Book 5

They say that there are black birds, dark to look at, which inhabit the land of the Parians and neighbouring Cyzicus; you would call them hawks by their shape. They do not taste flesh, and are temperate as to the belly, and seeds suffice them for a meal. When autumn begins, a flock of these birds (they call them Memnons) goes straight to the Trojan land, to the tomb of Memnon. Those who still dwell in the Troad say that there is a mound consecrated to Memnon the son of Eos; and that his very corpse, carried by his mother to Susa—the place so famously hymned as Memnonian—was raised on high from the field of slaughter and received the burial befitting him, while the monument there bears his name in another sense. So the birds named after the aforesaid hero come every year, and they divide and split into enmity and difference, and they fight a fierce battle, until half of them die, and the others, the victors, go off whence indeed they came. Now how this is done, and whence, I have no leisure now to philosophize, nor to track out the secrets of nature; but this shall be said. The aforesaid birds wage this contest every year as a funeral game for the son of Eos and Tithonus. The Greeks honoured Pelias once with a contest, and Amarynceus, and indeed Patroclus too, and Achilles, the rival of Memnon.

They say that in Crete the owl is not bred at all, but that if one is brought in from outside it dies. Euripides seems to have written without examination when he made Polyidus, seeing this bird and inferring from it that he would find Glaucus. For my part I learn that the Cretans sing and teach stories besides those already related. The Cretan land received a gift from Zeus, since it was, of course, his nurse and concealed him in the famous hiding-place: that it should be free of every wicked beast born for harm, and should neither breed such itself nor rear one brought from outside. And it displays the power of the gift; for it is barren of the aforesaid creatures. And if anyone, by way of test or proof of the favour from Zeus, should bring in one of those foreign beasts, it dies the moment it merely touches the land. So those who hunt snakes in nearby Libya contrive as follows. These charmers tame and bring as a spectacle many of the venomous beasts, and bring with them a load of Libyan earth, enough for their need. They do this through forethought for the snakes, so that they may not perish; and for this reason, whenever they come to the aforesaid island, they do not set down the animals before they have first scattered beneath them the foreign earth they bring. And upon this they gather the crowds, and indeed they astonish the foolish and the many. Now so long as each of them remains in its place, coiled and settled, and rises up but does not pass beyond its own familiar dust, so long it lives; but if it ventures out onto the foreign earth that is strange to it and hostile, it dies, and with reason. For if the nod of Zeus was not unfulfilled toward Thetis, nor would be toward anyone else, it will surely not appear void toward his own nurse.

The river Indus is without beasts, but in it alone, they say, is bred a worm. And its form is such as those that are born and bred in wood; but those of that river grow to seven cubits in length, though larger and smaller might be found; and their thickness is such that a boy of ten years would scarcely be able to clasp them with his arms. They have one tooth growing above and another below, and both are square, a span in length. So great is the strength of their teeth. Whatever they take in them they crush most easily, whether it be a stone or a tame or wild animal. By day they remain below in the depth of the river, delighting in the mud and slime, and so are not visible; but by night they come out onto the land, and whatever they meet—horse or ox or ass—they crush it, then drag it to their own haunts and eat it in the river, and gnaw all its limbs except the belly of the animal. And if hunger presses them even by day, when a camel or ox drinks at the bank they creep up beneath and seize it very warily by the tip of the lips, and by a most violent rush and a firm pull drag it into the water, and make it their dinner. A hide of two fingers' thickness covers each of them. The taking and hunting of them is contrived in this way. They let down a stout and strong hook fastened to an iron chain, having tied to it a rope of white flax a talent in weight, and wrapped both with wool here and there so that the worm may not gnaw through them; and having fixed a lamb or kid upon the hook, they then let it down into the water of the river. As many as thirty men hold the rope, each with a javelin slung ready and a sword at his side. And there lie at hand serviceable clubs to strike with if need be; these are of cornel-wood, exceedingly hard. Then, when the worm is caught upon the hook and has swallowed the bait, they haul it up, and having caught it they kill it and hang it in the heat for thirty days. And from it a thick oil drips into earthenware vessels; each animal yields ten cotylae. This oil they bring to the king of the Indians, sealed with seals; for no one else is permitted to have so much as a drop of it. The rest of the creature's carcass is useless. The oil has this power. Whatever heap of wood you wish to set ablaze and reduce to embers, you will kindle it by pouring on a cotyle of this, without first putting under it any seed of fire; and if you wish to burn a man or animal, you pour it on, and at once he is consumed. With this, they say, the king of the Indians takes the cities that have come into enmity with him, and waits for neither rams nor tortoises nor the other siege-engines, since he has taken them by burning; for he fills earthenware vessels, each holding about a cotyle, with the oil, and stops them up above, and slings them at the gates. And when they hit the windows, the vessels are dashed and broken, and the oil pours down, and fire is poured over the gates, and is unquenchable. It burns armour too, and men in battle, and its strength is boundless. It is put out and made to vanish by a great quantity of rubbish thrown over it. So Ctesias of Cnidus says.

