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BOOK VII. 1 MAN, HIS BIRTH, HIS ORGANIZATION, AND THE INVENTION OF THE ARTS.

CHAP. 1.—MAN.

SUCH then is the present state of the world, and of the countries, nations, more remarkable seas, islands, and cities which it contains.2 The nature of the animated beings which exist upon it, is hardly in any degree less worthy of our contemplation than its other features; if, indeed, the human mind is able to embrace the whole of so diversified a subject. Our first attention is justly due to Man, for whose sake all other things appear to have been produced by Nature; though, on the other hand, with so great and so severe penalties for the enjoyment of her bounteous gifts, that it is far from easy to determine, whether she has proved to him a kind parent, or a merciless step-mother.

In the first place, she obliges him alone, of all animated beings, to clothe himself with the spoils of the others; while, to all the rest, she has given various kinds of coverings, such as shells, crusts, spines, hides, furs, bristles, hair, down, feathers, scales, and fleeces.3 The very trunks of the trees even, she has protected against the effects of heat and cold by a bark, which is, in some cases, twofold.4 Man alone, at the very moment of his birth cast naked upon the laked earth,5 does she abandon to cries, to lamentations, and, a thing that is the case with no other animal whatever, to tears: this, too, from the very moment that he enters upon existence.6 But as for laughter, why, by Hercules!—to laugh, if but for an instant only, has never been granted to man before the fortieth day7 from his birth, and then it is looked upon as a miracle of precocity. Introduced thus to the light, man has fetters and swathings instantly put upon all his limbs,8 a thing that falls to the lot of none of the brutes even that are born among us. Born to such singular good fortune,9 there lies the animal, which is destined to command all the others, lies, fast bound hand and foot, and weeping aloud! such being the penalty which he has to pay on beginning life, and that for the sole fault of having been born. Alas! for the folly of those who can think after such a beginning as this, that they have been born for the display of vanity!

The earliest presage of future strength, the earliest bounty of time, confers upon him nought but the resemblance to a quadruped.10 How soon does man gain the power of walking? How soon does he gain the faculty of speech? How soon is his mouth fitted for mastication? How long are the pulsations of the crown of his head to proclaim him the weakest of all ani- mated beings?11 And then, the diseases to which he is subject, the numerous remedies which he is obliged to devise against his maladies, and those thwarted every now and then by new forms and features of disease.12 While other animals have an instinctive knowledge of their natural powers; some, of their swiftness of pace, some of their rapidity of flight, and some again of their power of swimming; man is the only one that knows nothing, that can learn nothing without being taught; he can neither speak, nor walk, nor eat,13 and, in short, he can do nothing, at the prompting of nature only, but weep. For this it is, that many have been of opinion, that it were better not to have been born, or if born, to have been annihilated14 at the earliest possible moment.

To man alone, of all animated beings, has it been given, to grieve,15 to him alone to be guilty of luxury and excess; and that in modes innumerable, and in every part of his body. Man is the only being that is a prey to ambition, to avarice, to an immoderate desire of life,16 to superstition,17—he is the only one that troubles himself about his burial, and even what is to become of him after death.18 By none is life held on a tenure more frail;19 none are more influenced by unbridled desires for all things; none are sensible of fears more bewildering; none are actuated by rage more frantic and violent. Other animals, in fine, live at peace with those of their own kind; we only see them unite to make a stand against those of a different species. The fierceness of the lion is not expended in fighting with its own kind; the sting of the serpent is not aimed at the serpent;20 and the monsters of the sea even, and the fishes, vent their rage only on those of a different species. But with man,—by Hercules! most of his misfortunes are occasioned by man.21

(1.) We have already given22 a general description of the human race in our account of the different nations. Nor, indeed, do I now propose to treat of their manners and customs, which are of infinite variety and almost as numerous as the various groups themselves, into which mankind is divided; but yet there are some things, which, I think, ought not to be omitted; and more particularly, in relation to those peoples which dwell at a considerable distance from the sea;23 among which, I have no doubt, that some facts will appear of an astounding nature, and, indeed, incredible to many. Who, for instance, could ever believe in the existence of the Æthiopians, who had not first seen them? Indeed what is there that does not appear marvellous, when it comes to our knowledge for the first time?24 How many things, too, are looked upon as quite impossible, until they have been actually effected?25 But it is the fact, that every moment of our existence we are distrusting the power and the majesty of Nature, if the mind, instead of grasping her in her entirety, considers her only in detail. Not to speak of peacocks, the spotted skins of tigers and panthers, and the rich colours of so many animals, a trifling thing apparently to speak of, but of inestimable importance, when we give it due consideration, is the existence of so many languages among the various nations, so many modes of speech, so great a variety of expressions; that to another, a man who is of a different country, is almost the same as no man at all.26 And then, too, the human features and countenance, although composed of but some ten parts or little more, are so fashioned, that among so many thousands of men, there are no two in existence who cannot be distinguished from one another, a result which no art could possibly have produced, when confined to so limited a number of combinations. In most points, however, of this nature, I shall not be content to pledge my own credit only, but shall confirm it in preference by referring to my authorities, which shall be given on all subjects of a nature to inspire doubt. My readers, however, must make no objection to following the Greeks, who have proved them- selves the most careful observers, as well as of the longest standing.27

CHAP. 2.—THE WONDERFUL FORMS OF DIFFERENT NATIONS.

We have already stated, that there are certain tribes of the Scythians, and, indeed, many other nations, which feed upon human flesh.28 This fact itself might, perhaps, appear incredible, did we not recollect, that in the very centre of the earth, in Italy and Sicily, nations formerly existed with these monstrous propensities, the Cyclopes,29 and the Læstrygones, for example; and that, very recently, on the other side of the Alps, it was the custom to offer human sacrifices, after the manner of those nations;30 and the difference is but small between sacrificing human beings and eating them.31

In the vicinity also of those who dwell in the northern re- gions, and not far from the spot from which the north wind arises, and the place which is called its cave,32 and is known by the name of Geskleithron, the Arimaspi are said to exist, whom I have previously mentioned,33 a nation remarkable for having but one eye, and that placed in the middle of the forehead. This race is said to carry on a perpetual warfare with the Griffins, a kind of monster, with wings, as they are commonly34 represented, for the gold which they dig out of the mines, and which these wild beasts retain and keep watch over with a singular degree of cupidity, while the Arimaspi are equally desirous to get possession of it.35 Many authors have stated to this effect, among the most illustrious of whom are Herodotus and Aristeas of Proconnesus.36

Beyond the other Scythian Anthropophagi, there is a country called Abarimon, situate in a certain great valley of Mount Imaus,37 the inhabitants of which are a savage race, whose feet are turned backwards,38 relatively to their legs: they possess wonderful velocity, and wander about indiscriminately with the wild beasts. We learn from Bæton, whose duty it was to take the measurements of the routes of Alexander the Great, that this people cannot breathe in any climate except their own, for which reason it is impossible to take them before any of the neighbouring kings; nor could any of them be brought before Alexander himself.

The Anthropophagi, whom we have previously mentioned39 as dwelling ten days' journey beyond the Borysthenes, according to the account of Isigonus of Nicæa, were in the habit of drinking out of human skulls,40 and placing the scalps, with the hair attached, upon their breasts, like so many napkins. The same author relates, that there is, in Albania, a certain race of men, whose eyes are of a sea-green colour, and who have white hair from their earliest childhood,41 and that these people see better in the night than in the day. He states also that the Sauromatæ, who dwell ten days' journey beyond the Borysthenes, only take food every other day.42

Crates of Pergamus relates, that there formerly existed in the vicinity of Parium, in the Hellespont, a race of men whom he calls Ophiogenes, and that by their touch they were able to cure those who had been stung by serpents, extracting the poison by the mere imposition of the hand.43 Varro tells us, that there are still a few individuals in that district, whose saliva effectually cures the stings of serpents. The same, too, was the case with the tribe of the Psylli,44 in Africa, according to the account of Agatharchides; these people received their name from Psyllus, one of their kings, whose tomb is in existence, in the district of the Greater Syrtes. In the bodies of these people there was by nature a certain kind of poison, which was fatal to serpents, and the odour of which overpowered them with torpor: with them it was a custom to expose children immediately after their birth to the fiercest serpents, and in this manner to make proof of the fidelity of their wives, the serpents not being repelled by such children as were the offspring of adultery.45 This nation, however, was almost entirely extirpated by the slaughter made of them by the Nasamones, who now occupy their territory.46 This race, however, still survives in a few persons who are descendants of those who either took to flight or else were absent on the oc- casion of the battle. The Marsi, in Italy, are still in possession of the same power, for which, it is said, they are indebted to their origin from the son of Circe, from whom they acquired it as a natural quality. But the fact is, that all men possess in their bodies a poison which acts upon serpents, and the human saliva, it is said, makes them take to flight, as though they had been touched with boiling water. The same substance, it is said, destroys them the moment it enters their throat, and more particularly so, if it should happen to be the saliva of a man who is fasting.47

Above the Nasamones,48 and the Machlytæ, who border upon them, are found, as we learn from Calliphanes, the nation of the Androgyni, a people who unite the two sexes in the same individual, and alternately perform the functions of each. Aristotle also states, that their right breast is that of a male, the left that of a female.49

Isigonus and Nymphodorus inform us that there are in Africa certain families of enchanters,50 who, by means of their charms, in the form of commendations, can cause cattle to perish, trees to wither, and infants to die. Isigonus adds, that there are among the Triballi and the Illyrii, some persons of this description, who also have the power of fascination with the eyes, and can even kill those on whom they fix their gaze for any length of time, more especially if their look denotes anger; the age of puberty is said to be particularly obnoxious to the malign influence of such persons.51

A still more remarkable circumstance is, the fact that these persons have two pupils in each eye.52 Apollonides says, that there are certain females of this description in Scythia, who are known as Bythiæ, and Phylarchus states that a tribe of the Thibii in Pontus, and many other persons as well, have a double pupil in one eye, and in the other the figure of a horse.53 He also remarks, that the bodies of these persons will not sink in water,54 even though weighed down by their garments. Damon gives an account of a race of people, not very much unlike them, the Pharnaces of Æthiopia, whose perspiration is productive of consumption55 to the body of every person that it touches. Cicero also, one of our own writers, makes the remark, that the glances of all women who have a double pupil is noxious.56

To this extent, then, has nature, when she produced in man, in common with the wild beasts, a taste for human flesh, thought fit to produce poisons as well in every part of his body, and in the eyes even of some persons, taking care that there should be no evil influence in existence, which was not to be found in the human body. Not far from the city of Rome, in the territory of the Falisci, a few families are found, who are known by the name of Hirpi. These people perform a yearly sacrifice to Apollo, on Mount Soracte, on which occasion they walk over a burning pile of wood, without being scorched even. On this account, by virtue of a decree of the senate, they are always exempted from military service, and from all other public duties.57

Some individuals, again, are born with certain parts of the body endowed with properties of a marvellous nature. Such was the case with King Pyrrhus, the great toe of whose right foot cured diseases of the spleen, merely by touching the patient.58 We are also informed, that this toe could not be re- duced to ashes together with the other portions of his body; upon which it was placed in a coffer, and preserved in a temple.

India, and the region of Æthiopia more especially, abounds in wonders.59 In India the largest of animals are produced; their dogs,60 for example, are much bigger than those of any other country.61 The trees, too, are said to be of such vast height, that it is impossible to send an arrow over them. This is the result of the singular fertility of the soil, the equable temperature of the atmosphere, and the abundance of water; which, if we are to believe what is said, are such, that a single fig-tree62 is capable of affording shelter to a whole troop of horse. The reeds here are also of such enormous length, that each portion of them, between the joints, forms a tube, of which a boat is made that is capable of holding three men.63 It is a well-known fact, that many of the people here are more than five cubits in height.64 These people never expectorate, are subject to no pains, either in the head, the teeth, or the eyes, and rarely in any other parts of the body; so well is the heat of the sun calculated to strengthen the constitution. Their philosophers, who are called Gymnosophists, remain in one posture, with their eyes immovably fixed upon the sun, from its rising to its setting, and, during the whole of the day, they are accustomed to stand in the burning sands on one foot, first one and then the other.65 According to the ac- count of Megasthenes, dwelling upon a mountain called Nulo, there is a race of men who have their feet turned backwards,66 with eight toes on each foot.67

On many of the mountains again, there is a tribe of men who have the heads of dogs,68 and clothe themselves with the skins of wild beasts. Instead of speaking, they bark; and, furnished with claws, they live by hunting and catching birds. According to the story, as given by Ctesias, the number of these people is more than a hundred and twenty thousand: and the same author tells us, that there is a certain race in India, of which the females are pregnant once only in the course of their lives, and that the hair of the children becomes white the instant they are born. He speaks also of another race of men, who are known as Monocoli,69 who have only one leg, but are able to leap with surprising agility.70 The same people are also called Sciapodæ,:71 because they are in the habit of lying on their backs, during the time of the extreme heat, and protect themselves from the sun by the shade of their feet. These people, he says, dwell not very far from the Troglodytæ;72 to the west of whom again there is a tribe who are without necks, and have eyes in their shoulders.,73

Among the mountainous districts of the eastern parts of India, in what is called the country of the Catharcludi, we find the Satyr,74 an animal of extraordinary swiftness. These go sometimes on four feet, and sometimes walk erect; they have also the features of a human being. On account of their swiftness, these creatures are never to be caught, except when they are either aged or sickly. Tauron gives the name of Choromandæ to a nation which dwell in the woods and have no proper voice. These people screech in a frightful manner; their bodies are covered with hair, their eyes are of a sea-green colour, and their teeth like those of the dog.75 Eudoxus tells us, that in the southern parts of India, the men have feet a cubit in length; while those of the women are so remarkably small, that they are called Struthopodes.76

