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women:4 and Pliny reports, that Livia, the wife of Augustus, hatched an egg in her bosom. Nor is only an animal heat required hereto, but an elemental and artificial warmth will suffice: for, as Diodorus delivereth, the Egyptians were wont to hatch their eggs in ovens, and many eyewitnesses confirm that practice unto this day. And, therefore, this generation of the basilisk seems like that of Castor and Helena; he that can credit the one, may easily believe the other; that is, that these two were hatched out of the egg which Jupiter, in the form of a swan, begat on his mistress Leda.

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The occasion of this conceit might be an Egyptian tradition concerning the bird ibis, which after became transferred unto cocks. For an opinion it was of that nation, that the ibis, feeding upon serpents, that venomous food so inquinated their oval conceptions or eggs within their bodies, that they sometimes came forth in serpentine shapes, and therefore they always brake their eggs, nor would they endure the bird to sit upon them. But how causeless their fear was herein, the daily incubation of ducks, peahens, and many other testify; and the stork might have informed them; which bird they honoured and cherished, to destroy their serpents.

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on the bodies of women.] Betweene the breasts of a woman, rolled in fine lawne, and they are stronger then those hatcht in the cases, how warme soever kept. But itt must bee by election in virgin's breasts, antequam sororiant, aut menstrua patiantur, næ prorsus intereant, alioqui prodituræ feliciter.-Wr.

5 ibis.] Black ibis.—Wr.

6 serpents.] Heer the learned author mistakes the story for Tully, in the 2nd De Natura Deorum says, the Ægyptians justly honored the ibis; quia pestem ab Egypto avertunt quum serpentes volucros, Africo è Libya advertos, interficiant. Soe farr were they from breaking their eggs, which had been to destroy the breed of those whom they honored. And what madnes had it been to honor the stork that destroyed the serpents and to destroy the ibides' eggs, by which creature (and not by the storke) those fiery flying serpents were destroyed. But mistake grew for want of right advertisement herein. For St. Hierom, that wel knew Egypt, tels us there were 2 kinds of the ibides: one coale black (and itt seemes pernicious some waye, and therefore hated by them), the other not much unlike the stork, though not the same. Soe that in honoring the second kinde, they might seem to honor the stork, which was (indeed) the right ibis, their preserver.-Wr.

That which much promoted it, was a misapprehension in Holy Scripture upon the Latin translation in Isa. li. Ova aspidum ruperunt, et telas aranearum texuerunt, qui comedet de ovis eorum morietur, et quod confotum est, erumpet in regulum. From whence, notwithstanding, beside the generation of serpents from eggs, there can be nothing concluded; and what kind of serpents are meant, not easy to be determined: for translations are very different: Tremellius rendering the asp hæmorrhous, and the regulus or basilisk, a viper; and our translation for the asp sets down a cockatrice in the text, and an adder in the margin.

Another place of Isaiah doth also seem to countenance it, chap. xiv. Ne læteris Philistæa, quoniam diminuta est virga percussoris tui; de radice enim colubri egredietur regulus, et semen ejus absorbens volucrem; which ours somewhat favourably rendereth: "Out of the serpent's root shall come forth a cockatrice, and his fruit shall be a fiery flying serpent." But Tremellius, è radice serpentis prodit hæmorrhous, et fructus illius prester volans; wherein the words are different, but the sense is still the same; for therein are figuratively intended Uzziah and Ezechias; for though the Philistines had escaped the minor serpent, Uzziah, yet from his stock a fiercer snake should arise, that would more terribly sting them, and that was Ezechias.

But the greatest promotion it hath received from a misunderstanding of the hieroglyphical intention. For being conceived to be the lord and king of serpents, to awe all others, nor to be destroyed by any, the Egyptians hereby implied eternity, and the awful power of the supreme deity; and therefore described a crowned asp or basilisk upon the heads of their gods: as may be observed in the Bembine table, and other Egyptian monuments.8

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as may be observed, &c.] This is from Pierius (141, B.) by whom a basilisk is figured from the Bembine, or Isiac table, as a serpent, with a crest, or crown, upon an obelisk, and having rudiments of wings and a long head and snout.

8 But, &c.] This paragraph was first added in the 3rd edit.

CHAPTER VIII.

That a Wolf first seeing a man, begets a dumbness in him. SUCH a story as the basilisk, is that of the wolf, concerning priority of vision, that a man becomes hoarse, or dumb, if a wolf have the advantage first to eye him. And this is in plain language affirmed by Pliny: In Italia, ut creditur, luporum visus est noxius, vocemque homini, quem priùs contemplatur, adimere; so is it made out what is delivered by Theocritus, and after him by Virgil:

Vox quoque Morim

Jam fugit ipsa, lupi Mœrim videre priores.

And thus is the proverb to be understood, when, during the discourse, if the party or subject interveneth, and there ensueth a sudden silence, it is usually said, lupus est in fabula. Which conceit being already convicted, not only by Scaliger, Riolanus, and others, but daily confutable almost everywhere out of England, we shall not further refute.