The porpoise is an animal like the dolphin, and it too has milk. In colour it is not black, but resembles the deepest dark-blue, and it breathes not by gills but by a blowhole; for so they call the passage of its breath. Its haunt is the Black Sea and the sea there; and the porpoise is least apt to wander beyond those haunts.

The hen that has conquered the male in battle grows proud with pleasure and lets down its wattles—not so far as the cocks do, yet it lets them down, and is filled with spirit, and steps out more largely.

The dolphin is believed to be a creature that loves its own kind. And the proof is this. Aenus is a Thracian city. It happened that a dolphin was caught and wounded, not to death, but so that life was still possible for the captive. So blood flowed, and the others not yet taken perceived it, and a whole shoal came to the harbour, and leaped about, and seemed bent on doing something not good. So the people of Aenus were afraid and released the captive. And the others, having recovered it as one of their kindred, went off and departed. But rarely is a man a partner in zeal and care for a kinsman or kinswoman in misfortune.

In Egypt, as Eudemus says, a monkey was being pursued, and cats were the pursuers. So fleeing with all its might it made straight for a certain tree, and they too sprang up most swiftly; for they cling to the bark, and trees are climbable for them too. But when it was being caught, being one against many, it leaped from the trunk, and seized with its hands the tip of a branch that hung overhead, and held on firmly for no short time; and the cats, since it was no longer within their reach, ran off to another hunt. And it, with much effort, was saved, owing to itself, as was fitting, its rescue.

Aristotle says that the land of the Astypalaeans is hostile to snakes, just as the same author agrees with us that Rheneia is hostile to weasels. And the crow cannot climb up to the Athenian acropolis. And you will not call Elis the mother of mules—or what is said is false.

For the people of Rhegium and the Locrians it is by treaty allowed to pass into each other's land and till it. Yet the cicadas of the one and of the other do not agree with these terms, nor are they of one and the same mind; for you will find the Locrian cicada most silent in Rhegium, and the Rhegian most

voiceless among the Locrians. And what the reason for such an exchange is, I do not know, nor does anyone else, unless he is idly bold; but Nature alone knows, O men of Rhegium and Locri. At any rate a river runs between the land of the Rhegians and Locris, and the banks are not parted even by the distance of a plethron, and yet neither kind flies across it. And in Cephallenia there is a river which is the cause of the fruitfulness of the cicadas on one side and their barrenness on the other. As for their king, the bees, when he leaves them—being gentle and tame and very nearly stingless—pursue and chase him as a fugitive from his rule. They track him by scent in a secret way, and seize him from the smell about him, and bring him back to his kingship, willingly and of their own desire, admiring his character. But the Athenians drove out Pisistratus, and the Syracusans Dionysius, and others others, since they were tyrants and lawless and unable to display the kingly art, which is indeed humanity and the protection of subjects.

It is the king's care among the bees that the swarm be ordered in this way. Some he commands to carry water, others within to mould the honeycombs, while the third part goes out to forage; and then they change their tasks in rotation, having most beautifully divided them. But the king himself—it is enough for him to have taken thought for these things and to legislate as I have said, after the manner of the great rulers whom the philosophers like to name the same men, statesmen and kings—as for the rest he rests and is exempt from working with his own hands. And if it is better for the bees to move, then the ruler too departs. And if he is still young, he leads, and the rest follow; but if he is older, he goes carried, borne by other bees. The bees turn to sleep at a signal. When it seems time to sleep, the king commands one to sound the signal for slumber. And she, obeying, has proclaimed it, and the others turn thereupon to rest, having until then been humming. So long as the king survives, the swarm prospers, and all disorder is banished; and the drones rest contentedly in their own cells, and the older bees dwell apart, and the young apart, and the king by himself, and the larvae are by themselves, and their food and their evacuations are kept separate. But when the king perishes, all is full of disorder and anarchy; for the drones lay eggs in the bees' cells, and the rest, being thrown into confusion among one another, no longer permit the swarm to prosper; and they die out at last for lack of a ruler. The bee lives a pure life, and would never feed upon any animal; and it needs no Pythagoras as counsellor, but the flowers suffice it as food. It is also of the highest temperance. At any rate it has hated luxury and softness. And the proof is this: it pursues and drives away one anointed with perfume as an enemy who has done it deadly harm. And it knows too one who has come from licentious intercourse, and pursues him also as a deadly foe. And they are well endowed with courage and are not to be turned. They flee no animal at all, nor yield in cowardice, but go to meet it. And toward those who do not trouble them nor begin unjust acts nor approach the swarm with mischief and treachery, they are peaceful and at truce; but a truceless war, as the saying is, is kindled against those who harm them, and whoever comes to ravage their honey is reckoned among their enemies. They smite the wasps badly too. And Aristotle says that once, meeting a horseman near the swarm, the bees killed him, falling upon him in force, horse and all. Yet at times they differ even among themselves, and the stronger overcome the weaker. And there overcome them, as I hear, both the toads and the frogs from the marshes and the bee-eaters and the swallows, and often the wasps too. But whoever overcomes them wins, so to speak, a Cadmean victory; for being struck and stung they come off badly; for the bees are armed no less with spirit than with stings. Nor are they without a share of providential wisdom, and Aristotle gives proof of what I say. It is this. Some bees came to a swarm not their own but another's, and then plundered the honey that in no way belonged to them. But the others, although robbed of their own labour, nevertheless endured quietly, keeping still, and then waited firmly to see what would come. And when the beekeeper had killed most of the enemy, those within, judging that they could be a match for an equal fight, came forth and then defended themselves, and exacted a vengeance for what they had been robbed of that was by no means to be blamed.