Megasthenes places among the Nomades77 of India, a people who are called Scyritæ. These have merely holes in their faces instead of nostrils, and flexible feet, like the body of the serpent. At the very extremity of India, on the eastern side, near the source of the river Ganges, there is the nation of the Astomi, a people who have no mouths; their bodies are rough and hairy, and they cover themselves with a down78 plucked from the leaves of trees. These people subsist only by breathing and by the odours which they inhale through the nostrils. They support themselves upon neither meat nor drink; when they go upon a long journey they only carry with them various odoriferous roots and flowers, and wild apples,79 that they may not be without something to smell at. But an odour, which is a little more powerful than usual, easily destroys them.80

Beyond these people, and at the very extremity of the mountains, the Trispithami81 and the Pygmies are said to exist; two races which are but three spans in height, that is to say, twenty-seven inches only. They enjoy a salubrious atmosphere, and a perpetual spring, being sheltered by the mountains from the northern blasts; it is these people that Homer82 has mentioned as being waged war upon by cranes. It is said, that they are in the habit of going down every spring to the sea-shore, in a large body, seated on the backs of rams and goats, and armed with arrows, and there destroy the eggs and the young of those birds; that this expedition occupies them for the space of three months, and that otherwise it would be impossible for them to withstand the increasing multitudes of the cranes. Their cabins, it is said, are built of mud, mixed with feathers and egg-shells. Aristotle, indeed, says, that they dwell in caves; but, in all other respects, he gives the same details as other writers.83

Isigonus informs us, that the Cyrni, a people of India, live to their four hundredth year; and he is of opinion that the same is the case also with the Æthiopian Macrobii,84 the Seræ, and the inhabitants of Mount Athos.85 In the case of these last, it is supposed to be owing to the flesh of vipers, which they use as food;86 in consequence of which, they are free also from all noxious animals, both in their hair and their garments.

According to Onesicritus, in those parts of India where there is no shadow,87 the bodies of men attain a height of five cubits and two palms,88 and their life is prolonged to one hundred and thirty years; they die without any symptoms of old age, and just as if they were in the middle period of life. Crates of Pergamus calls the Indians, whose age exceeds one hundred years, by the name of Gymnetæ;89 but not a few authors style them Macrobii. Ctesias mentions a tribe of them, known by the name of Pandore, whose locality is in the valleys, and who live to their two hundredth year; their hair is white in youth, and becomes black in old age.90 On the other hand, there are some people joining up to the country of the Macrobii, who never live beyond their fortieth year, and their females have children once only during their lives. This circumstance is also mentioned by Agatharchides, who states, in addition, that they live91 on locusts,92 and are very swift of foot. Clitarchus and Megasthenes give these people the name of Mandi, and enumerate as many as three hundred villages which belong to them. Their women are capable of bearing children in the seventh year of their age, and become old at forty.93

Artemidorus states that in the island of Taprobane,94 life is prolonged to an extreme length, while, at the same time, the body is exempt from weakness. According to Durisis, some of the Indians have connection with beasts, and from this union a mixture of half man, half beast, is produced.95 Among the Calingæ, a nation also of India, the women conceive at five years of age, and do not live beyond their eighth year.96 In other places again, there are men born with long hairy tails,97 and of remarkable swiftness of foot; while there are others that have ears so large as to cover the whole body.98

The Oritæ are divided from the Indians by the river Arabis;99 they are acquainted with no food whatever except fish, which they are in the habit of tearing to pieces with their nails, and drying in the sun.100 Crates of Pergamus states, that the Troglodytæ, who dwell beyond Æthiopia, are able to outrun the horse; and that a tribe of the Æthiopians, who are known as the Syrbotæ, exceed eight cubits in height.

There is a tribe of Æthiopian Nomades dwelling on the banks of the river Astragus, towards the north, and about twenty days' journey from the ocean. These people are called Menismini; they live on the milk of the animal which we call cynocephalus,101 and rear large flocks of these creatures, taking care to kill the males, except such as they may preserve for the purpose of breeding. In the deserts of Africa, men are frequently seen to all appearance, and then vanish in an instant.102 Nature, in her ingenuity, has created all these marvels in the human race, with others of a similar nature, as so many amusements to herself, though they appear miraculous to us. But who is there that can enumerate all the things that she brings to pass each day, I may almost say each hour? As a striking evidence of her power, let it be sufficient for me to have cited whole nations in the list of her prodigies. Let us now proceed to mention some other particulars con- nected with Man, the truth of which is universally admitted.

CHAP. 3.—MARVELLOUS BIRTHS.

(3.) That three children are sometimes produced at one birth, is a well-known fact; the case, for instance, of the Horatii and the Curiatii. Where a greater number of children than this is produced at one birth, it is looked upon as portentous, except, indeed, in Egypt, where the water of the river Nile, which is used for drink, is a promoter of fecundity.103 Very recently, towards the close of the reign of the Emperor Augustus, now deified, a certain woman of the lower orders, at Ostia, whose name was Fausta, brought into the world, at one birth, two male children and two females, a presage, no doubt, of the famine which shortly after took place. We find it stated, also, that in Peloponnesus, a woman was delivered of five104 children at a birth four successive times, and that the greater part of all these children survived. Trogus informs us, that in Egypt,105 as many as seven children are occasionally produced at one birth.106

Individuals are occasionally born, who belong to both sexes; such persons we call by the name of hermaphrodites;107 they were formerly called Androgyni, and were looked upon as monsters,108 but at the present day they are employed for sensual purposes.109

Pompeius Magnus, among the decorations of his theatre,110 erected certain statues of remarkable persons, which had been executed with the greatest care by artists of the very highest reputation. Among others, we here read an inscription to the following effect: "Eutychis,111 of Tralles,112 was borne to the funeral pile by twenty of her children, having had thirty in all."113 Also, Alcippe114 was delivered of an elephant115—but then that must be looked upon as a prodigy; as in the case, too, where, at the commencement of the Marsian war,116 a female slave was delivered of a serpent.117 Among these monstrous births, also, there are beings produced which unite in one body the forms of several creatures. For instance, Claudius Cæsar informs us, in his writings, that a Hippocentaur was born in Thessaly, but died on the same day: and indeed I have seen one myself, which in the reign of that emperor was brought to him from Egypt, preserved in honey.118 We have a case, also, of a child at Saguntum, which returned immediately into its mother's womb, the same year in which that place was destroyed by Hannibal.

(4) The change of females into males is undoubtedly no fable. We find it stated in the Annals, that, in the consulship of P. Licinius Crassus and C. Cassius Longinus,119 a girl, who was living at Casinum120 with her parents, was changed into a boy; and that, by the command of the Aruspices, he was con- veyed away to a desert island. Licinius Mucianus informs us, that he once saw at Argos a person whose name was then Arescon, though he had been formerly called Arescusa: that this person had been married to a man, but that, shortly after, a beard and marks of virility made their appearance, upon which he took to himself a wife. He had also seen a boy at Smyrna,121 to whom the very same thing had happened. I myself saw in Africa one L. Cossicius, a citizen of Thysdris,122 who had been changed into a man the very day on which he was married to a husband.123 When women are delivered of twins, it rarely happens but that either the mother herself, or one, at least, of the twins perishes.124 If, however, the twins should happen to be of different sexes, it is less probable that both of them will survive. Female children are matured more quickly than males,125 and become old sooner. Of the two, male children most frequently are known to move in the womb;126 they mostly lie on the right side of the body, females on the left.127

CHAP. 4. (5.)—THE GENERATION OF MAN; UNUSUAL DURATION OF PREGNANCY; INSTANCES OF IT FROM SEVEN TO TWELVE MONTHS.

In other animals the period of gestation and of birth is fixed and definite, while man, on the other hand, is born at all seasons of the year,128 and without any certain period of gestation;129 for one child is born at the seventh month, another at the eighth, and so on, even to the beginning of the tenth and eleventh. Those children which are born before the seventh month are never known to survive;130 unless, indeed, they hap- pen to have been conceived the day before or the day after the full moon, or at the change of the moon. In Egypt it is not an uncommon thing for children to be born at the eighth month; and in Italy, too, children that are born at this period live just as long as others, notwithstanding the opinions of the ancients to the contrary. There are great variations in this respect, which occur in numerous ways. Vestilia, for instance, who was the wife of C. Herdicius, and was afterwards married, first, to Pomponius,131 and then to Orfitus, very eminent citizens, after having brought forth four children, always at the seventh month, had Suillius Rufus at the eleventh month, and then Corbulo at the seventh, both of whom became consuls; after which, at the eighth month, she had Cæsonia, who became the wife of the Emperor Caius.132 As for children who are born at the eighth month, the greatest difficulty with them is to get them over the first forty days.133 Pregnant women, on the other hand, are in the greatest danger during the fourth and the eighth month, and abortions during these periods are fatal. Masurius informs us, that L. Papirius, the prætor. on one occasion, when the next but one in succession was urging his suit at law, decided against him, in favour of the heir,134 although his mother declared that her period of gestation had lasted thirteen months—upon the ground that it did not appear that there was any fixed and definite period of gestation.135

CHAP. 5. (6.)—INDICATIONS OF THE SEX OF THE CHILD DURING THE PREGNANCY OF THE MOTHER. 136

On the tenth day after conception, pains are felt in the head, vertigo, and dimness of the sight; these signs, together with loathing of food and rising of the stomach, indicate the formation of the future human being. If it is a male that is conceived, the colour of the pregnant woman is more healthy,137 and the birth less painful: the child moves in the womb upon the fortieth day. In the conception of a child of the other sex, all the symptoms are totally different: the mother experiences an almost insupportable weight, there is a slight swelling of the legs and the groin, and the first movement of the child is not felt until the ninetieth day. But, whatever the sex of the child, the mother is sensible of the greatest languor at the time when the hair of the fœtus first begins to grow, and at the full moon; at which latter time it is that children newly born are exposed to the greatest danger. In addition to this, the mode of walking, and indeed everything that can be mentioned, is of consequence in the case of a woman who is pregnant. Thus, for instance, women who have used too much salted meat will bring forth children without nails: parturition, too, is more difficult, if they do not hold their breath. It is fatal, too, to yawn during labour;138 and abortion ensues, if the female should happen to sneeze just after the sexual congress. (7.) It is a subject for pity, and even for a feeling of shame, when one reflects that the origin of the most vain of all animated beings is thus frail: so much so, indeed, that very often the smell even of a lamp just extinguished is a cause of abortion.139 From such beginnings as these springs the tyrant, from such the murderous dispositions of men. Thou man, who placest thy confidence in the strength of thy body, thou, who dost embrace the gifts of Fortune, and look upon thyself, not only as her fosterling, but even as her own born child, thou, whose mind is ever thirsting for blood,140 thou who, puffed up with some success or other, dost think thyself a god—by how trifling a thing might thy life have been cut short! Even this very day, something still less even may have the same effect, the puncture, for instance, of the tiny sting of the serpent; or even, as befell the poet Anacreon,141 the swallowing of the stone of a raisin, or of a single hair in a draught of milk, by which the prætor and senator, Fabius, was choked, and so met his death. He only, in fact, will be able to form a just estimate of the value of life, who will always bear in mind the extreme frailty of its tenure.

CHAP. 6. (8.)—MONSTROUS BIRTHS.

It is contrary to nature for children to come into the world with the feet first, for which reason such children are called Agrippæ, meaning that they are born with difficulty.142 In this manner, M. Agrippa143 is said to have been born; the only instance, almost, of good fortune, out of the number of all those who have come into the world under these circumstances. And yet, even he may be considered to have paid the penalty of the unfavourable omen produced by the unnatural mode of his birth, in the unfortunate weakness of his legs, the misfortunes of his youth, a life spent in the very midst of arms and slaughter, and ever exposed to the approaches of death; in his children, too, who have all proved a very curse to the earth, and more especially, the two Agrippinas, who were the mothers respectively of Caius and of Domitius Nero,144 so many firebrands hurled among the human race. In addition to all this, we may add the shortness of his life, he being cut off in his fifty-first year, the distress which he experienced from the adulteries of his wife,145 and the grievous tyranny to which he was subjected by his father-in-law. Agrippina, too, the mother of Nero, who was lately Emperor, and who proved himself, throughout the whole of his reign, the enemy of the human race, has left it recorded in writing, that he was born with his feet first. It is in the due order of nature that man should enter the world with the head first, and be carried to the tomb in a contrary fashion.

CHAP. 7. (9.)—OF THOSE WHO HAVE BEEN CUT OUT OF THE WOMB.

Those children, whose birth has cost the mother her life, are evidently born under more favourable auspices; for such was the case with the first Scipio Africanus; the first, too, of the Cæsars was so named, from his having been removed by an incision in his mother's womb. For a similar reason, too, the Cæsones were called by that name.146 Manilius, also, who entered Carthage with his army, was born in a similar manner.

CHAP. 8. (10.)—WHO WERE CALLED VOPISCI.

A child used to be called Vopiscus,147 who, when twins had been conceived, had been retained in the womb and born alive, the other having perished by abortion. There are, too, some very remarkable instances of this kind, although they are singularly rare and uncommon.

CHAP. 9. (11.)—THE CONCEPTION AND GENERATION OF MAN.