The ground, or occasional original hereof, was probably the amazement and sudden silence the unexpected appearance of wolves doth often put upon travellers; not by a supposed vapour, or venomous emanation, but a vehement fear, which naturally produceth obmutescence, and sometimes irrecoverable silence. Thus birds are silent in the presence of an hawk, and Pliny saith that dogs are mute in the shadow of an hyæna. But thus could not the mouths of worthy martyrs be silenced, who being exposed not only unto the eyes, but the merciless teeth of wolves, gave loud expressions of their faith, and their holy clamours 2 were heard as high as heaven.

9 that a man becomes hoarse.] When any one becomes hoarse, the French say, il a vu le loup. See Howell's Familiar Letters, vol. iv. p. 52. See Erasmi Colloquia, De Amicitiâ.-Jeff.

Ross uses the argumentum ad hominem in this case: he says, "Dr. Browne did unadvisedly reckon this among his vulgar errors, for I believe he would find this no error, if he were suddenly surprised by a wolf, having no means to escape or save himself!"

Scaliger.] Exercitatione 344.- Wr.

2 clamours.] Shouts. Clamours is improper here, for 'twas not

That which much promoted it, beside the common proverb, was an expression in Theocritus, a very ancient poet, ov þƉéyéŋ, Aúkov εides, Edere non poteris vocem, Lycus est tibi visus; which Lycus was rival unto another, and suddenly appearing, stopped the mouth of his corrival. Now Lycus signifying also a wolf occasioned this apprehension; men taking that appellatively which was to be understood properly, and translating the genuine acception: which is a fallacy of equivocation, and in some opinions begat the like conceit concerning Romulus and Remus, that they were fostered by a wolf-the name of the nurse being Lupa—and founded the fable of Europa, and her carriage over the sea by a bull, because the ship or pilot's name was Taurus. And thus have some been startled at the proverb, bos in lingua, confusedly apprehending how a man should be said to have an ox in his tongue, that would not speak his mind; which was no more than that a piece of money had silenced him; for by the ox was only implied a piece of coin stamped with that figure, first current with the Athenians, and after among the Romans.3

CHAPTER IX.

Of the long life of the Deer.

THE common opinion concerning the long life of animals is very ancient, especially of crows, choughs, and deer, in moderate accounts exceeding the age of man, in some the days of Nestor, and in others surmounting the years of Artephius or Methuselah. From whence antiquity hath raised

feare of death that made them cry out at all; but an assured certainty of their neer approaching glorification made them kiss their persequutors, as promoters to eternity, and to sing in the midst of their torments aloud! Soe that, instead of "clamours," I put "shouts," wherewith they daunted those wolves, and made them stand amazed at their courage; which they concluded must needs proceed from the hope of something after death, to bee farr better then the present life, and by this meanes were many of them converted.-Wr.

3 first current with the Athenians, &c.] Wherewith the embassadors stopt Demosthenes his mouth, that hee should not inveigh against their countrye.-Wr.

proverbial expressions, and the real conception of their duration hath been the hyperbolical expression of many others. From all the rest we shall single out the deer, upon concession a long-lived animal, and in longevity by many conceived to attain unto hundreds ; wherein, permitting every man his own belief, we shall ourselves crave liberty to doubt, and our reasons are these ensuing.

The first is that of Aristotle, drawn from the increment and gestation of this animal, that is, its sudden arrivance unto growth and maturity, and the small time of its remainder in the womb. His words in the translation of Scaliger are these-De ejus vitæ longitudine fabulantur; neque enim aut gestatio aut incrementum hinnulorum ejusmodi sunt, ut præstent argumentum longævi animalis; that is, "fables are raised concerning the vivacity of deer, for neither are their gestation or increment such as may afford an argument of long life." And these, saith Scaliger, are good mediums conjunctively taken, that is, not one without the other. For of animals viviparous, such as live long go long with young, and attain but slowly to their maturity and stature. So the horse, that liveth about thirty, arriveth unto his stature about six years, and remaineth about ten months in the womb,-so the camel, that liveth unto fifty, goeth with young no less than ten months, and ceaseth not to grow before seven,-and so the elephant, that liveth an hundred, beareth its young above a year, and arriveth unto perfection at twenty. On the contrary, the sheep and goat, which live but eight or ten years, go but five months, and attain to their perfection at two years: and the like proportion is observable in cats, hares, and conies. And so the deer, that endureth the womb but eight months, and is complete at six years, from the course of nature we cannot expect to live an hundred, nor in any proportional allowance much

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vivacity.] i. e. long life. The passage is from the Hist. Animal. lib. vi. c. xxix.

5 above a year.] The periods here assigned to the horse, camel, and elephant, are all shorter than the fact. That of the horse is twelve months, the camel eleven and a half, and the elephant twenty.

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five months.] The 1st of August was (of old) cal'd Lammas day, bycause the rams, going then to the flocks, made the fall of the lambs alwayes about the Nativitye; the 19th of December terminating the full time of gestation, i. e. five months, or twenty weeks.—Wr.

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