This too is a proof of the industriousness of bees. In the most wintry of places, from the setting of the Pleiades to the spring equinox, the bees keep continually within doors and rest indoors quietly, out of longing for warmth and flight from cold; but all the rest of the year they hate idleness and rest, and are good at toil. And you would never see a bee loitering outside that season in which their limbs are numbed.

Geometry, and beauty of shapes, and lovely formations the bees display without art or rule or what the wise call the compass. And when there is increase and the swarm thrives with bees, they send out colonies just as the greatest and most populous of cities do. The bee knows too when rain threatens to visit, and when a harsh wind is to come. And if the wind should come upon it contrary to its expectation, you will see each carrying a stone with the tips of its feet for ballast. And what the divine Plato says about the cicadas and their love of song and of music, one might say also about the choir of bees. At any rate, whenever they frisk about or stray, then the beekeepers clap a certain rhythmic and harmonious clapping; and the bees, as though drawn by a Siren, indeed turn back to their own haunts again.

In the island of Gyaros, Aristotle says, there are mice, and indeed they eat the iron ore of the earth. And Amyntas says that those in Teredon (this is a land of Babylonia) feed on the same. In Latmus in Caria, I hear, there are scorpions which sting their own citizens to death, but the strangers only gently and just enough to cause an itch—Zeus the protector of strangers, it seems to me, having assigned this gift to those who come there.

Wasps too, then, are ruled by a king, but not tyrannized as men are. And the proof is that these also are stingless. And the subjects have it for a law to mould the works, while the rulers are double the size, but gentle and such as can harm neither willingly nor unwillingly. Who then would not hate the Dionysii in Sicily, and Clearchus in Heraclea, and Apollodorus the butcher of the people of Cassandrea, and Nabis the ruiner of the Lacedaemonians, if indeed those took heart in the sword, while the kings of the wasps took heart in stinglessness and gentleness?

The wasps that have stings are said to do this too. Whenever they see a dead viper, they fall upon it and poison their sting. Whence men too seem to me to have learned a lesson, and that not a good one. And indeed Homer bears witness in the Odyssey, saying, "seeking a man-slaying drug, that he might have wherewith to anoint his bronze-tipped arrows"; or, by Zeus, if one must give any heed to the tale about Heracles—that he dipped his arrows in the poison of the hydra—so those too whet their stings with the dipping.

Let the fly too have from us the honour of not being left without mention here; for it also is a creation of nature. The flies of Pisa, at the festival of the Olympic games, make, as one might say, a truce both with the visitors and the natives. At any rate, when so many victims are sacrificed and blood is shed and meats are hung up, the flies vanish of their own accord, and cross the Alpheus to the bank opposite. And they seem to differ not at all from the women of the country, save perhaps that those flies are admitted to be somewhat more self-controlled than the women in their conduct; for the women are driven out by the law of the contest and of the temperance belonging to it, but the flies withdraw of their own accord from the sacred things, and during the rites and throughout the appointed time of the games they depart. The contest is dissolved, and they return, as though exiles who have obtained a recall by decree; then the flies flow back into Elis again.

The orphus is a sea creature, and if you catch and cut it open, you would not see it die at once, but it lingers in motion, and that for no short time. Through the winter it likes to keep house in its holes; and its haunts are dearer to it nearer the land.

The wolf is least apt to go to meet a bull and come at it face to face, but it fears the horns and swerves from their points. And as though it would fight in a straight line it threatens; yet it does not do this, but only makes a show as if about to attack, and then when the bull charges, it twists itself aside and leaps onto its back, and the rival beast holds the beast firmly, and overpowers it, the wolf making up by natural cunning for what it lacks.

The sea-ass has its heart placed in its belly, as those skilled in such matters agree with us and teach.