Few animals, except the female of the human species, receive the male when pregnant. In only one or two species, and no more, does superfœtation ever take place.148 Cases are to be found stated in the journals of physicians, and of others who have paid particular attention to the subject, in which twelve embryos149 have been removed at a single abortion. When, however, but a very short time has intervened between two conceptions, the embryos both of them proceed to maturity; as was seen to be the case with Hercules and his brother Iphicles.150 This was the case also with the woman who brought forth two children at a birth, one of whom bore a resemblance to her husband, and the other to her paramour. So too, with a female slave in Proconnesus,151 who was delivered of two children at one birth, one of whom bore a strong resemblance to her master, and the other to her master's steward, with both of whom she had had connection on the same day; with another woman who was delivered of two children at a birth, the one after the usual period of gestation, the other an em- bryo only five months old: and again, with another female, who, having been delivered of one child at the end of seven months, in due course, two months afterwards, brought forth twins.152

CHAP. 10.—STRIKING INSTANCES OF RESEMBLANCE.

It is universally known that well-formed parents often produce defective children; and on the other hand, defective parents children who are well formed, or else imperfect in the same part of the body as the parents. It is a well-known fact also, that marks, moles, and even scars, are reproduced in members of the same family in successive generations. The mark which the Daci make on their arms for the purpose of denoting their origin, is known to last even to the fourth generation.153

(12.) We have heard it stated that three members of the family of the Lepidi have been born, though not in an uninterrupted succession, with one of the eyes covered with a membrane.154 We observe, too, that some children strongly resemble their grandfather, and that of twins one child is like the father, while the other resembles the mother; and have known cases where a child that was born a year after another, resembled him as exactly as though they had been twins. Some women have children like themselves, some like their husband, while others again bear children who resemble neither the one nor the other. In some cases the female children resemble the father, and the males the mother. The case of Nicæus, the celebrated wrestler of Byzantium, is a well-known and un- doubted instance. His mother was the produce of an act of adultery, committed with a male of Æthiopia; and although she herself differed in no way from the ordinary complexion of other females, he was born with all the swarthy complexion of his Æthiopian grandfather.155

These strong features of resemblance proceed, no doubt, from the imagination of the parents, over which we may reasonably believe that many casual circumstances have a very powerful influence; such, for instance, as the action of the eyes, the ears, or the memory, or impressions received at the moment of conception. A thought156 even, momentarily passing through the mind of either of the parents, may be supposed to produce a resemblance to one of them separately, or else to the two combined. Hence it is that the varieties are much more numerous in the appearance of man than in that of other animals; seeing that, in the former, the rapidity of the ideas, the quickness of the perception, and the varied powers of the intellect, tend to impress upon the features peculiar and diversified marks; while in the case of the other animals, the mind is immovable, and just the same in each and all individuals of the same species.157 A man named Artemon, one of the common people,158 bore so strong a resemblance to Antiochus, the king of Syria, that his queen Laodice, after her husband Antiochus was slain, acted the farce of getting this man159 to recommend her as the successor to the crown. Vibius, a member of the plebeian order,160 and Publieius as well, a freedman who had formerly been a slave, so strongly resembled Pompeius Magnus in appearance as to be scarcely distinguishable from him; they both had that ingenuous countenance161 of his, and that fine forehead,162 which so strongly bespoke his noble descent. It was a similar degree of resemblance to this, that caused the surname of his cook, Menogenes, to be given to the father of Pompeius Magnus, he having already obtained that of Strabo, on account of the cast in his eye,163 a defect which he had contracted through imitating a similar one in his slave. Scipio, too, had the name of Serapion given him, after the vile slave of a pig-jobber: and after him, another Scipio of the same family was surnamed Salvitto, after a mime164 of that name. In the same way, too, Spinther and Pamphilus, who were respectively actors of only second and third rate parts, gave their names to Lentulus and Metellus, who were at that time colleagues in the consulship; so that, by a very curious but disagreeable coincidence, the likenesses of the two consuls were to be seen at the same moment on the stage.

On the other hand again, L. Plancus, the orator, bestowed his surname on the actor Rubrius: the player, Burbuleius, again, gave his name to the elder Curio, and the player, Menogenes, to Messala, the censor.165 There was a certain fisherman, too, a native of Sicily, who bore a strong resemblance to the proconsul, Sura, not only in his features, but in the mode even of opening his mouth, and the spasmodic contraction of his tongue, and his hurried and indistinct utterance when speaking. Cassius Severus,166 the celebrated orator, had it thrown in his teeth how strongly he resembled Armentarius, the gladiator.167 Toranius, a slave-dealer, sold to Antony, while he was one of the Triumvirs, two boys of remarkable beauty, as being twins, so strong was their resemblance; whereas, in reality, one of them was born in Asia, and the other beyond the Alps. The fraud, however, having been soon afterwards discovered through the difference in the language of the youths, Antony, who was greatly exasperated, violently upbraided the dealer, and, among other things, complained that he had fixed the price at so high a sum as two hundred thousand sesterces.168 The crafty slave-merchant, however, made answer that that was the very reason for his having set so high a price upon them; for, as he said, there would have been nothing particularly striking in the resemblance of the boys, if they had been born of the same mother, whereas, children found to be so exactly like each other, though natives of different countries, ought to be deemed above all price; an answer which produced such a reasonable feeling of surprise and admiration in the mind of the proscriber,169 that he who was but just before frantic under the injury he had received, was led to set a higher value on no part whatever of all the property in his possession.

CHAP. 11. (13.)—WHAT MEN ARE SUITED FOR GENERATION. INSTANCES OF VERY NUMEROUS OFFSPRING.

There exists a kind of peculiar antipathy between the bodies of certain persons, which, though barren with respect to each other, are not so when united to others;170 such, for instance, was the case with Augustus and Livia.171 Certain individuals, again, both men and women, produce only females, others males; and, still more frequently, children of the two sexes alternately; the mother of the Gracchi, for instance, who had twelve children, and Agrippina, the mother of Germanicus, who had nine. Some women, again, are barren in their youth, while to others it is given to bring forth once only during their lives. Some women never go to their full time, or if, by dint of great care and the aid of medicine, they do give birth to a living child, it is mostly a girl. Among other instances of rare occurrence, is the case of Augustus, now deified, who, in the year in which he departed this life, witnessed the birth of M. Silanus,172 the grandson of his granddaughter: having obtained the government of Asia, after his consulship, he was poisoned by Nero, on his accession to the throne.

Q. Metellus Macedonicus,173 leaving six children, left eleven grandsons also, with daughters-in-law and sons-in-law,174 twenty-seven individuals in all, who addressed him by the name and title of father. In the records of the times of the Emperor Augustus, now deified, we find it stated that, in his twelfth consulship, Lucius Sylla being his colleague, on the third day before the ides of April,175 C. Crispinus Hilarus, a man of a respectable family of the plebeian order, living at Fæsulæ,176 came to the Capitol, to offer sacrifice, attended by eight children (of whom two were daughters), twenty-eight grandsons, nineteen great-grandsons, and eight granddaughters, who all followed him in a lengthened train.

CHAP. 12. (14.)—AT WHAT AGE GENERATION CEASES.

Women cease to bear children at their fiftieth year, and, with the greater part of them, the monthly discharge ceases at the age of forty. But with respect to the male sex, it is a well-known fact, that King Masinissa, when he was past his eighty-sixth year, had a son born to him, whom he named Metimanus,177 and that Cato the Censor, after he had completed his eightieth year, had a son by the daughter of his client, Salonius: a circumstance from which, while the descendants of his other sons were surnamed Liciniani, those of this son were called Saloniani, of whom Cato of Utica was one.178 It is equally well known, too, that L. Volusius Saturninus,179 who lately died while prefect of the city, had a son when he was past his seventy-second year,180 by Cornelia, a member of the family of the Scipios, Volusius Saturninus, who was afterwards consul. Among the lower classes of the people, we not uncommonly meet with men who become the fathers of children after the age of seventy-five.

CHAP. 13. (15.)—REMARKABLE CIRCUMSTANCES CONNECTED WITH THE MENSTRUAL DISCHARGE.

Among the whole range of animated beings, the human fe- male is the only one that has the monthly discharge,181 and in whose womb are found what we term "moles." These moles consist of a shapeless mass of flesh, devoid of all life, and capable of resisting either the edge or the point of the knife; they are movable in the body, and obstruct the menstrual discharge; sometimes, too, they are productive of fatal consequences to the woman, in the same manner as a real fœtus; while, at other times, they remain in the body until old age; in some cases, again, they are discharged, in consequence of an increased action of the bowels.182 Something of a very similar nature is produced in the body of the male, which is called a "schirrus;"183 this was the case with Oppius Capito, a man of prætorian rank.

It would indeed be a difficult matter to find anything which is productive of more marvellous effects than the menstrual discharge.184 On the approach of a woman in this state, must will become sour, seeds which are touched by her become sterile, grafts wither away, garden plants are parched up, and the fruit will fall from the tree beneath which she sits. Her very look, even, will dim the brightness of mirrors, blunt the edge of steel, and take away the polish from ivory. A swarm of bees, if looked upon by her, will die immediately; brass and iron will instantly become rusty, and emit an offensive odour; while dogs which may have tasted of the matter so discharged are seized with madness, and their bite is venomous and incurable.

In addition to this, the bitumen which is found at certain periods of the year, floating on the lake of Judæa, known as Asphaltites, a substance which is peculiarly tenacious, and adheres to everything that it touches, can only be divided into separate pieces by means of a thread which has been dipped in this virulent matter.185 It is said that the ant, even an insect so extremely minute, is sensible of its presence, and rejects the grains which it has been carrying, and will not return to them again.186

This discharge, which is productive of such great and singular effects, occurs in women every thirty days, and in a greater degree every three months.187 In some individuals it occurs oftener than once a month, and in others, again, it never takes place. Women of this nature, however, are not capable of bearing children, because it is of this substance that the infant is formed.188 The seed of the male, acting as a sort of leaven, causes it to unite and assume a form, and in due time it acquires life, and assumes a bodily shape. The consequence is, that if the flow continues during pregnancy, the child will be weak, or else will not live; or if it does, it will be full of gross humours, Nigidius says.

(16.) The same author is also of opinion, that the milk of a woman who is giving suck will not become impure, if she should happen to become pregnant again by the same man.189

CHAP. 14.—THE THEORY OF GENERATION.

Conception is generally said to take place the most readily, either at the beginning or the end of the menstrual discharge.190 It is said, too, that it is a certain sign of fecundity in a woman, when her saliva becomes impregnated with any medicament which has been rubbed upon her eye-lids.191

CHAP. 15.—SOME ACCOUNT OF THE TEETH, AND SOME FACTS CONCERNING INFANTS.

It is a matter beyond doubt, that in young children the front teeth are produced at the seventh month, and, nearly always, those in the upper jaw the first. These are shed in the seventh year, and are then replaced by others.192 Some infants are even born with teeth:193 such was the case with Manius Curius, who, from this circumstance, received the name of Dentatus; and also with Cn. Papirius Carbo, both of them distinguished men. When this phenomenon happened in the case of a female, it was looked upon in the time of the kings as an omen of some inauspicious event. At the birth of Valeria, under such circumstances as these, it was the answer of the soothsayers, that any city to which she might happen to be carried, would be destroyed; she was sent to Suessa Pometia,194 at that time a very flourishing place, but the prediction was ultimately verified by its destruction. Some female children are born with the sexual organs closed,195 a thing of very unfa- vourable omen; of which Cornelia, the mother of the Gracchi, is an instance. Some persons are born with a continuous bone in the mouth, in place of teeth; this was the case with the upper jaw of the son of Prusias, the king of Bithynia.196

The teeth are the only parts of the body which resist the action of fire, and are not consumed along with the rest of it.197 Still, however, though they are able thus to resist flame, they become corroded by a morbid state of the saliva. The teeth are whitened by certain medicinal agents.198 They are worn down by use, and fail in some persons long before any other part of the body. They are necessary, not only for the mastication of the food, but for many other purposes as well. It is the office of the front teeth to regulate the voice and the speech; by a certain arrangement, they receive, as if in concert, the stroke communicated by the tongue, while by their structure in such regular order, and their size, they cut short, moderate, or soften the utterance of the words. When they are lost, the articulation becomes altogether confused and indistinct.199

In addition to this, it is generally supposed that we may form prognostics from the teeth. The number of teeth allotted to all men, with the exception of the nation of the Turduli,200 is thirty-two; those persons who have a greater number, are thought to be destined to be long-lived. Women have fewer teeth than men.201 Those females who happen to have two canine teeth on the right side of the upper jaw, have promise of being the favourites of fortune, as was the case with Agrippina,202 the mother of Domitius Nero: when they are on the left side, it is just the contrary. It is the custom of most nations not to burn the bodies of children who die before they have cut their teeth. We shall have more to say on this subject when we give an account of the different parts of the body.203

We find it stated that Zoroaster was the only human being who ever laughed on the same day on which he was born. We hear, too, that his brain pulsated so strongly that it repelled the hand when laid upon it, a presage of his future wisdom.

CHAP. 16.—EXAMPLES OF UNUSUAL SIZE.

