other parts their body is astonished weakned trembles and is very cold vomiting and convulsion followes and inflation of the yard their ears are afflicted with most cruel pains and the soles of their feet They use bathing for a remedy if the party recovered go willingly into bathes afterwards or were by chance or by craft brought into them by the hot water the contagion passeth over the whole body and he perceives the same mischief in the whole body Dioscorides writes the same things in the chapter concerning Trifoly that smels like Asphaltum The decoction of the whole plant easeth all the pain by fomentation where Serpents have stung men what man soever that hath ulcers and washeth himself in the same bath is so affected as he that was bit by a Serpent Galen saith he thinks it is done by a miracle Lib. de Theriaca ad Pisonom if Galen did write that Book But Aelian speaks more miraculously where he affirms that may happen to those that are sound making no mention of ulcers And thus much for symptomes Now for the cure The cure is particular or general Physitians speak of but a few particular cures because the general is commonly effectual But Pliny sets down a remedy against the biting of the Phalangium called Formicarium that hath a red head to shew another of the same kinde to him that is wounded and they are kept dead for this purpose Also a young Weasil is very good whose belly is stuft with Coriander kept long and drank in Wine A Wasp that is called Ichneumon bruised and applied drives back the venome of the Phalangium Vesparium saith Bellonius not otherwise than as one living kils another that is alive For Ichneumon saith Aristotle is a small creature that is an enemy to the Phalangia it often goes into their holes and goes forth again losing its labour For it is a matter of great labour for so small a creature to draw forth its enemy greater than it self by force but if he light upon his enemy preying abroad he drags the Phalangium as easily with him as a Pismire doth a corn and the more stifly he drawes himself back the Wasp draws him on the more fiercely and sparing
sleep as the disease increaseth their hearts beat exceedingly their voice is interrupted their arteries beat weakly sometimes in the height of their pain they are extended and their mouth fomes as in the Epilepsie their belly is swoln like a Tympany Sometimes the pains abate and again there follow torments and Colique pains with a henterie flux of the belly sometimes they are costive and the excrements are hard These are the signs of Worms now follow the Prognosticks The Prognosticks are very necessary in all diseases to know what will be the event and to know the condition of the patient serves much for the cure as Hippocrates especially in his Prognosticks hath abundantly shewed who in the beginning of his book de prudent Medico hath delivered it Especially foretelling here before the patient things present past and to come and what the sick have neglected he is thought to understand the condition of the patient and hence it is that men wil better dare to trust the Physitian But because it is difficult to foresee all this unlesse we use some artificial conjecture I call that an artificial conjecture that comes very neer the truth and who can easily attain this unlesse he have learned the things that belong to the art and remember them and hath with all diligence exercised himself in the practice of it The things wil be thus known If a man suppose that there is any vital vertue he must know the disposition of the patient in strength and weaknesse and when he is perfect in these he must study further to know all differences of diseases in the greatnesse and manner of them and then to learn the foreknowledge of the future state And when he hath learned all these then he must exercise himself both in comprehending the magnitude of the disease by exact conjecture and the â—orce of the patient and how long they may last Now practise wil help him much in this and before he hath diligently learned all these it wil no whit profit him to see sick people wherefore they that professe physick proceeding in this method shal never undergo any disgrace neither in curing nor foretelling of future events which they report some famous Paysitians have fallen into Hence it may be collected why some Physitians are more fortunate then others and what a fraud that is to call a Physitian more fortunate then another how absurd that is Galen and Erasistratus have shewed saying that a Physitian must be exercised in all these things in his minde and he must be diligent and prudent by nature that comparing all together he may get a grosse summe of praedictions that shal be useful for himself and for his patient For such is the force of praediction that alwayes for the most part what the Physitian foresces wil come to passe where the Physitian is perfect and the sick doth not negiect his orders But because as it is evident a Physician by praedictions may get immortality almost so chiefly from those things that do belong to this affect he shal win glory to himself by telling the sick their condition who for the most part are children or ignorant what their disease is Since therefore Prognosticks are chiefly necessary for this disease I wil not fail to set down what the Ancients have written of this disease Paulus a great follower of Galen writes of these things to this purpose Worms bred at the beginning of Feavers have