The peacock knows that it is the most beautiful of birds, and where its beauty resides, this too it knows, and on it it prides itself and is haughty, and takes confidence in its feathers, which both lend it adornment and send forth fear upon outsiders, and in the summer season provide it with shade from its own resources, not begged nor borrowed. At any rate, if it wishes to frighten anyone, it raises its tail-feathers and then shakes them and sends forth a sound, and the bystanders are afraid, as though frightened by the clang of a soldier from his armour. It lifts its head and nods most haughtily, as though shaking a triple crest. And when it needs to cool itself, it raises its feathers, and inclining them forward displays a kind of natural shade of its own body, screening off the keen point of the sunbeam. And if there is also a wind behind, it quietly parts its feathers; and the breath that flows through, blowing soft and most pleasant breezes upon it, gives the bird refreshment. And when praised it perceives it, and just as a beautiful boy or a lovely woman displays the most advantageous part of the body, so too the peacock raises its feathers in order and in rows, and resembles a flowery meadow or a picture variegated with the many hues of paints; and the labour lies before painters to liken the peculiar work of nature. And it shows how it stands in abundance for display; for it allows the bystanders to take their fill of the sight, and turns itself about, showing diligently the many-formed splendour of its plumage, displaying its own robe above the dress of the Medes and the embroideries of the Persians, and that most haughtily. It is said to have been brought from the barbarians to the Greeks. And being long rare it was then shown for a fee to those who loved beauty, and at Athens at the new moons they received both men and women to view them, and made the spectacle a source of revenue. They valued the male and the female at ten thousand drachmas, as Antiphon says in his speech against Erasistratus. And a double house is needed for their keeping, and guards and attendants too. Hortensius the Roman was judged the first to sacrifice a peacock for a banquet. But Alexander of Macedon, seeing these birds among the Indians, was astonished, and marvelling at their beauty he threatened the heaviest threats against anyone who should sacrifice a peacock.

When mice fall into wine-coolers, being unable to swim up and climb out, they bite each other's tails, and so the first draws up the second, and the second the third. Thus indeed most wise Nature taught even these to ally with and help one another.

Crocodiles lie in wait for those who draw water from the Nile in the following way. They throw brushwood over themselves, and looking out through it they swim beneath the brushwood. The people come bringing jars or pitchers or water-pots. Then, as they are drawing water, the crocodiles slip out from the brushwood and spring up onto the bank, and seizing them with a most violent snatch they have their dinner. These present remarks of mine have been about the inborn wickedness and cunning of crocodiles.

The hare fears dogs, and so too the fox. And these same, by their barking, even rouse a boar from the thicket, and turn a lion, and pursue a deer; but no bird makes any account of a dog, and there is a truce between them. The bustard alone shudders at dogs. The reason is that they are heavy and carry a mass of flesh. So their wings do not lift and lighten them easily, and for this reason they fly low and near the ground, the mass weighing them down. And they are often caught by the dogs. Being conscious of this, whenever they hear barking, they run down into the thickets and marshes, putting these before themselves as a defence, and so rescue themselves from the present danger most readily.

Late does a man begin to recognize his parents, being taught and in a way compelled to look upon his father and greet his mother and smile upon his kin; but lambs leap about their mothers from birth, and know both the strange and the familiar, and need to learn nothing at all from the herdsmen.

The monkey is a most imitative creature, and whatever you teach it of the things done with the body, it will learn exactly, so as to display it. At any rate it dances, if it learns, and plays the flute, if you teach it. And I myself have seen one holding the reins and laying on the whip and driving. And learning one thing and another it would not disappoint its teacher; so varied and versatile is nature.

There are also these peculiar and various natures of animals. Theopompus says that the hares among the Bisaltae have double livers. Ister says that the Meleagrides in Leros are harmed by none of the crook-taloned birds. Aristotle says that the oxen among the Neuri have their horns on their shoulders, and Agatharchides that the pigs in Ethiopia have horns. Sostratus says that the blackbirds in Cyllene are all white. Alexander of Myndus says that the sheep in Pontus are fattened by the most bitter wormwood. The same author says that the goats born on Mimas do not drink for six months, but only look toward the sea and gape and receive the breezes from there. And I hear that Illyrian goats have a solid hoof, not a cloven one. And Theophrastus tells the most marvellous thing: that in the Babylonian land the fish often come up out of the river and then graze on the dry land.

The purple coot, besides being most jealous, possesses this peculiarity too. They say it is a lover of its own kind and cherishes the companionship of its mates. At any rate I have heard of a purple coot and a cock reared in a house, feeding on the same food, taking the same walks, and bathing together in the dust. And from this a wondrous friendship grew up between them. And once, when a festival came round, the master of both, having sacrificed the cock, feasted with his household; but the purple coot, having lost its mate and unable to bear the loneliness, destroyed itself by refusing food.