It is a well-known fact, that, at the age of three years, the body of each person is half the height that it will ever attain. Taking it all in all, it is observed that in the human race, the stature is almost daily becoming less and less, and that sons are rarely taller than their parents, the fertility of the seed being dried up by the heat of that conflagration to which the world is fast approaching.204 A mountain of the island of Crete having been burst asunder by the action of an earthquake, a body was found there standing upright, forty-six cubits in height;205 by some persons it is supposed to have been that of Orion;206 while others again are of opinion that it was that of Otus.207 It is generally believed, from what is stated in ancient records, that the body of Orestes, which was disinterred by command of an oracle, was seven cubits in height.208 It is now nearly one thousand years ago, that that divine poet Homer was unceasingly complaining, that men were of less stature in his day than they had formerly been.209 Our Annals do not inform us what was the height of Nævius Pollio;210 but we learn from them that he nearly lost his life from the rush of the people to see him, and that he was looked upon as a prodigy. The tallest man that has been seen in our times, was one Gabbaras211 by name, who was brought from Arabia by the Emperor Claudius; his height was nine feet and as many inches.212 In the reign of Augustus, there were two persons, Posio and Secundilla by name, who were half a foot taller than him; their bodies have been preserved as objects of curiosity in the museum of the Sallustian family.213

In the reign of the same emperor, there was a man also, remarkable for his extremely diminutive stature, being only two feet and a palm in height; his name was Conopas, and he was a great pet with Julia, the grand-daughter of Augustus. There was a female also, of the same size, Andromeda by name, a freed-woman of Julia Augusta. We learn from Varro, that Manius Maximus and M. Tullius, members of our equestrian order, were only two cubits in height; and I have myself seen them, preserved in their coffins.214 It is far from an unknown fact, that children are occasionally born a foot and a half in height, and sometimes a little more; such children, however, have finished their span of existence by the time they are three years old.215

CHAP. 7.—CHILDREN REMARKABLE FOR THEIR PRECOCITY.

We find it stated by the historians, that the son of Euthymenes of Salamis had grown to be three cubits in height, at the age of three years; that he was slow of gait and dull of comprehension; that at that age he had attained puberty even, and his voice had become strong, like that of a man. We hear, also, that he died suddenly of convulsions of the limbs, at the completion of his third year.216 myself, not very long ago, was witness to exactly similar appearances, with the exception of the state of puberty, in a son of Cornelius Tacitus, a member of the equestrian order, and procurator217 of Belgic Gaul.218 The Greeks call such children as these, εχτραπέλοι; we have no name for them in Latin.

(17.) It has been observed, that the height of a man from the crown of the head to the sole of the foot, is equal to the distance between the tips of the middle fingers of the two hands when extended in a straight line; the right side of the body, too, is generally stronger than the left; though in some, the strength of the two sides is equal; while in others again, the left side is the strongest. This, however, is never found to be the case in women.219

CHAP. 18.—SOME REMARKABLE PROPERTIES OF THE BODY.

Males are heavier than females, and the bodies of all animals are heavier when they are dead than when alive; they also weigh more when asleep than when awake. The dead bodies of men float upon the back, those of women with the face downwards; as if, even after death, nature were desirous of sparing their modesty.220

(18.) We find it stated, that there are some men whose bones are solid, and devoid of marrow,221 and that one mark of such persons is the fact that they are never thirsty, and emit no perspiration. At the same time, we know that by the exercise of a resolute determination, any one may resist the feeling of thirst; a fact which was especially exemplified in the case of Julius Viator, a Roman of equestrian rank, but by birth one of the Vocontii, a nation on terms of alliance with us. Having, in his youth, been attacked by dropsy, and forbidden the use of liquids by his physicians,222 use with him became a second nature, and so, in his old age, he never took any drink at all. Other persons also, have, by the exercise of a strong determination, laid similar restraints upon themselves.

(19.) It is said that Crassus, the grandfather of Crassus, who was slain by the Parthians, was never known to laugh; from which circumstance he obtained the name of Agelastus.223 There are other persons again, who have never been seen to weep. Socrates, who was so famous for his wisdom, always appeared with the same countenance, and was never known to appear either more gay or more sad than ordinary. This even tenor of the mind, however, sometimes degenerates into a sort of harshness, and a rigorous and inflexible sternness of nature, entirely effacing all the human affections. The Greeks, among whom there have been many persons of this description, are in the habit of calling them ᾿απαθεῖς.224 A very remarkable thing, too, is the fact, that among these persons are to be found some of the greatest masters of philosophy. Diogenes the Cynic, for instance, Pyrrho, Heraclitus, and Timon, which last allowed himself to be so entirely carried away by this spirit, as to become a hater of all mankind. Less important peculiarities of nature, again, are to be observed in many persons; Antonia,225 for instance, the wife of Drusus, was never known to expectorate; and Pomponius, the poet, a man of consular rank, was never troubled with eructation. Those rare instances of men,226 whose bones are naturally solid and without marrow, are known to us as men "of horn."227

CHAP. 19. (20.)—INSTANCES OF EXTRAORDINARY STRENGTH.

Varro, speaking of persons remarkable for their strength, gives us an account of Tributanus, a celebrated gladiator, and skilled in the use of the Samnite228 arms;229 he was a man of meagre person, but possessed of extraordinary strength. Varro makes mention of his son also, who served in the army of Pompeius Magnus. He says, that in all parts of his body, even in the arms and hands, there was a network of sinews,230 extending across and across. The latter of these men, having been challenged by an enemy, with a single finger of the right hand, and that unarmed,231 vanquished him, and then seized and dragged him to the camp. Vinnius Valens, who served as a centurion in the prætorian guard of Augustus, was in the habit of holding up waggons laden with casks, until they were emptied; and of stopping a carriage with one hand, and holding it back, against all the efforts of the horses to drag it forward. He performed other wonderful feats also, an account of which may still be seen inscribed on his monument. Varro, also, gives the following statement: "Fusius, who used to be called the ' bumpkin232 Hercules,' was in the habit of carrying his own mule; while Salvius was able to mount a ladder, with a weight of two hundred pounds attached to his feet, the same to his hands, and two hundred pounds on each shoulder." I myself once saw,—a most marvellous display of strength,—a man of the name of Athanatus walk across the stage, wearing a leaden breast-plate of five hundred pounds weight, while shod with buskins of the same weight. When Milo, the wrestler, had once taken his stand, there was not a person who could move him from his position; and when he grasped an apple in his hand, no one could so much as open one of his fingers.

CHAP. 20.—INSTANCES OF REMARKABLE AGILITY.

It was considered a very great thing for Philippides to run one thousand one hundred and sixty stadia, the distance between Athens and Lacedæmon, in two days, until Amystis, the Lacedæmonian courier, and Philonides,233 the courier of Alexander the Great, ran from Sicyon to Elis in one day, a distance of thirteen hundred and five stadia.234 In our own times, too, we are fully aware that there are men in the Circus, who are able to keep on running for a distance of one hundred and sixty miles; and that lately, in the consulship of Fonteius and Vipstanus,235 there was a child eight years of age, who, between morning and evening, ran a distance of seventy-five miles.236 We become all the more sensible of these wonderful instances of swiftness, upon reflecting that Tiberius Nero, when he made all possible haste to reach his brother Drusus, who was then sick in Germany, reached him in three stages, travelling day and night on the road; the distance of each stage was two hundred miles.237

CHAP. 21. (21.)—INSTANCES OF ACUTENESS OF SIGHT.

Instances of acuteness of sight are to be found stated, which, indeed, exceed all belief. Cicero informs us,238 that the Iliad of Homer was written on a piece of parchment so small as to be enclosed in a nut-shell. He makes mention also of a man who could distinguish objects at a distance of one hundred and thirty-five miles.239 M. Varro says, that the name of this man was Strabo; and that, during the Punic war, from Lilybæum, the promontory of Sicily, he was in the habit of seeing the fleet come out of the harbour of Carthage, and could even count the number of the vessels.240 Callicrates241 used to carve ants and other small animals in ivory, so minute in size, that other persons were unable to distinguish their individual parts. Myrmecides242 also was famous in the same line;243 this man made, of similar material, a chariot drawn by four horses, which a fly could cover with its wings; as well as a ship which might be covered by the wings of a tiny bee.244

CHAP. 22.(22.)—INSTANCES OF REMARKABLE ACUTENESS OF HEARING.

We have one instance on record of remarkable acuteness of hearing; the noise of the battle, on the occasion when Sybaris245 was destroyed, was heard, the day on which it took place, at Olympia.246 But, as to the victory over the Cimbri,247 and that over Perseus, the news of which was conveyed to Rome by the Castors,248 they are to be looked upon in the light of visions and presages proceeding immediately from the gods.

CHAP. 23. (23.)—INSTANCES OF ENDURANCE OF PAIN.

Of patience in enduring pain, that being too frequently the lot of our calamitous fate, we have innumerable instances related. One of the most remarkable instances among the female sex is that of the courtesan Leæna, who, although put to the torture, refused to betray the tyrant-slayers, Harmodius and Aristogiton.249 Among those of men, we have that of Anaxarchus, who, when put to the torture for a similar reason, bit off his tongue and spit it into the face of the tyrant, thus destroying the only hope250 of his making any betrayal.

CHAP. 24. (24.)—MEMORY.

It would be far from easy to pronounce what person has been the most remarkable for the excellence of his memory, that blessing so essential for the enjoyment of life, there having been so many who have been celebrated for it. King Cyrus knew all the soldiers of his army by name:251 L. Scipio the names of all the Roman people. Cineas, the ambassador of king Pyrrhus, knew by name all the members of the senate and the equestrian order, the day after his arrival at Rome. Mithridates,252 who was king of twenty-two nations, administered their laws in as many languages, and could harangue each of them, without employing an interpreter. There was in Greece a man named Charmidas, who, when a person asked him for any book in a library, could repeat it by heart, just as though he were reading. Memory, in fine, has been made an art; which was first invented by the lyric poet, Simonides,253 and perfected by Metrodorus of Scepsis, so as to enable persons to repeat word for word exactly what they have heard.254 Nothing whatever, in man, is of so frail a nature as the memory; for it is affected by disease, by injuries, and even by fright; being sometimes partially lost, and at other times entirely so. A man, who received a blow from a stone, forgot the names of the letters only;255 while, on the other hand, another person, who fell from a very high roof, could not so much as recollect his mother, or his relations and neighbours. Another person, in consequence of some disease, forgot his own servants even; and Messala Corvinus, the orator, lost all recollection of his own name. And so it is, that very often the memory appears to attempt, as it were, to make its escape from us, even while the body is at rest and in perfect health. When sleep, too, comes over us, it is cut off altogether; so much so, that the mind, in its vacancy, is at a loss to know where we are.256

CHAP. 25. (25.)—VIGOUR OF MIND

The most remarkable instance, I think, of vigour of mind in any man ever born, was that of Cæsar, the Dictator. I am not at present alluding to his valour and courage, nor yet his exalted genius, which was capable of embracing everything under the face of heaven, but I am speaking of that innate vigour of mind, which was so peculiar to him, and that promptness which seemed to act like a flash of lightning. We find it stated that he was able to write or read, and, at the same time, to dictate and listen. He could dictate to his secretaries four letters at once, and those on the most important business; and, indeed, if he was busy about nothing else, as many as seven. He fought as many as fifty pitched battles, being the only commander who exceeded M. Marcellus,257 in this respect, he having fought only thirty-nine.258 In addition, too, to the victories gained by him in the civil wars, one million one hundred and ninety-two thousand men were slain by him in his battles. For my own part, however, I am not going to set it down as a subject for high renown, what was really an outrage committed upon mankind, even though he may have been acting under the strong influence of necessity; and, indeed, he himself confesses as much, in his omission to state the number of persons who perished by the sword in the civil wars.

CHAP. 26.—CLEMENCY AND GREATNESS OF MIND.

With much more justice we may award credit to Pompeius Magnus, far having taken from the pirates259 no less than eight hundred and forty-six vessels: though at the same time, over and above the great qualities previously mentioned, we must with equal justice give Cæsar the peculiar credit of a remark- able degree of clemency, a quality, in the exercise of which, even to repentance, he excelled all other individuals whatsoever. The same person has left us one instance of magnanimity, to which there is nothing that can be at all compared. While one, who was an admirer of luxury, might perhaps on this occasion have enumerated the spectacles which he exhibited, the treasures which he lavished away, and the magnificence of his public works, I maintain that it was the great proof, and an incomparable one, of an elevated mind, for him to have burnt with the most scrupulous carefulness the papers of Pompeius, which were taken in his desk at the battle of Pharsalia, and those of Scipio, taken at Thapsus, without so much as reading them.260

CHAP. 27. (26.)—HEROIC EXPLOITS.

But now, as it belongs fully as much to the glorious renown of the Roman Empire, as to the victorious career of a single individual, I shall proceed on this occasion to make mention of all the triumphs and titles of Pompeius Magnus: the splendour of his exploits having equalled not only that of those of Alexander the Great, but even of Hercules, and perhaps of Father Liber261 even. After having recovered Sicily, where he first commenced his career as a partizan of Sylla, but in behalf of the republic, after having conquered the whole of Africa, and reduced it to subjection, and after having received for his share of the spoil the title of " Great,"262 he was decreed the honours of a triumph; and he, though only of equestrian rank,263 a thing that had never occurred before, re-entered the city in the triumphal chariot: immediately after which, he hastened to the west, where he left it inscribed on the trophy which he raised upon the Pyrenees, that he had, by his victories, reduced to subjection eight hundred and seventy-six cities, from the Alps to the borders of Farther Spain; at the same time he most magnanimously said not a word about Sertorius.264 After having put an end to the civil war, which indeed was the primary cause of all the foreign ones, he, though still of only equestrian rank, again entered Rome in the triumphal chariot, having proved himself a general thus often before having been a soldier.265 After this, he was dispatched to the shores of all the various seas, and then to the East, whence he brought back to his country the following titles of honour, resembling therein those who conquer at the sacred games—for, be it remembered, it is not they that are crowned, but their respective countries.266 These honours then did he award to the City, in the temple of Minerva,267 which he consecrated from the spoils that he had gained: "Cneius Pompeius Magnus, Imperator, having brought to an end a war of thirty years' duration, and having defeated, routed, put to the sword, or received the submission of, twelve millions two hundred and seventy-eight thousand men, having sunk or captured eight hundred and forty-six vessels, having received as allies one thousand five hundred and thirty-eight cities and fortresses, and having conquered all the country from the Mæotis to the Red Sea, dedicates this shrine as a votive offering due to Minerva." Such, in few words, is the sum of his exploits in the East. The following are the introductory words descriptive of the triumph which he obtained, the third day before the calends268 of October,269 in the consulship of M. Piso and M. Messala;270 "After having delivered the sea-coast from the pirates, and restored the seas to the people of Rome, he enjoyed a triumph over Asia, Pontus, Armenia, Paphlagonia, Cappadocia, Cilicia, Syria, the Scythians, Judæa, the Albanians, Iberia, the island of Crete, the Basterni, and, in addition to all these, the kings Mithridates and Tigranes."

