OTHER MARVELLOUS FACTS CONNECTED WITH ANIMALS

Latine · Mayhoff 1906

Reliqua mirabilia ex iis, quae diximus: non latrari a cane membranam e secundis canis habentem aut leporis fimum vel pilos tenentem. in culicum genere muliones..... non amplius quam uno die vivere, eosque, qui arborarii pici rostrum habeant et mella eximant, ab apibus non attingi; porcos sequi eum, a quo cerebrum corvi acceperint in offa. pulverem, in quo se mula volutaverit, corpori inspersum mitigare ardores amoris. sorices fugere, si unus castratus emittatur. anguina pelle et sale et farre, serpyllo contritis una deiectisque cum vino in fauces boum uva maturescente, toto anno eos valere, vel si hirundinum pulli terni ternis offis dentur. pulvere e vestigio anguium collecto sparso apes in alvos reverti. arietis dextro teste praeligato oves tantum gigni. non lassescere in ullo labore qui nervos ex alis et cruribus gruis habeant. mulas non calcitrare, cum vinum biberint. ungulas tantum mularum repertas, neque aliam ullam materiam, quae non perroderetur a veneno Stygis aquae, cum id dandum Alexandro Magno Antipater mitteret, memoria dignum est, magna Aristotelis infamia excogitatum.

Nunc ad aquatilia praevertemur.

English · Bostock & Riley 1855–57

There are still some other marvellous facts related, with reference to the animals which we have mentioned. A dog will not bark at a person who has any part of the secundines of a bitch about him, or a hare’s dung or fur. The kind of gnats called “muliones,” do not live more than a single day. Persons when taking honey from the hives, will never be touched by the bees if they carry the beak of a wood-pecker about them. Swine will be sure to follow the person who has given them a raven’s brains, made up into a bolus. The dust in which a she-mule has wallowed, sprinkled upon the body, will allay the flames of desire. Rats may be put to flight by castrating a male rat, and setting it at liberty. If a snake’s slough is beaten up with some spelt, salt, and wild thyme, and introduced into the throat of oxen, with wine, at the time that grapes are ripening, they will be in perfect health for a whole year to come: the same, too, if three young swallows are given to them, made up into three boluses. The dust gathered from the track of a snake, sprinkled among bees, will make them return to the hive. If the right testicle of a ram is tied up, he will generate females only. Persons who have about them the sinews taken from the wings or legs of a crane, will never be fatigued with any kind of laborious exertion. Mules will never kick when they have drunk wine.

Of all known substances, it is a mule’s hoofs only that are not corroded by the poisonous waters of the fountain Styx: a memorable discovery made by Aristotle, to his great infamy, on the occasion when Antipater sent some of this water to Alexander the Great, for the purpose of poisoning him.

We will now pass on to the aquatic productions.