At Aegium in Achaea a goose loved a beautiful boy, Amphilochus by name, an Olenian by descent. Theophrastus tells this. The boy was being kept under guard at Aegium together with the Olenian exiles. So the goose brought him gifts. And in Chios, since Glauce the lyre-player was very beautiful—if men loved her, that is nothing strange; but a ram and a goose too, as I hear, loved her. The geese, in crossing Mount Taurus, fear

the eagles, and each of them, biting a stone so as not to scream, as though putting a bit in their own mouth, fly over in silence, and for the most part thus escape the eagles' notice. Now the goose, being most hot and fiery in nature, loves bathing and delights in swimming and most of all in the moistest foods—plants and lettuces and the rest, whatever produces coolness within them; and even if it should be wasting with hunger, it would not eat a laurel leaf, nor would it taste oleander, either willingly or unwillingly; for it knows that it will die if it eats any of these. But men through profligacy are plotted against both in food and in drink. Countless ones, at any rate, have swallowed something deadly while drinking, like Alexander, and while eating, like Claudius the Roman and Britannicus his son; and having lain down to sleep they did not rise again, by the use of poison, some having drunk it willingly, others by treachery. As for the fox-goose, its name has been woven from the peculiar and inborn traits of each animal. For it has the form of the goose, but in cunning it might most justly be matched against the fox. And it is smaller than a goose, but braver, and formidable at coming to close quarters. At any rate it defends itself against eagle and cat and the rest, whatever are its adversaries.

These too are peculiar to the snake. Its heart is placed at the throat, its gall in the intestines; it has its testicles by the tail; it lays its eggs long and soft; and it carries its venom in its teeth.

To the peacock, the aforesaid bird, these traits too are natural and peculiar, which are worth learning. At three years old it begins to conceive and brings forth, and then begins the many-coloured beauty of its feathers. It broods not on successive days, but leaving an interval of two days. The peacock too might lay wind-eggs, as other birds also do.

The duck, when it lays, lays on dry ground, but near a lake or marsh or some other watery and dewy place. And the duckling by a certain peculiar and secret instinct knows that it has no share either in flight aloft or in life on dry land. And from these it leaps into the water, and is a swimmer from birth, and needs no teaching, but dives and rises most cleverly, as though it had long been trained in this. But the eagle which they call the duck-killer leaps upon the swimming duck as if to seize it; and the duck, diving, makes itself disappear, then swimming under, peeps out elsewhere. And the eagle is there too, and again the duck dives, and again this happens, and again. And one of two things: either it is drowned in diving, or the eagle withdraws to another prey, while the duck, having safety, swims on the surface again.

The swan surpasses men in the greatest matters; for it knows when the end of life comes to it, and moreover, having received from nature this most beautiful gift, it bears its approach with good cheer; for it is convinced that there is nothing painful or grievous in death. But men dread what they do not know, and consider it the greatest of evils. So great is the cheerfulness that abounds in the swan, that even at the close of its life it sings and strikes up, as it were, a funeral song for itself. Such a one, prepared for death heroically and greatly, does Euripides hymn in Bellerophon. At any rate he has made him say to his own soul, "You were ever pious toward the gods, while you lived, and you helped strangers, and never wearied for your friends," and what follows upon this. So the swan too sings a kind of funeral music for itself, giving as provision for its journey either hymns of the gods or some praise of its own. And Socrates too bears witness to it, that it sings not grieving but rather rejoicing; for one who has anything grievous and painful against his soul would never have leisure for song and music. And the swan is brave not only toward death, but also toward battles. It does not begin unjust acts, like a temperate and well-bred man, but from one who has begun it neither withdraws nor yields. Now the other birds are at peace and at truce with one another, but the eagle has often rushed upon this one too, as Aristotle says, and yet never once overcame it, but was always beaten, the swan fighting not only with strength but defending itself also with justice.

The heron is clever at eating oysters, and swallows them closed, just as the pelicans do the cockles. And in what is called its crop the heron warms the oysters and keeps them; and they gape open from the heat, and it, perceiving this, vomits up the shells but keeps the flesh, and has its food, consuming whole, by the power of digestion, what has passed within.

There is a bird named the asterias, and it is tamed in Egypt, and understands human speech. If anyone, reproaching it, calls it a slave, it grows angry; and if anyone calls it lazy, it bristles and is indignant, as though mocked for baseness and rebuked for idleness.

If one holds Cyrenaic juice and takes hold of the torpedo-fish, there indeed he has escaped the effect that comes from it. But if you wish to pull up a sea-dragon with your right hand, it will not follow, but will fight with all its might; if you draw it up with your left, it yields and is caught.