The most glorious, however, of all glories, resulting from these exploits, was, as he himself says, in the speech which he made in public relative to his previous career, that Asia, which he received as the boundary of the empire, he left its centre.271 If any one should wish, on the other hand, in a similar manner, to pass in review the exploits of Cæsar, who has shown himself greater still than Pompeius, why then he must enumerate all the countries in the world, a task, I may say, without an end.

CHAP. 28. (27.)—UNION IN THE SAME PERSON OF THREE OF THE HIGHEST QUALITIES WITH THE GREATEST PURITY.

Many other men have excelled in different kinds of virtues. Cato, however, who was the first of the Porcian family,272 is generally thought to have been an example of the three greatest of human endowments, for he was the most talented orator, the most talented general, and the most talented politician;273 all which merits, if they were not perceptible before him, still shone forth, more refulgently even, in my opinion, in Scipio Æmilianus, who besides was exempted from that hatred on the part of many others under which Cato laboured:274 in cones- quence of which it was, what must be owned to be a peculiarity in Cato's career, that he had to plead his own cause no less than four and forty times;275 and yet, though no person was so frequently accused, he was always acquitted.

CHAP. 29. (28.)—INSTANCES OF EXTREME COURAGE.

A minute enquiry by whom the greatest valour has ever been exhibited, would lead to an endless discussion, more especially if all the fables of the poets are to be taken for granted. Q. Ennius admired T. Cæcilius Denter276 and his brother to such a degree, that on their account he added a sixteenth book to his Annals. L. Siccius Dentatus, who was tribune of the people in the consulship of Spurius Tarpeius and A. Aterius,277 not long after the expulsion of the kings, has also very numerous testimonies in his favour. This hero fought one hundred and twenty battles, was eight times victorious in single combat, and was graced with forty-five wounds in the front of the body, without one on the back. The same man also carried off thirty-four spoils,278 was eighteen times presented with the victor's spear,279 and received twenty-five pendants,280 eighty-three torcs,281 one hundred and sixty bracelets,282 twenty-six crowns, (of which fourteen were civic, eight golden, three mural, and one obsidional), a fisc283 of money, ten prisoners, and twenty oxen altogether.284 He followed in the triumphal processions of nine generals, who mainly owed their victories to his exertions; besides all which, a thing that I look upon as the most important of all his services, he denounced to the people T. Romilius,285 one of the generals of the army, at the end of his consulship, and had him convicted of having made an improper use of his authority.286

The military honours of Manlius Capitolinus would have been no less splendid than his, if they had not been all effaced at the close of his life. Before his seventeenth year, he had gained two spoils, and was the first of equestrian rank who received a mural crown; he also gained six civic crowns, thirty seven donations, and had twenty-three scars on the fore-part of his body. He saved the life of P. Servilius, the master of the horse, receiving wounds on the same occasion in the shoulders and the thigh. Besides all this, unaided, he saved the Capitol, when it was attacked by the Gauls, and through that, the state itself; a thing that would have been the most glorious act of all, if he had not so saved it, in order that he might, as its king, become its master.287 But in all matters of this nature, although valour may effect much, fortune does still more.

No person living, in my opinion at least, ever excelled M. Sergius,288 although his great-grandson, Catiline, tarnished the honours of his name. In his second campaign he lost his right hand; and in two campaigns he was wounded three and twenty times; so much so, that he could scarcely use either his hands or his feet; still, attended by a single slave, he afterwards served in many campaigns, though but an invalided soldier. He was twice taken prisoner by Hannibal, (for it was with no ordinary enemy that he would engage,) and twice did he escape from his captivity, after having been kept, without a single day's intermission, in chains and fetters for twenty months. On four occasions he fought with his left hand alone, two horses being slain under him. He had a right hand made of iron, and attached to the stump, after which he fought a battle, and raised the siege of Cremona, defended Placentia, and took twelve of the enemy's camps in Gaul. All this we learn from an oration of his, which he delivered when, in his prætorship, his colleagues attempted to exclude him from the sacred rites, on the ground of his infirmities.289 What heaps upon heaps of crowns would he have piled up, if he had only had other enemies! For, in matters of this nature, it is of the first importance to consider upon what times in especial the valour of each man has fallen. What civic crowns did Trebia, what did the Ticinus, what did Lake Thrasymenus afford? What crown was there to be gained at Cannæ, where it was deemed the greatest effort of valour to have escaped290 from the enemy? Other persons have been conquerors of men, no doubt, but Sergius291 conquered even Fortune herself.292

CHAP. 30. (29.)—MEN OF REMARKABLE GENIUS.

Among so many different pursuits, and so great a variety of works and objects, who can select the palm of glory for transcendent genius? Unless perchance we should agree in opinion that no more brilliant genius ever existed than the Greek poet Homer, whether it is that we regard the happy subject of his work, or the excellence of its execution. For this reason it was that Alexander the Great—and it is only by judges of such high estate that a sentence, just and unbiassed by envy, can be pronounced in the case of such lofty claims—when he found among the spoils of Darius, the king of Persia, a casket for perfumes,293 enriched with gold, precious stones, and pearls, covered as he was with the dust of battle, deemed it beneath a warrior to make use of unguents, and, when his friends were pointing out to him its various uses, exclaimed, "Nay, but by Hercules! let the casket be used for preserving the poems of Homer;" that so the most precious work of the human mind might be placed in the keeping of the richest work of art. It was the same conqueror, too, who gave directions that the descendants and house of the poet Pindar294 should be spared, at the taking of Thebes. He likewise rebuilt the native city295 of Aristotle, uniting to the extraordinary brilliancy of his exploits this speaking testimony of his kindliness of disposition.

Apollo impeached by name the assassins of the poet Archilochus296 at Delphi. While the Lacedemonians were besieging Athens, Father Liber ordered the funeral rites to be performed for Sophocles, the very prince of the tragic buskin; repeatedly warning their king, Lysander, in his sleep, to allow of the burial of his favourite. Upon this, the king made enquiry who had lately died in Athens; and understanding without any difficulty from the Athenians to whom the god referred, he allowed the funeral rites to be performed without molestation.

CHAP. 31. (30.)—MEN WHO HAVE BEEN REMARKABLE FOR WISDOM.

Dionysius the tyrant, who otherwise manifested a natural propensity for cruelty and pride, sent a vessel crowned with garlands to meet Plato, that high-priest of wisdom; and on his disembarcation, received him on the shore, in a chariot drawn by four white horses. Isocrates was able to sell a single oration of his for twenty talents.297 Æschines, the great Athenian orator, after he had read to the Rhodians the speech which he had made on the accusation of Demosthenes, read the defence made by Demosthenes, through which he had been driven into exile among them. When they expressed their admiration of it, "How much more," said he, "would you have admired it, if you had heard him deliver it him- self;"298 a striking testimony, indeed, given in adversity, to the merit of an enemy! The Athenians sent their general, Thucydides, into banishment, but recalled him as their historian, admiring his eloquence, though they had punished his want of valour.299 A strong testimony, too, was given to the merit of Menander, the famous comic poet, by the kings of Egypt and Macedonia, in sending to him a fleet and an embassy; though, what was still more honourable to him, he preferred enjoying the converse of his literary pursuits to the favour of kings.

The nobles too of Rome have given their testimonies in favour of foreigners, even. Cn. Pompeius, after having finished the war against Mithridates, when he went to call at the house of Posidonius, the famous teacher of philosophy, forbade the lictor to knock at the door, as was the usual custom;300 and he, to whom both the eastern and the western world had yielded submission, ordered the fasces to be lowered before the door of a learned man. Cato the Censor, after he had heard the speech of Carneades,301 who was one of the embassy sent from Athens, of three men famous for their learning, gave it as his opinion, that the ambassadors ought to be dismissed as soon as possible, because, in consequence of his ingenious method of arguing, it became extremely difficult to distinguish truth from falsehood.302 What an extraordinary change too in our modes of thinking! This Cato constantly gave it out as his decided opinion that all Greeks ought to be expelled from Italy, while, on the other hand, his great-grandson, Cato of Utica, upon his return from his military tribuneship, brought back with him a philosopher, and a second one303 when he returned from his embassy to Cyprus;304 and it is a very remarkable fact, that the same language which had been proscribed by one of the Cato's, was introduced among us by the other. But let us now give some account of the honours of our own countrymen.

The elder Africanus ordered that the statue of Ennius should be placed in his tomb, and that the illustrious surname, which he had acquired, I may say, as his share of the spoil on the conquest of the third part of the world, should be read over his ashes, along with the name of the poet.305 The Emperor Augustus, now deified, forbade the works of Virgil to be burnt, in opposition to the modest directions to that effect, which the poet had left in his will: a prohibition which was a greater compliment paid to his merit, than if he himself had recommended his works.

M. Varro306 is the only person, who, during his lifetime, saw his own statue erected. This was placed in the first public library that was ever built, and which was formed by Asinius Pollio with the spoils of our enemies.307 The fact of this distinction being conferred upon him by one who was in the first rank, both as an orator and a citizen, and at a time, too, when there was so great a number of men distinguished for their genius, was not less honourable to him, in my opinion, than the naval crown which Pompeius Magnus bestowed upon him in the war against the pirates. The instances that follow among the Romans, if I were to attempt to reckon them, would be found to be innumerable; for it is the fact that this one nation has furnished a greater number of distinguished men in every branch than all the countries of the world taken together.308

But what atonement could I offer to thee, Marcus Tullius,309 were I to be silent respecting thy name? or on what ground am I to pronounce thee as especially pre-eminent? On what, indeed, that can be more convincing than the most abundant testimony that was offered in thy favour by the whole Roman people? Contenting myself with the selection only of such of the great actions of the whole of your life, as were performed during your consulship.—You speak, and the tribes surrender the Agrarian law, or, in other words, their very subsistence;310 you advise them to do so, and they pardon Roscius,311 the author of the law for the regulation of the theatres, and, without any feelings of resentment, allow a mark to be put upon themselves by allotting them an inferior seat; you entreat, and the sons of proscribed men blush at having canvassed for public honours: before your genius, Catiline took to flight, and it was you who proscribed M. Antonius. Hail then to thee, who wast the first of all to receive the title of Father of thy country,312 who wast the first of all, while wearing the toga, to merit a triumph, and who didst obtain the laurel for oratory. Great father, thou, of eloquence and of Latin literature! as the Dictator Cæsar, once thy enemy, wrote in testimony of thee,313 thou didst require a laurel superior to every triumph! How far greater and more glorious to have enlarged so immeasurably the boundaries of the Roman genius, than those of its sway!

(31.) Those persons among the Romans, who surpass all others in wisdom, have the surnames of Catus and Corculus314 given to them. Among the Greeks, Socrates was declared by the oracle of the Pythian Apollo to be superior to all others in wisdom.

CHAP. 32. (32.)—PRECEPTS THE MOST USEFUL IN LIFE.

Again, men have placed on an equality with those of the oracles the precepts uttered by Chilon,315 the Lacedæmonian. These have been consecrated at Delphi in letters of gold, and are to the following effect: "That each person ought to know himself, and not to desire to possess too much;"316 and "That misery is the sure companion of debt and litigation." He died of joy, on hearing that his son had been victorious in the Olympic games, and all Greece assisted at his funeral rites.

CHAP. 33. (33.)—DIVINATION.

A spirit of divination, and a certain communion with the gods, of the most exalted nature, was manifested-among women, in the Sibyl, and among men, in Melampodes,317 the Greek, and in Marcius,318 the Roman.

CHAP. 34. (34.)—THE MAN WHO WAS PRONOUNCED TO BE THE MOST EXCELLENT.

Scipio Nasica is the only individual who, since the commencement of the Roman era, has been declared, by a vote of the senate, confirmed by oath, to be the most excellent of men.319 And yet, the same person, when he was a candidate for office, was twice stigmatized by a repulse of the Roman people. He was not allowed, in fine, to die in his native country,320—no, by Hercules! no more than Socrates, who was declared by Apollo to be the wisest of men, was permitted to die outside of a prison.

CHAP. 35. (35.)—THE MOST CHASTE MATRONS.

Sulpicia, the daughter of Paterculus, and wife of Fulvius Flaccus, has been considered, in the judgment of matrons, to have been the chastest of women. She was selected from one hundred Roman ladies, who had been previously named, to dedicate a statue of Venus, in obedience to the precepts contained in the Sibylline books.321 Again, Claudia gave strong proof of her piety and virtue, on the occasion of the introduction into Rome of the Mother of the gods.322

CHAP. 36. (36.)—INSTANCES OF THE HIGHEST DEGREE OF AFFECTION.