their subsistence from the corruption in the body about the state of the disease from the malignity of the disease about the declining they grow better For Hippocrates saith it is good that round Worms come forth when the disease comes to a Crisis But Aetius writes thus from the opinion of Herodotus a Physician Worms breed in Feavers and without that differ one from the other in multitude magnitude colour and time For Worms bred at the beginning of a disease have their being from the corruption that is in the body about the vigour of it from the malignity of the disease about the declination from the change to better and they are soon also voided forth Nature driving them to the outward parts as she doth the rest of the excrements But the greater ones are worse then the lesser many than few red than white living than dead Our new writers adde to these if round Worms are cast forth alive at the beginning of acute diseases they shew pestilent diseases but if dead ones be cast forth when the diseases decline they are an ill sign also however they appear both these times it is bad It may be because that Feaver that follows Worms is alwayes naught because it consumes the matter for Worms It happens also that the Worms are set on fire and grow hot by reason of a Feaver and so are wreathed together and moved that they so much the more affect and trouble those that have these Worms They adde further that it is proved by experience that Worms are in the belly if in the morning you sprinkle cold water on the mouth of childrens stomachs for they will all gather to one place Worms sprinkled with bloud so voided is ill for they shew great hurt of the guts to cast Worms up by vomit is naught for it shews the stomach to be stuffed with filthy humours Frequent cold breathing of children their bodies yet swelling is deadly for it shews they will die the next day If the eyes of the sick are somewhat held together and cannot be closed by the fingers of those that stand by death is at hand Some there are it may be following the opinion of Alsaravius that say that those who are troubled with Ascarides are but short-lived But there is a great question to be resolved and that being done I shal put an end to those things that concern the Prognosticks taken from Worms Aetius a little before said that live Worms were worse than dead ones But Rhasis and Avicenna that follows him think the contrary absolutely preferring the dead ones before the living In which question to passe over other men I shal say what I think that the strongest affection is taken from those that are dead because they must needs be driven forth and cannot come forth of their own accord yet I follow Hippocrates who in a certain place useth some words that are difficult wherein he would have us to consider diligently what symptoms VVorms breed for if they come forth without any symptoms they foreshew a good sign But he makes it clearer elsewhere thus It is necessary that round Worms should come forth with the excrements when the disease comes to the Crisis So that by this we may understand that if they be voided any other time it is done rather symptomatically than by force of nature and therefore they shew corruption or malignity as Paulus and Aetius distinguished But because we can never rightly undertake the methodicall way of curing Worms unlesse the belly in which they are
Horses Aelianus Vigetius Coelius Aristotle The Horses of divers Nations Oppianus Apollonius Horses with horns and wings Ruellius Absyrtus Vegetius Strabo Suctonius Varrius Strabo Oppianus Aelianus Absyrtus Ruellius Camerarius Albertus Strabo Vegetius Aelianus Oppianus Strabo Leo African Absyrtus Aelianus Coelius Aelianus Vegetius Pliny Nebrodon Strabo Textor Volatteran The members of an eligible Horse Signs to chuse a good Colt Columella Varro Albertus Of the choise of a Horse unbacked or never ridden Of the colour Varrinus Artificial means to make Mares conceive the best coloured Colts The sorm The beauty of a Stallion The age of a Stallion Columella Palladius Absyrtus The choise of Mares The copulation of Horses and Mares Aristotle Albertus Pliny A history of a stallion to his own dam. The means to procure Horses to copulation To ingender a male or female The ordering of a Mare with foal Varro Palladius Orus Aristotle The time of their going with young Aristotle Vegetius Camerarius Camerarius Russius Pollux Camerarius Vegetius The furniture of a Horse and his trimming Xenophon Russius Absyrtus Pollux A History Solinus Aristotle Orus Oppianus Cardan Aelianus Gillius Textor Xenophon The institution of a warlike Horse Men have perished by rashness in riding The honour of Horsemanship Festus Suidas The Athenian Orders Aristophanes Coelius Suidas Pliny Dion Alexander Variomanus Grapaldus Camerarius Camerarius Livius Festus Xenophon Oppianus Albertus Aristotle Russius Palladius Mathaeolus Dioscorides The time of their life Mat. Michou Pau. Venetus Textor Heliodorus Coelius Giraldus Festus 〈…〉 try by the pictures of Horses Munster The ceremony of the Persians going to war Coelius Varrinus Strabo Plutarch The burial of Horses Dion Aelianus Pliny Festus Predictions or Augurisms by Horses Valer. Man Of Monster Horses Pliny Dion Coelius Of Centaures Pollux Amianus Sipontinus Blundevile Blondevile Blundevile Blundevile Blundevile Blundevile Markham Blundevile Blundevile Markham Blundevile Markham Blundevile Markham Blundevile Markham Blundevile Blundevile