I hear Charmis the Massaliote saying that the nightingale loves music, and indeed loves glory too. At any rate, in the solitudes, when it sings to itself, the bird sings a simple song without elaboration; but when it is caught and does not miss its hearers, it sings varied strains and winds out the song softly. And Homer too seems to me to hint at this when he says, "As when the daughter of Pandareus, the pale-green nightingale, sings beautifully when spring is newly come, sitting amid the thick leaves of the trees, and pouring forth, with frequent turns, her many-toned voice." Indeed some write "many-modulated voice" for that which is varied in its imitations, as "unsweet" for that which is not turned to imitation at all.

Democritus says that of all animals the lion alone is born with its eyes open, being already in a way enraged and eager from birth for some noble deed. And others have observed that even while sleeping it moves its tail, showing, as is likely, that it is not wholly at rest, nor has sleep encircled and overcome it, as it has the other animals. The Egyptians, having observed something of the sort about it, are said to boast, saying that the lion is stronger than sleep, being ever wakeful. For this reason too, I learn, they assign it to the sun; for the sun, being the most industrious of the gods, is either seen above the earth or goes its lower course without resting. And the Egyptians bring Homer as witness, who says "the unwearying sun." But besides its strength the lion is also intelligent. At any rate it plots against the cattle, going by night to the steadings. And Homer knew this too, saying, "As cattle which a lion has frightened, coming in the dead of night." And it strikes them all with terror by its might, but snatching one it devours it. And when it has filled itself to satiety, it wishes to store some up for another time, but shame holds it from remaining to keep guard, as though it feared hunger from lack of food. So gaping over it, it breathes its own breath upon it, and to this entrusts the guard, while it itself departs; and the other animals, coming and perceiving whose leavings the carcass is, do not dare to touch it, but depart in fear of seeming to rob and cut off anything of their own king's. Now if good hunting and success come to it, it forgets the first kill and, scorning it as stale, departs; but if not, it comes to it as to its own treasure. And when it is over-full, it empties itself by rest and fasting, or again, meeting a monkey and eating it, it empties its belly, purging it with that creature's flesh. The lion, then, was just, and such as to defend a man when someone first does him wrong. At any rate it stands against the one who attacks, lashing its tail and curling it against its sides, then rousing itself as though whetting itself with a goad. But the one who has shot at it and missed it punishes with an equal measure, frightening but harming not at all. When tamed from young, it is most gentle and pleasant to meet, and is fond of play, and endures everything gently to gratify its keeper. Hanno, at any rate, had a lion as a baggage-carrier, and a tame lion accompanied Berenice, differing nothing from her hairdressers. At any rate it brightened her face with its tongue, and smoothed her wrinkles, and shared her table, eating gently and orderly and in human fashion. And Onomarchus the tyrant of Catana, and the son of Cleomenes, had lions as messmates.

They say the leopard has obtained a certain wondrous fragrance, hidden from us, but it knows its own advantage, and indeed the other animals know it along with the leopard, and it is caught in the following way. The leopard, when it needs food, hides itself either in thick brush or in deep foliage, and is invisible to meet, and only breathes. So the fawns and gazelles and wild goats and such animals are drawn, as by some spell of the fragrance, and come near; and it leaps out and has its prey.

I learn that the ruminant animals have three stomachs, and I hear their names are the reticulum, the omasum, and the abomasum. And cuttlefish and squids feed by two proboscises—for it is no worse so to name them, taking the hint both from their use and from their shape. And when it is stormy and the surge is troubled, they lay hold of the rocks with these same projections, and cling as with anchors most firmly, and remain unshaken and unwashed by the waves; then if it becomes calm, they release and free themselves, and swim again, knowing a lesson not to be despised—flight from the storm and safety from danger.

If you wish to learn the names of bees, I would not grudge to tell what I have learned. Some are called leaders, and others sirens, and some water-carriers, and others moulders. Nicander says that the drones are the water-carriers. About the land of the Cappadocians they say that the bees make honey without combs, and tradition holds that this is thick like oil. In Trapezus on the Black Sea I learn that honey is made from the box-tree, and that this is heavy in smell, and makes the healthy go out of their minds, but brings epileptics back to health again. In Media I hear that honey drips from the trees, as Euripides says in his Cithaeron that sweet drops flow from the branches. And I have heard that in Thrace too honey comes from the plants. But in Myconos no bee is bred, and even one brought from outside dies.

Aristotle says that about the river Hypanis is bred the creature so called, the "one-day" creature, being born at nightfall and dying as the sun turns to its setting.

The cuttlefish has a venomous bite and teeth strongly concealed. The osmylus too and the octopus were biting creatures; and the octopus would bite more violently than the cuttlefish, but discharges less venom.