Infinite is the number of examples of affection which have been known in all parts of the world; but one in particular occurred at Rome, to which no other can possibly be compared. A woman of quite the lower class, and whose name has consequently not come down to us, having lately given birth to a child, obtained permission to visit her mother,323 who was confined in prison; but was always carefully searched by the gaoler before being admitted, to prevent her from intro- ducing any food. At last, however, she was detected nourishing her mother with the milk of her breast; upon which, in consideration of the marvellous affection of the daughter, the mother was pardoned, and they were both maintained for the rest of their days at the public charge; the spot, too, was consecrated to Piety, a temple to that goddess being built on the site of the prison, in the consulship324 of C. Quintius and M. Acilius, where the theatre of Marcellus325326 now stands.

The father of the Gracchi, on finding [two] serpents in his house, consulted the soothsayers, and received an answer to the effect, that he would survive if the serpent of the other sex was put to death.—"No," said he, "rather kill the serpent of my own sex, for Cornelia is still young, and may yet bear children."327 Thus did he shew himself ready, at the same moment, to spare his wife and to benefit the state; and shortly after, his wish was accomplished. M. Lepidus died of regret for his wife, Apuleia, after having been divorced from her.328 P. Rupilius,329 who was at the time affected by a slight disease, instantly expired, upon news being brought to him that his brother had failed in obtaining the consulship. P. Catienus Plotinus was so much attached to his patron, that on finding himself named heir to all his property, he threw himself on the funeral pile.

CHAP. 37. (37.)—NAMES OF MEN WHO HAVE EXCELLED IN THE ARTS, ASTROLOGY, GRAMMAR, AND MEDICINE.

Innumerable are the men who have excelled in the various arts; we may, however, take a cursory survey of them, by citing the names of the principal ones. Berosus excelled in astrology; and on account of his divinations and predictions, a public statue was erected in his honour by the Athenians. Apollodorus, for his skill as a grammarian, had public honours decreed him by the Amphictyonic Council of Greece. Hip- pocrates excelled in medicine; before its arrival, he predicted the plague, which afterwards came from Illyria, and sent his pupils to various cities, to give their assistance. As an acknowledgment of his merit, Greece decreed him the same honours as to Hercules.330 King Ptolemy rewarded a similar degree of skill in the person of Cleombrotus of Ceos, by a donation of one hundred talents, at the Megalensian games,331 he having succeeded in saving the life of King Anti- ochus.332 Critobulus also rendered himself extremely famous, by extracting an arrow333 from the eye of King Philip with so much skill, that, although the sight was lost, there was no defect to be seen.334 Asclepiades of Prusa, however, acquired the greatest fame of all—he founded a new sect, treated with disdain the promises of King Mithridates conveyed to him by an embassy, discovered a method of successfully treating diseases by wine,335 and, breaking in upon the funeral ceremony, saved the life of a man, who was actually placed336 on the funeral pile. He rendered himself, however, more celebrated than all, by staking his reputation as a physician against Fortune herself, and asserting that he did not wish to be so much as looked upon as a physician, if he should ever happen in any way to fall sick; and he won his wager, for he met his death at an extreme old age, by falling down stairs.337

CHAP. 38.—GEOMETRY AND ARCHITECTURE.

M. Marcellus, too, at the taking of Syracuse, offered a remarkable homage to the sciences of geometry and mechanics, by giving orders that Archimedes was to be the only person who should not be molested; his commands, however, were disregarded, in consequence of the imprudence of one of the soldiers.338 Chersiphron, also, the Cnossian,339 was rendered fa- mous by the admirable construction of the temple of Diana at Ephesus; Philon, by the construction of the basin at Athens, which was capable of containing one thousand vessels;340 Cte- sibius, by the invention of pneumatics and hydraulic machines; and Dinochares,341 by the plan which he made of the city of Alexandria, founded by Alexander in Egypt. The same monarch, too, by public edict, declared that no one should paint his portrait except Apelles, and that no one should make a marble statue of him except Pyrgoteles, or a bronze one except Lysippus.342 These arts have all been rendered glorious by many illustrious examples.

CHAP. 39. (38.)—OF PAINTING; ENGRAVING ON BRONZE, MARBLE, AND IVORY; OF CARVING.

King Attalus gave one hundred talents,343 at a public auction, for a single picture of Aristides, the Theban painter.344 Cæsar, the Dictator, purchased two pictures, the Medea and the Ajax of Timomachus, for eighty talents,345 it being his intention to dedicate them in the temple of Venus Genetrix. King Candaules gave its weight in gold for a large picture by Bularchus, the subject of which was the destruction of the Magnetes. Demetrius, who was surnamed the "taker of cities,"346 refused to set fire to the city of Rhodes, lest he should chance to destroy a picture of Protogenes, which was placed on that side of the walls against which his attack was directed. Praxiteles347 has been ennobled by his works in marble, and more especially by his Cnidian Venus, which became remarkable from the insane love which it inspired in a certain young man,348 and the high value set upon it by King Nicomedes, who endeavoured to procure it from the Cnidians, by offering to pay for them a large debt which they owed. The Olympian Jupiter day by day bears testimony to the talents of Phidias,349 and the Capitoline Jupiter and the Diana of Ephesus to those of Mentor;350 to which deities, also, were consecrated vases made by this artist.

CHAP. 40. (39.)—SLAVES FOR WHICH A HIGH PRICE HAS BEEN GIVEN.

The highest price ever given for a man born in slavery, so far as I am able to discover, was that paid for Daphnus, the grammarian, who was sold by Natius of Pisaurum351 to M. Scaurus, the first man in the state, for seven hundred thousand sesterces.352 In our day, no doubt, comic actors have fetched a higher price, but then they were purchasing their own freedom. In the time of our ancestors, Roscius, the actor, gained five hundred thousand sesterces annually. Perhaps, too, a person might in the present instance refer to the case of the army commissary353 in the Armenian war, which was of late years undertaken in favour of Tiridates; which officer, in our own time, received his manumission from Nero for the sum of thirteen million sesterces;354 but, in this case, the consideration was the profit to be derived from the war,355 and it was not the value of the man that was paid for. And so, too, when Lutorius Priscus bought of Sejanus, the eunuch, Pæzon, for fifty million sesterces,356 the price was given, by Hercules! rather to gratify the passion of the purchaser, than in commendation of the beauty of the slave. Universal sorrow and consternation then reigning, the public were too much pre-occupied with it to put a stop to a bargain of so scandalous a nature.357

CHAP. 41. (40.)—SUPREME HAPPINESS.

Of all nations of the earth, the Romans have, without doubt, excelled every other in the display of valour.358 The human judgment cannot, however, possibly decide what man has enjoyed the highest degree of happiness, seeing that every one defines a state of prosperity in a way different from another, and entirely in conformity with his own notions. If we wish to form a true judgment and come to a decision, casting aside all the allurements and illusions of fortune, we are bound to say that no mortal is happy. Fortune has dealt well, and, indeed, indulgently, to him who feels that he has a right to say that he is not unhappy. For if there is nothing else, at all events, there is the fear lest fortune should fail at last; which fear itself, when it has once fastened upon us, our happiness is no longer unalloyed. And then, too, is it not the case that there is no mortal who is always wise? Would that there were many to be found, who could feel a conviction that this is false, and that it had not been enunciated by an oracle itself, as it were! Mortals, vain as they are, and ingenious in deceiving themselves, calculate in the same way as the Thracians, who, according to their experience of each day, deposit in an urn a black or a white pebble; at the close of their life, these pebbles are separated, and from the relative number of each kind, they form their conclusions.359 But really, may not that very day that has been complimented with a white pebble, have contained in itself the germ of some misfortune? How many a man has got into trouble by the very power which has been bestowed upon him? How many have been brought to ruin and plunged into the deepest misery by their own blessings? or rather, by what have been looked upon too fondly as blessings, for the hour during which they were in the full enjoyment of them. But most true it is, that it is the day after, that is the judge of the day before; and after all, it is only the last day that is to set its stamp on the whole; the consequence is, that we can put our trust in none of them. And then, too, is it not the fact that the blessings of life would not be equal to its evils, even though they were equal in number? For what pleasure is there that can compensate for the slightest grief? Alas! what a vain and unreasonable task we impose upon ourselves! We trouble ourselves with counting the number of days, when it is their weight360 that ought to be taken into consideration.

CHAP. 42. (41.)—RARE INSTANCES OF GOOD FORTUNE CONTINUING IN THE SAME FAMILY.

During the whole course of ages, we find only one woman, and that, Lampido, the Lacedæmonian, who was the daughter of a king, the wife of a king, and the mother of a king.361 Berenice was the only woman who was daughter, sister, and mother of conquerors in the Olympian games,362 The family of the Curios363 has been the only one to produce three orators in succession; that of the Fabii alone has given three chiefs of the senate in succession, Fabius Ambustus, his son Fabius Rullianus, and his grandson Quintus Fabius Gurges.364

CHAP. 43. (42.)—REMARKABLE EXAMPLE OF VICISSITUDES.

As to examples of the vicissitudes of Fortune, they are innumerable. For what great pleasures has she ever given us, which have not taken their rise in misfortunes? And what extraordinary misfortunes have not taken their first rise in great pleasures? (43.) It was fortune that preserved the Senator, M. Fidustius,365 who had been proscribed by Sylla, for a period of thirty-six years. And yet he was proscribed a second time; for he survived Sylla, even to the days of Antony, and, as it appears, was proscribed by him, for no other reason but because he had been proscribed before.

CHAP. 44.—REMARKABLE EXAMPLES OF HONOURS.

Fortune has determined that P. Ventidius alone should enjoy the honour of a triumph over the Parthians, and yet the same individual, when he was a child, she led in the triumphal procession of Cneius Pompeius, the conqueror of Asculum.366 Indeed, Masurius says, that he had been twice led in triumph; and according to Cicero, he used to let out mules for the bakers of the camp.367 Most writers, indeed, admit that his younger days were passed in the greatest poverty, and that he wore the hob-nailed shoes368 of the common soldier. Balbus Cornelius, also, the elder, was elected to the consulate;369 but he had previously been accused, and the judges had been charged to discuss the point whether he could or not lawfully be scourged with rods; he being the first foreigner,370—born even on the very shores of the ocean,—who obtained that honour, which our ancestors denied even to the people of Latium.371 Among other remarkable instances, also, we have that of L. Fulvius,372 the consul of the rebellious Tusculani, who, immediately upon his coming over to the Romans, obtained from them the same honour. He is the only individual who, in the same year in which he had been its enemy, enjoyed the honour of a triumph in Rome, and that too, over the people whose consul he had previously been. Down to the present time, L. Sylla is the only man who has claimed to himself the surname of "Happy;"373 a name which he derived, forsooth, from the bloodshed of the citizens and the oppression of his country! But what claim had he on which to found his title to this happiness? Was it the power which he had of proscribing and massacreing so many thousands of his fellow-citizens? Oh interpretation most disgraceful, and which must stamp him as "Unhappy"374 to all future time! Were not the men who perished in those times, of the two, to be looked upon as the more fortunate—seeing that with them we sympathize, while there is no one who does not detest Sylla? And then, besides, was not the close of his life more horrible than the sufferings which had been experienced by any of those who had been proscribed by him? his very flesh eating into itself, and so engendering his own punishment.375 And this, although he may have thought proper to gloss it over by that last dream of his,376 in the very midst of which he may be said, in some measure, to have died; and in which, as he pretended, he was told that his glory alone had risen superior to all envy; though at the same time, he confessed that it was still wanting to his supreme happiness, that he had not dedicated the Capitol.377

CHAP. 45.—TEN VERY FORTUNATE CIRCUMSTANCES WHICH HAVE HAPPENED TO THE SAME PERSON.

Q. Metellus, in the funeral oration which he made in praise of his father, L. Metellus, who had been pontiff, twice consul,378 dictator, master of the horse, one of the quindecemvirs for dividing the lands,379 and the first who had elephants in his triumphal procession,380 the same having been taken in the first Punic war, has left it written to the effect that his father had attained the ten greatest and best things, in the search after which wise men have spent all their lives. For, as he states, he was anxious to become the first warrior, the best orator, the bravest general, that the most important of all business should be entrusted to his charge, that he should enjoy the very highest honours, that he should possess consummate wisdom, that he should be regarded as the most distinguished senator, that he should by honourable means acquire a large fortune, that he should leave behind him many children, and that he should be the most illustrious person in the state. To refute this assertion, would be tedious and indeed unnecessary, seeing that it is contradicted more than sufficiently by the single fact, that Metellus passed his old age, deprived of his sight, which he had lost in a fire, while rescuing the Palladium from the temple of Vesta;381 a glorious action, no doubt, although the result was unhappy: on which account it is, that although he ought not to be called unfortunate, still he cannot be called fortunate. The Roman people, however, granted him a privilege which no one else had ever obtained since the foundation of the city, that of being conveyed to the senate- house in a chariot whenever he went to the senate:382 a great distinction, no doubt, but bought at the price of his sight.