Blundevile Markham Blundevile Markham Blundevile Markham Blundevile Markham Blundevile Markham Blundevile Markham Blundevile Blundevile Markham Blundevile Markham Blundevile Markham Markham Blundevile Markham Blundevilé Blundevilé Blundevilé Markhanm Blundevilé Blundevile Blundevile Blundevile Blundevile Blundevile Blundevile Blundevile Blundevile Blundevile Blundevile Blundevilé Markham Blundevik Markham Blundevile Blundevile Blundevile Markham Blundevile Blundevile Markham Blundevile Blundevile Blundévile Blundevile Markham Blundevile Markham Blundevilâ— Markham Blundevile Markham Blundevile Markham Blundevile Markham Blundevile Markham Blundevile Markham Blundevile Blundevile Markham Blundevile Markham Markham Blundevile Markham Blundevile Markham Blundevile Markham Blundevile Markham Markham Markham Blundevile Blundevile Blundevile Markham Markham Blundevile Blundevile Blundevile Markham Pliny Theomnestus Vegetius Pliny Furnerius Albertus Marcellus Sextus Pliny Pliny Pliny Marcellus Hippocrates Marcellus Rasis Albertus Rasis Russius Dioscorides Pliny Marcellus Russius Pelagonius Albertus Aesculapius Marcellus Pliny Sextus Empiricus Marcellus Pliny Empiricus Dioscorides Galen Pliny Mâ—gâ— The names and other general accidents Albertus Hieronymus Aristotle Oppianus The several parts Pliny Solinus Albertus Aristotle Whether they change sexes yearly Ovid. Aelianus Their procreation The disposition and natural properties of this beast Pliny Solinus Aelianus Philes Solinus Aelianus Texâ—or Aelianus Their enmity with other beasts Gâ—us The natural use of their skins Palladius Kasis Plutarch Coelius Actuarius Zoroastres Porphyrius The Region and quantity The lamentation for the dead Albertus â—â—llunensts The several names The parts and natural disposition The manner of their taking The region proportion and other qualities Philes The medicinal properties Galeu Rasis Pliny Pliny Albertus Rasis Pliny Pliny Democritus Myrepsus Alberius Pliny Dioscorides Marcellus Galen Marcellus Pliny Marcellus Pliny Marcellus Dioscorides Of the name A fiction of Capricornus Porphyrius The attributes of this beast Textor Their Countries of breed and parts of their body Stumpsius The benefit of cold Their several members Their taking Their copulation Their behaviour at their death Pelagonius The use of their horns The kindes and names with the reason thereof Hermolaus Gillius Albertus Vincentius The quantity and leveral parts Their procreation and fights one with another The places of their abode The courage and strength of this beast His entrance into a Crocodile The taming of Ichneumons Their food Their subtilty in obtaining their prey The Crocodiles behavior feeling the Ichneumon in her belly Their combates with Asps Their enmity to all kindes of Serpents and their egs Pliny Avicenna Marcellus Herodotus The signification of the word Lamia Visions of Phairies Philostratus The Poetical Lamia Varinus Old Wives tails of Phalâ—ies A story of a Phairy woman Coelius The true definition of Phairies Their tames and description The several names of Lions The several kinds of Lions Varinus Hesychius Aelianus Monsters bred like Lions Coelius Herodotus Countries without Lions Vartomannus The colour of Lions Cardanus The several parts Plutarch Aelianus Aristotle Pliny Cardanus Solinus The Epithets of Lions The voice of Lions Pa. Venetus Aelianus The estimation of a Lioness and the general rage of Lions Aristotle Their food and eating Albertus Avicen Aelianus Philes Solinus Pliny Aristotle The cruelty of Lions Leo Afer Philes Herodotus The hatred of Lions and their several enemies Aelianus Ambrosius The drink of Lions The terrors of Lions and means whereby they perish Pliny Ambrose Animalia solaria Aelianus Pliny Leo Afer Their lust of copulation The adultery of Lionesses Pliny Apollonius Ponux Caelius Philostratus Physiologus Aelianus Endemus Gillius Aelianus The recompence of young Lions to the old Tzelzes Aristotle Albertus The love of Lions to their benefactors The nature of their revenge Pliny Solinus Pliny Solinus Textor Albertus Pliny Aelianus Gellius A notable story of a Lion Gellius Gillius Appion A story of the justice of Lions Aelianus Textor Diodorus The clemency of Lions in sparing men Textor Men devoured by Lions Aelianus Plutarch Men that have overcome Lions Men transfigured into Lions according to Poets and fictions Olympiodorus Porphyrius The understanding of Lions Leo Afer The anger of Lions and the signes thereof Adamantius Albertus The hunting and taking of Lions Paulus Vâ—neius Three ways to take Lion The second The third Leo Afer Pliny Aristotle Albertus Of the taming of Lions Coelius Aelianus Leo Afer Aelianus The best means to tame Lions The triumphs games and combates with Lions Plutarch Pliny Tame Lions become wilde again The length of a Lions life and their diseases Albertus Cardan The use of a Lions several parts Ridiculous imitation Coelius The fat of Lions Rasis Albertus Marcellus Sextus Magical Physick for to be invincible Alex. ab Al. A monster like a Lion The Images and several statues of Lions Coelius Anthologius Varinus Pausanias Atheneus Agricola Oppianus Varinus The constellation of the Lion Macrobius Lions norished in Temples worshipped Albertus Sextus Aesculapius Galen Rasis Galen Myâ—etsis Albertus Rasis Pliny Betrutius Albertus Galen Rasis Aetius Albertus Aristotle The names of the Linx Bellonius Avicenna The reason of the Latins names Two kinds of Linxes A