They say that the wild boar does not charge anyone before it has whetted its tusks; and Homer indeed bears witness to this, saying, "having whetted his white tusk in his curved jaws." And I hear that the boar fattens most when it does not bathe, but spends its time in the mire and wallows and drinks muddied water, and delights in quiet and a darker shelter, and in foods that are most flatulent and able to fill it up. And Homer seems to hint at these things. About their wallowing and delighting in the filthier sloughs . . . saying "swine that bed on the ground"; that they fatten on troubled water . . . he says "drinking black water, which nourishes in swine their thriving fat." That they delight in darkness he proves by these words: "beneath a hollow rock they slept, in the shelter from Boreas." And he hints at the flatulence of their food when he says they eat "the heart-cheering acorn." And Homer, knowing that the boar wastes away and ruins its flesh at the sight of the sow, has made the males sleep apart and the females apart. And in Salamis, if a sow falling upon green corn and a flourishing crop crops it, it is a law of the Salaminians to grind out its teeth. And this they say is what is meant by Homer's "corn-wasting sow." But others think otherwise, and say that the sow that has tasted green corn has weak teeth.

Nature gave to dogs a herb that counteracts wounds. And if worms trouble them, by eating what is called the green corn they expel them. They are said too, when they need to empty either belly, to eat a certain herb, and to vomit up the part of the food that floats on top, while the surplus is excreted below them, they say. From this the Egyptians too are said to have learned the practice of purging. And partridges and storks when wounded, and ringdoves, gnaw, as the story goes, marjoram, then putting it in their wounds they heal their bodies, and indeed need nothing at all of human medicine.

I shall need no older witness here, but I shall tell what I myself have known. A man, having caught a lizard, of those that are exceedingly green but rather full in body, and having pierced it with a sting made of bronze and so blinded the lizard, and having bored an earthenware pot of newly made ware with very fine holes, so as not to shut out the air yet not to give it a way of escape, and having poured in earth, and that very dewy, and put in the creature and a certain herb whose name he did not tell, and an iron ring set with a stone of jet, on which a lizard had been engraved—he covered the pot, sealing on it nine seals, of which he removed a seal each day for nine days. And having effaced the last of all he opens the vessel, and I myself saw the lizard looking, and it had most clear eyes, those that until then had been maimed. And we released it where it had been taken, but that ring the man who did these things said was good for the eyes.

To me, O men, it seems most shameful that there should be friendship among animals toward one another, not only among those of the same haunts nor among those of the same kind, but even among those that have no kinship with one another in the common species. At any rate sheep are friendly to goats, and there is friendship between dove and turtledove; and ringdoves and partridges are friendly toward one another; and we have long known that the halcyon and the cerylus long for each other; and the crow is friendly toward the heron, and the gull toward what is called the jackdaw, and the harpe toward the kite. But the crows and the owls wage everlasting and, so to speak, truceless war; and enemies are the kite and the raven, and the redstart against the turtledove, and the brenthus and the gull, and again the greenfinch against the turtledove, and the vultures and the eagles, and the swans and the snakes, and lions against the antelopes and bulls. Most hostile of all were the elephant and the snake, and the ichneumon against the asp, and the titmouse against the ass; for the ass brays, and the titmouse's eggs are broken, and the young fall out unformed; and the titmouse, avenging its young, leaps upon the sores of the asses, and eats them. And the fox hates the hawk, and the bull the raven, and the anthus the horse. And the educated man, who hears nothing in vain, must know that the dolphin too is at odds with the whale, the basses with the mullets, and the lampreys with the conger-eels, and others with others.

Bears, when those of the hunters who fall on their faces and draw in their breath are smelt by them, leave them as dead; and this animal seems to loathe a corpse. Mice too hate those that die in their own dwellings and runs, and indeed the swallow casts out a dead swallow. And to the ants too most wise Nature has given the care of carrying out their dead and cleansing their own runs, since this too is peculiar to the irrational creatures—to carry their dead, those of the same kind and nature, more quickly out of sight. And the tales of the Ethiopians, which have no taste of Greek flattery or boasting, say that an elephant, seeing a dead elephant, would not pass it by without scooping up earth with its trunk and casting it on, as though performing some secret holy rite on behalf of the common nature; for not to do this is sacrilege. And it is enough for it to throw on even a branch, and it departs, having not dishonoured the common end of all. And this tale too has come to us. When elephants die of wounds, whether shot in war or having suffered this in the hunt, they take up the herb that is at hand or the dust at their feet, and look up to heaven, and throw up one of the aforesaid things, and in their own voice they wail and lament, as though calling the gods to witness the unjust and lawless things they endure.

It is possible to recognize this too as peculiar to animals. We see the tame birds, those reared and kept under our feet, bold among horses and asses and oxen and camels; and if they are reared together with some gentle and tame elephant, they are not afraid, but go even between those very legs. And cocks even fly up onto their backs; so great is their boldness and fearlessness. But a weasel running past instils in them terror and strong fear. And of bellowing and braying they take no account, but at the mere squeak of the aforesaid weasel they shudder. Of geese and swans and ostriches they think little or nothing, but they dread a hawk, though it be very small. The cock by crowing frightens a lion and kills a basilisk; yet it cannot endure either cats or kites. The doves take heart at the cry of eagles and vultures, but no longer at that of hawks and sea-eagles. The flock and the kid and every foal go to the mother's teats the moment they are born, and indeed fill themselves by drawing at the udders; and the parent meddles not at all, but stands still. But all the cloven-footed animals offer their teats to their young lying on their backs—wolves and dogs and lionesses and leopards.