(44.) The son also, of the same Q. Metellus, who has given the above account of his father, is considered himself to have been one of the rarest instances of human felicity.383 For, in ad- dition to the very considerable honours which he obtained, and the surname which he acquired from the conquest of Macedonia, he was carried to the funeral pile by his four sons,384 one of whom had been prætor, three of them consuls, two had obtained triumphs, and one had been censor; each of which honours falls to the lot of a very few only. And yet, in the very full-blown pride of his dignity, as he was returning from the Campus Martius at mid-day, when the Forum and the Capitol are deserted, he was seized by the tribune, Caius Atinius Labeo,385 surnamed Macerion, whom, during his censorship, he had ejected from the senate, and was dragged by him to the Tarpeian rock, for the purpose of being precipitated there from. The numerous band, however, who called him by the name of father, flew to his assistance, though tardily, and only just, as it were, at the very last moment, to attend his funeral obsequies, seeing that he could not lawfully offer resistance, or repel force by force in the sacred case of a tribune;386 and he was just on the very point of perishing, the victim of his virtues and the strictness of his censorship, when he was saved by the intervention of another tribune,—only obtained with the greatest difficulty,—and so rescued from the very jaws of death. He afterwards had to subsist on the bounty of others, his property having been consecrated387 by the very man whom he had degraded; and who, as if that had not satiated his vengeance, still farther wreaked his malice upon him, by throwing a rope around his neck,388 and twisting it with such extreme violence that the blood flowed from out of his ears.389 And for my part, too, I should look upon it as in the number of his misfortunes, to have been the enemy of the second Africanus; indeed, Macedonicus, in this instance, bears testimony against himself; for he said to his sons, "Go, my children, render the last duties to Scipio; you will never witness the funeral of a greater citizen than him;" and this speech he made to his sons, one of whom had already acquired the surname of Balearicus, and another of Diadematus,390 he himself at the time bearing that of Macedonicus.

Now, if we take into account the above injury alone, can any one justly pronounce that man happy, whose life was thus endangered by the caprice of an enemy, and that enemy, besides, not an Africanus? What victories over enemies could possibly be counterbalanced by such a price as this? What honours, what triumphs, did not Fortune cancel, in suffering a censor to be dragged through the middle of the city—indeed, that was his only resource for gaining time391—dragged to that Capitol, whither he himself, in his triumph, had forborne to drag in a similar manner even the very captives whom he had taken in his conquests? This crime, too, must be looked upon as all the greater, from its having so nearly deprived Macedonicus of the honours of his funeral, so great and so glorious, in which he was borne to the pile by his triumphant children, he himself thus triumphing, as it were, in his very obsequies. Most assuredly, there is no happiness that can be called unalloyed, when the terror of our life has been interrupted by any outrage, and much more by such an outrage as this. As for the rest, I really am at a loss whether we ought most to commend the manners of the age,392 or to feel an increased degree of indignation, that, among so many members of the family of the Metelli, such wicked audacity as that of C. Atinius remained unpunished.

CHAP. 46.—THE MISFORTUNES OF AUGUSTUS.

In the life of the now deified emperor Augustus even, whom the whole world would certainly agree to place in this class,393 if we carefully examine it in all its features, we shall find remarkable vicissitudes of human fate. There was his rejection from the post of master of the horse, by his uncle,394 and the preference which was given to Lepidus, and that, too, in opposition to his own requests; the hatred produced by the proscription; his alliance in the Triumvirate395 with some among the very worst of the citizens, and that, too, with an unequal share of influence, he himself being entirely borne down by the power of Antony; his illness396 at the battle of Philippi; his flight, and his having to remain three days concealed in a marsh,397 though suffering from sickness, and, according to the account of Agrippa and Mecænas, labouring under a dropsy; his shipwreck398 on the coast of Sicily, where he was again under the necessity of concealing himself in a cave; his desperation, which caused him even to beg Proculeius399 to put him to death, when he was hard-pressed by the enemy in a naval engagement;400 his alarm about the rising at Perusia;401 his anxiety at the battle of Actium;402 the extreme danger he was in from the falling of a tower during the Pannonian war403 seditions so numerous among his soldiers; so many attacks by dangerous diseases;404 the suspicions which he entertained respecting the intentions of Marcellus;405 the disgraceful banishment, as it were, of Agrippa;406 the many plots against his life;407 the deaths of his own children,408 of which he was accused, and his heavy sorrows, caused not merely by their loss;409 the adultery410 of his daughter, and the discovery of her parricidal designs; the insulting retreat of his son-in-law, Nero;411 another adultery, that of his grand-daughter;412 to which there were added numerous other evils, such as the want of money to pay his soldiers; the revolt of Illyria;413 the necessity of levying the slaves; the sad deficiency of young men;414 the pestilence that raged in the City;415 the famine in Italy; the design which he had formed of putting an end to his life, and the fast of four days, which brought him within a hair's breadth of death. And then, added to all this, the slaughter of Varus;416 the base slanders417 whispered against his authority; the rejection of Posthumous Agrippa, after his adoption,418 and the regret to which Augustus was a prey after his banishment;419 the suspicions too respecting Fabius, to the effect that he had betrayed his secrets; and then, last of all, the machinations of his wife and of Tiberius, the thoughts of which occupied his last moments. In fine, this same god,420 who was raised to heaven, I am at a loss to say whether deservedly or not, died, leaving the son of his own enemy his heir.421

CHAP. 47. (46.)—MEN WHOM THE GODS HAVE PRONOUNCED TO BE THE MOST HAPPY.

In reference to this point, two oracles of Delphi may come under our consideration, which would appear to have been pronounced as though in order to chastise the vanity of man. These oracles were the following: by the first, Pedius was pronounced to be the most happy of men, who had just before fallen in defence of his country.422 On the second occasion, when it had been consulted by Gyges, at that time the most powerful king in the world, it declared that Aglaiis of Psophis423 was a more happy man than himself.424 This Aglaiis was an old man, who lived in a poor petty nook of Arcadia, and cultivated a small farm, though quite sufficient for the supply of his yearly wants;425 he had never so much as left it, and, as was quite evident from his mode of living, his desires being of the most limited kind, he had experienced but an extremely small share of the miseries of life.

CHAP. 48. (47.)—THE MAN WHOM THE GODS ORDERED TO BE WORSHIPPED DURING HIS LIFE-TIME; A REMARKABLE FLASH OF LIGHTNING.

While still surviving, and in full possession of his senses, by the command of the same oracle, and with the sanction of Jupiter, the supreme Father of the gods, Euthymus,426 the pugilist, who had always, with one exception, been victorious in the Olympic games, was deified. He was a native of Locri, in Italy. I find that Callimachus,427 considering it a more wonderful circumstance than any he had ever known, that the two statues which had been erected to him, one at Locri, and the other at Olympia, were struck by lightning on the same day, ordered sacrifices to be offered up to him, which was accordingly done, both during his life-time, and after his death. Nothing, indeed, has appeared to me so remarkable, as this mark of approval given by the gods.

CHAP. 49. (48.)—THE GREATEST LENGTH OF LIFE.

Not only the differences of climate, but the multitude of instances named, and the peculiar destiny attached to each of us from the moment of his birth,428 tend to render one very uncertain in forming any general conclusion respecting the length and duration of human life. Hesiod, who was the first to make mention of this subject, while he states many circumstances about the age of man, which appear to me to be fabulous, gives to the crow nine times the ordinary duration of our life, to the stag four times the length of that of the crow, to the raven three times the length of that of the stag, besides other particulars with reference to the phœnix and the Nymphs of a still more fabulous nature. The poet Anacreon gives429 one hundred and fifty years to Arganthonius,430 the king of the Tartessii; ten more to Cinaras,431 the king of Cyprus, and two hundred to Ægimius .432 Theopompus gives one hundred and fifty-three years to Epimenides of Cnossus; according to Hellenicus, some of the nation of the Epii, in Ætolia, have completed their two hundredth year; and his account is confirmed by Damastes, who relates that Pictoreus, one of this nation, who was remarkable for his size and strength, lived even to his three hundredth year. Ephorus says that some kings of Arcadia have lived three hundred years; Alexander Cornelius, that there was one Dandon, in Illyricum, who lived five hundred years. Xenophon, in his Periplus, gives to a king of the island of the Lutmii six hundred years, and, as though in that instance he had lied too sparingly, to his son eight hundred.433 All these statements, however, have originated in a want of acquaintance with the accurate measurement of time. For some nations reckon the summer as one year, and the winter as another; others again, consider each of the four seasons a year; the Arcadians, for instance, whose years were of three months each. Others, such as the Egyptians, calculate by the moon, and hence it is that some individuals among them are said to have lived as many as one thousand years.

Let us proceed, however, to what is admitted to be true. It is pretty nearly certain, that Arganthonius of Gades434 reigned eighty years, and he is supposed to have commenced his reign when he was forty. Masinissa, beyond a doubt, reigned sixty years,435 and Gorgias, the Sicilian, lived one hundred and unwittingly the father of Adonis, by his own daughter Myrrha (or Smyrna), in consequence of the anger of Venus or Aphrodite. He was said to have founded the city of Cinyra in Cyprus. eight.436 Quintus Fabius Maximus was an augur for sixty- three years.437 M. Perperna, and more recently, L. Volusius Saturninus, survived all those whose suffrages each had solicited on the occasion of his consulship;438 Perperna lived ninety-eight years, and left after him only seven of those whose names, when censor, he had enrolled. Connected with this fact, it also suggests itself, and deserves to be remarked, that it has happened only once, that five successive years have ever passed without the death of a senator taking place; this was the case from the occasion on which the censors Flaccus and Albinus performed the lustration, in the year of the City 579, until the time of the succeeding censors.439. M. Valerius Corvinus completed one hundred years, forty-six of which intervened between his first and sixth consulship.440 He occupied the curule chair twenty-one times,441 a thing that was never the case with any one besides. The pontiff Metellus also attained the same age.442

Among women also, Livia, the wife of Rutilius, exceeded her ninety-sixth year; during the reign of Claudius, Statilia, a member of a noble family, died at the age of ninety-nine; Terentia, the wife of Cicero, lived one hundred and three years, and Clodia, the wife of Ofilius, one hundred and fifteen; she had fifteen children.443

Lucceia, an actress in the mimes, performed on the stage when one hundred years old, and Galeria Copiola returned to the stage, to perform in the interludes,444 at the votive games which were celebrated for the health of the deified Augustus, in the consulship of C. Poppæus and Q. Sulpicius.445 She had made her first appearance when eight years of age, just ninety-one years before that time, when M. Pomponius was ædile of the people, in the consulship of C. Marius and Cn. Carbo.446 When Pompeius Magnus dedicated his great theatre, he brought her upon the stage, as being quite a wonder, considering her old age. Asconius Pedianus informs us, that Sammula also lived one hundred and ten years. I consider it less wonderful that Stephanio, who was the first to dance on the stage in comedy descriptive of Roman manners, should have447 danced at the two secular games, those celebrated by the deified Augustus, and by Claudius Cæsar, in his fourth consulship, considering that the interval that elapsed between them was no more than sixty-three years;448 indeed, he lived a considerable time after the last period. We are informed by Mutianus, that, on the peak of Mount Tmolus, which is called Tempsis, the people live one hundred and fifty years, and that T. Fullonius, of Bononia, was set down as of the same age, in the registration which took place under the censorship of Claudius Cæsar; and this appeared to be confirmed by comparing the present with former registrations, as well as many other proofs that he had been alive at certain periods—for that prince greatly interested himself in ascertaining the exact truth of the matter.

CHAP. 50. (49.)—THE VARIETY OF DESTINIES AT THE BIRTH OF MAN.

The present conjuncture would appear to demand from me some opinion upon the science of the stars. Epigenes449 used to maintain that human life could not be possibly prolonged to one hundred and twelve years, and Berosus450 that it could exceed one hundred and seventeen. The system is still in existence which Petosiris and Necepsos451 transmitted to us, and called by them "tartemorion,"452 from the division of the signs into four portions; from which it would appear, that life, in the region of Italy, may possibly be extended to one hundred and twenty-four years They maintain that, reckoning from the commencement of an ascending sign, no life can possibly exceed a period of ninety degrees from that point; which periods they call by the name of "anaphoræ;"453 they say also, that these anaphoræ may be intercepted by meeting with malign stars or their rays even, or those of the sun.454 To theirs the school of Æsculapius succeeded, which admits that the allotted duration of life is regulated by the stars, but that it is quite uncertain what is the greatest extent of the period. These say that long life is uncommon, because a very great number of persons are born at critical moments in the hours of the lunar days; for example, in the seventh and the fifteenth hours, both by day and night; these individuals are subject to the malign influence of that ascending scale of the years which is termed the "climacteric,"455 and never hardly, when born under these circumstances, exceed the fifty-fourth year.

First of all, however, it must strike us that the variations which have taken place in this science prove its uncertainty; and to this consideration may be added the experience of the very last census, which was made four years ago, under the direction of the Emperors Vespasian, father and son.456 I shall not search through the registers;457 I shall only cite some instances in the middle district that lies between the Apennines and the river Padus. At Parma, three persons declared themselves to be one hundred and twenty years of age; at Brixellum,458 one was one hundred and twenty-five; at Parma, two were one hundred and thirty; at Placentia, one was one hundred and thirty; at Faventia, one woman was one hundred and thirty-two; at Bononia, L. Terentius, the son of Marcus, and at Ariminum, M. Aponius, were one hundred and forty, and Tertulla, one hundred and thirty-seven. In the hills which lie around Placentia is the town of Veleiacium,459 in which six persons gave in their ages as one hundred and ten years, and four one hundred and twenty, while one person, M. Mucius, the son of Marcus, surnamed Felix, and of the Galerian tribe,460 was aged one hundred and forty. Not, however, to dwell upon what is generally admitted, in the eighth region of Italy, there appeared by the register, to be fifty-four persons of one hundred years of age, fourteen of one hundred and ten, two of one hundred and twenty-five, four of one hundred and thirty, the same number of one hundred and thirty-five to one hundred and thirty-seven, and three of one hundred and forty.