Nature has made the animals most various-voiced and, as one might say, of many sounds, just as she has made men also. The Scythian speaks one way and the Indian another, and the Ethiopian has a voice natural to him, and so do the Sacae; and Greek speech is one thing, and Roman another. So too the animals each send forth in its own way the sound and noise native to its tongue; for one roars, another lows, and there is the neighing of one and the braying of another, the bleating and the bleat of goats, and to some belongs howling, to others barking, and to another snarling; and screams and hisses and creakings and songs and melodies and warblings, and countless other gifts of nature, peculiar to the animals, some to some, some to others.

Throughout the land of Egypt asps make their dens near the Nile on both banks. And for the rest of the time they keep to their place and love it, as men love their own houses; but when the river is about to rise in the summer season, some thirty days beforehand the aforesaid asps move to the regions farther from the Nile, and creep into the overhanging banks, and indeed take their own offspring with them, having received this gift peculiar to themselves from nature: to know the yearly visitation of so great and so industrious a river, and to guard against the seizure and harm it brings. And the tortoises and the crabs and the crocodiles at the same season carry off their eggs to places untrodden and unreachable by the river; and from this those who chance upon the eggs of the aforesaid creatures already reckon how far the Nile, when it rises, will water their land for them.

The river-horses are nurslings of the Nile; and when the crops are at their height and the ears are golden, they do not begin at once to crop and eat them, but passing outside the cornfield they reckon how great a measure will fill them, and then, having calculated what is enough for them, they fall to and retreat step by step as they fill, taking the river's stream at their back. And this has been thought out by them, so that if any of the farmers should come upon them to defend their crops, they might most easily run down into the water, these river-horses watching their enemies face to face, and not from behind.

In the Mauretanian land the leopards do not attack the monkeys by main force or by such strength and might as they have. The reason is that the monkeys do not come to close quarters, but flee from them and run up onto the trees and sit there, guarding against their plots. But the leopard, then, was craftier than the monkey. See, at any rate, what kind of snares it contrives and weaves against them. Where a multitude of monkeys sit, there it comes and throws itself down under the tree, and lies on its back upon the ground, and swells out its belly, and lets its legs fall slack, and shuts its eyes, and presses in its breath, and lies there as if dead. The monkeys, seeing their bitterest enemy from above, think it is dead, and what they most wish, that they also believe. Yet they do not yet take heart, but make trial, and the trial is this: they send down one of themselves who seems most fearless, to test and examine the leopard's condition. He goes down not wholly without fear, but having run a little way then turns back, fear having checked him; and he comes down again, and having come near withdraws, and turns back once more, and examines the eyes, and tests whether it lets its breath go. And the leopard, keeping still most resolutely, instils in him little by little a sense of safety. And when he has approached and stayed by it unharmed, the monkeys aloft now take heart, and running down both from that tree and from the others that grow near, gathering in a crowd they go about it and dance round it. Then leaping upon it and mounting it they tumble and dance over it a mocking dance befitting monkeys, and after outraging it in various ways, they show forth the joy and pleasure they have, as over a dead thing. But it endures everything, and then, when it perceives that they are wearied with their dancing and their insolence, it springs up unexpectedly and leaping among them tears some with its claws and rends some with its teeth, and has a most abundant banquet and feast of its enemies. And nature bids the leopard endure patiently and stoutly and nobly, that it may prevail over the enemies who have outraged it, contending most enduringly and having no need to say, "Endure now, my heart." But the son of Laertes uncovered himself a little before the time, unable to bear the insolence of the serving-maids.

Among the Indians the elephants, when the Indians compel them to tear up some tree by the roots, do not first set upon it nor attempt the task before they have shaken it and considered whether it can be overturned or is wholly impossible.

The deer in Syria are bred on the greatest mountains—Amanus and Lebanon and Carmel; and when they wish to cross the sea, the herd comes to the shores and waits for the dying-down of the wind, and when they perceive it blowing gentle and quiet, then they take heart for the deep. They swim in a row, and hold to one another, those following resting their chins on the loins of those in front; and the last, resting itself on the one before, then brings up the rear. They set out for Cyprus out of longing for the grass there; for it is said to be deep and to provide good pasture. And the Cypriots say that they dwell in a land of good soil, and dare to match their own fields against the cornlands of the Egyptians. Other deer too display this same swimming. The deer of Epirus, at any rate, swim across to Corcyra, and these lie facing each other across the strait.