Again, we have another illustration of the uncertain tenure of human life. Homer informs us that Hector and Polydamas461 were born on the same night,462 and yet how different was their fate! M. Cælius Rufus463 and C. Licinius Calvus were born on the same day, the fifth before the calends of June, in the consulship of C. Marius and Cn. Carbo; they both of them lived to be orators, it is true, but how different their destiny! The same thing, too, happens every day, and in every part of the world, with respect to men that are born in the self-same hour; masters and slaves, kings and beggars, come into the world at the same moment.

CHAP. 51. (50.)—VARIOUS INSTANCES OF DISEASES.

P. Cornelius Rufus,464 who was consul with M. Curio, lost his sight while he was asleep and dreaming that that accident had befallen him. On the other hand, Jason, of Pheræ, when he was labouring under an abscess and had been given up by the physicians, determined to end his life in battle, where he received a wound in the chest, and found, at the hands of the enemy, a remedy for his disease.465 Q. Fabius Maximus,466 the consul, having engaged in battle with the Allobroges and the Arverni, at the river Isara, on the sixth day before the ides of August, and having slain there one hundred and thirty thousand of the enemy, found himself cured, during the engage. ment, of a quartan fever.

This gift of life, which is bestowed upon us by nature, is extremely uncertain and frail, whatever portion of it may be allotted to us. The measure is, indeed, but scanty and brief, even when it is the largest, if we only reflect upon the extent of eternity. And then, besides, if we take into account our sleep during the night, we can only be properly said to live half the period of our life; seeing that just one half of it is passed, either in a state resembling death, or else of bodily suffering, if we are unable to sleep. Added to this, we ought not to reckon the years of infancy, during which we are not sensible of our existence, nor yet the years of old age, which is prolonged only for the punishment of those who arrive at it. There are so many kinds of dangers, so many diseases, so many apprehensions, so many cares, we so often invoke death, that really there is nothing that is so often the object of our wishes. Nature has, in reality, bestowed no greater blessing on man than the shortness of life. The senses become dull, the limbs torpid, the sight, the hearing, the legs, the teeth, and the organs of digestion, all of them die before us, and yet we reckon this state as a part of our life. The solitary instance of Xenophilus, the musician,467 who lived one hundred and five years without any infirmity of body, must be regarded then as a kind of miracle; for, by Hercules! all other men are subject, at certain fixed periods, to recurring and deadly attacks by heat or cold, in every part of the body, a thing that is not the case with other animals; and these attacks, too, return not only at regular hours, but on certain days and certain nights—sometimes the third day, sometimes the fourth, sometimes every day throughout the year.

And then, too, there is another kind of fatal disease, that which is produced by over-exertion of the mental faculties.468 Nature has appointed certain laws as well for our maladies; quartan fevers never commence at the winter solstice, nor yet during the winter months; some diseases never attack us after the sixtieth year; some again disappear at the age of puberty, especially in females;469 while aged persons are but seldom affected by the plague. There are some diseases which attack whole nations; others prevail among classes; some among slaves,470 others among the higher ranks, and others among other classes of society. It has been remarked, in reference to this subject, that the plague always takes a course from the south towards the west,471 and scarcely ever in an opposite direction; it never appears in the winter, or lasts longer than three months.

CHAP. 52. (51.)—DEATH.

And now to speak of the premonitory signs of death. Among these are laughter, in madness472 in cases of delirium,473 the patient carefully folding the fringe or the plaits of the bed- clothes;474 insensibility to the attempts of those who would rouse them from sleep; and involuntary discharges from the body, which it is not necessary here to particularize; but the most unequivocal signs of all, are certain appearances of the eyes and the nose, a lying posture with the face continually upwards, an irregular and feeble motion of the pulse,475 and the other symptoms, which have been observed by that prince of physicians, Hippocrates. At the same time that there are innumerable signs of death, there are none of health and safety; so much so, that Cato the Censor, when speaking to his son in relation to those who appear to be in good health, declared, as though it had been the enunciation of some oracle,476 that precocity in youth is a sign of an early death.477

The number of diseases is infinite. Pherecydes of Scyros died from vast numbers of worms issuing from his body.478 Some persons are distressed by a perpetual fever; such was the case with C. Mæcenas; during the last three years of his life, he could never get a single moment's sleep.479 Antipater of Sidon, the poet, was attacked with fever every year, and that only on his birthday; he died of it at, an advanced age.480

CHAP. 53. (52.)—PERSONS WHO HAVE COME TO LIFE AGAIN AFTER BEING LAID OUT FOR BURIAL.

Aviola,481 a man of consular rank, came to life again when on the funeral pile; but, by reason of the violence of the flames, no assistance could be rendered him, in consequence of which he was burnt alive. The same thing is said to have happened to L. Lamia, a man of prætorian rank. Messala, Rufus,482 and many other authors, inform us, that C. Ælius Tubero, who had filled the office of prætor, was also rescued from the funeral pile. Such then is the condition of us mortals: to these and the like vicissitudes of fortune are we born; so much so, that we cannot be sure of any thing, no, not even that a person is dead. With reference to the soul of man, we find, among other instances, that the soul of Hermotinus of Clazomenæ was in the habit of leaving his body, and wandering into distant countries, whence it brought back numerous accounts of various things, which could not have been obtained by any one but a person who was present. The body, in the meantime, was left apparently lifeless.483 At last, however, his enemies, the Cantharidæ,484 as they were called, burned the body, so that the soul, on its return, was deprived of its sheath, as it were. It is stated also, that in Pro- connesus,485 the soul of Aristeas was seen to fly out of his mouth, under the form of a raven;486 a most fabulous story, however, which may be well ranked with the one that follows. It is told of Epimenides487 of Cnossus, that when he was a boy, being fatigued by heat and walking, he fell asleep in a cave, where he slept for fifty-seven years; and that when he awoke, as though it had been on the following day, he was much astonished at the changes which he saw in the appearance of every thing around him: after this, old age, it is said, came upon him in an equal number of days with the years he had slept, but his life was prolonged to his hundred and fifty-seventh year.488 The female sex appear more especially disposed to this morbid state,489 on account of the misplacement of the womb;490 when this is once corrected, they immediately come to themselves again. The volume of Heraclides491 on this subject, which is highly esteemed among the Greeks, contains the account of a female, who was restored to life, after having appeared to be dead for seven days.

Varro informs us,492 that when he was one of the "viginti. viri," or twenty commissioners,493 appointed to superintend the division of the lands at Capua, a man who had been carried to the funeral pile, returned on foot from the Forum to his own house, and that the very same thing happened also at Aquinum. He states also, that Corfidius, who had married his maternal aunt, came to life again, after the funeral had been all arranged, and that he afterwards attended the funeral of the person who had so arranged his own. He gives in addition some other marvellous relations, the whole of which it may be as well to set forth; he says that there were two brothers, members of the equestrian order, and named Corfidius:494 it so happened that the elder of these was seen to breathe his last to all appearance, and on opening his will, it was found that he had named his brother his heir, who accordingly ordered his funeral. In the meanwhile, however, he who had been thought to be dead, clapping his hands,495 summoned the servants, and told them that he was just come from his brother's house, who had placed his daughter in his charge; in addition to which, he had mentioned to him the place where he had secretly buried some gold, and had requested that the funeral preparations which had been made, might be employed for himself. While he was stating to this effect, the servants of his brother came in the greatest haste, and informed them that he was dead: the gold too, was found in the place just as he had stated. But throughout the whole of our lives we are perpetually hearing of such predictions as these; they are not, however, worth collecting, seeing that they are almost always false, as we shall illustrate by the following remarkable instance.

In the Sicilian war, Gabienus, the bravest of all Cæsar's naval commanders, was taken prisoner by Sextus Pompeius, who ordered his throat to be cut; after which, his head almost severed from his body, he lay the whole of the day upon the seashore. Towards evening, with groans and entreaties, he begged the crowds of people who had assembled, that they would prevail upon Pompeius to come to him, or else send one of his most confidential friends, as he had just returned from the shades below, and had some important news to communicate. Pompeius accordingly sent several of his friends, to whom Gabienus stated that the good cause and virtuous partisans of Pompeius were well pleasing to the infernal deities, and that the event would shortly prove such as he wished: that he had been ordered to announce to this effect, and that, as a proof of its truthfulness, he himself should expire the very moment he had fulfilled his commission; and his death actually did take place.

We have instances also of men who have been seen after their burial; but, for the present, we are treating of the operations of nature, and not of miracles.

CHAP. 54. (53.)—INSTANCES OF SUDDEN DEATH.

Among the things that are looked upon as more especially singular, though of frequent occurrence, is sudden death, a thing that, in fact, is the greatest happiness of life, and, as we will shew, only a natural occurrence. Verrius has given many instances of it; we will limit ourselves by only making a selection. Besides Chilo, who has been already mentioned,496 Sophocles,497 and Dionysius,498 the tyrant of Sicily, both of them, died of joy, on learning that they had obtained the prize for tragedy. After the defeat at Cannæ, a mother died of joy, on seeing that her son had returned in safety, she having heard a false report of his death.499 Diodorus, the professor of logic,500 died of mortification, because he could not immediately answer some question which had been put to him by Stilpo, by way of joke.

Two of the Cæsars,501 one of whom was at the time prætor, and the other had previously discharged that office, and was the father of the Dictator Cæsar, died without any apparent cause, in the morning, while putting on their shoes; the former at Pisæ, the latter at Rome. Quintus Fabius Maximus died during his consulship, on the day before the calends of January,502 and in his place C. Rebilus got himself elected consul for only a few hours.503 The same thing happened also to the senator, C. Volcatius Gurges; these were all of them so well, and in such perfect health, that they were actually preparing to go from home. Q. Æmilius Lepidus,504 just as he was leaving his house, struck his great toe against the threshold of his chamber door. C. Aufustius, having gone from home, was proceeding to the senate-house, when he stumbled in the Comitium,505 and expired. Their ambassador, who had just been pleading the cause of the Rhodians in the senate, to the admiration of every one, suddenly expired at the door of the senate-house, just as he was about to retire. Cn. Bæbius Tamphilus,506 who had been prætor also, expired while he was enquiring of a boy507 what time it was: Aulus Pompeius508 died just after saluting the gods in the Capitol; and M. Juventius Thalna,509 the consul, while he was sacrificing. C. Servilius Pansa expired at the second hour of the day,510 while he was standing in the Forum, near a shop there,511 and leaning on the arm of his brother, Publius Pansa: the judge Bæbius, while he was giving an order for an enlargement of bail:512 M. Terentius Corax, while he was making an entry in his note-book in the Forum: only last year too, a member of the equestrian order at Rome, while whispering in the ear of a man of consular rank, before the ivory Apollo, in the Forum513 of Augustus;514 and, what is more singular than all, C. Julius, the physician, while he was applying, with his probe,515 some ointment to the eye of a patient. Aulus Manlius Torquatus, a man of consular rank, died in the act of reaching a cake at dinner; L. Tuscius Valla, the physician, while he was taking a draught of honeyed wine;516 Ap. Saufeius, while, on his return from the bath, after drinking some honeyed wine and water, he was swallowing an egg: P. Quinctius Scapula, while he was dining with Aquilius Gallus: Decimus Saufeius, the scribe, while he was breakfasting at his house. Corn. Gallus,517 who had filled the office of Prætor, and Titus Haterius,518 a man of equestrian rank, died in the venereal act; and, a thing that was especially remarked by those of our day, two members of the equestrian order expired in the embraces of the same actor of pantomimes, Mysticus by name, who was remarkable for his singular beauty.

But the most perfect state, to all appearance, of security from death, was that of which we have an account given by the ancients, in the case of M. Ofilius Hilarus. He was an actor, and after having been very greatly applauded by the people, was giving, on his birthday, an entertainment. During dinner he called for a cup of warm drink; at the same time, looking at the masque which he had worn during the day, he placed upon it the chaplet,519 which he had taken from his own head; and in that position he remained rigidly fixed, without moving, no one being aware of what had taken place, until the person who was reclining next to him reminded him that the drink was getting cold; upon which he was found to be dead.

These are instances of persons dying a happy death;520 but, on the other hand, there are innumerable cases also of unfortunate ends. L. Domitius,521 a member of a most illustrious family, having been conquered at Massilia by Cæsar, and taken prisoner by him at Corfinium, being weary of life, took poison; but, immediately after, he used every possible exertion to prolong his life. We find it stated in our Annals, that Felix, a charioteer of the red party,522 being placed on the funeral pile, some one of the number of his admirers threw himself upon the pile; a most silly piece of conduct. Lest, however, this circumstance might be attributed to the great excellence of the dead man in his art, and so redound to his glory, the other parties all declared that he had been overpowered by the strength of the perfumes. Not long ago, M. Lepidus, a man of very noble birth, who died, as I have stated above,523 of chagrin caused by his divorce, was hurled from the funeral pile by the violence of the flames, and in consequence of the heat, could not be replaced upon it; in consequence of which, his naked body was burnt with some other pieces of brushwood, in the vicinity of the pile.

CHAP. 55. (54.)—BURIAL.

The burning of the body after death, among the Romans, is not a very ancient usage; for formerly, they interred it.524 After it had been ascertained, however, in the foreign wars, that bodies which had been buried were sometimes disinterred, the custom of burning them was adopted. Many families, how- ever, still observed the ancient rites, as, for example, the Cor- nelian family, no member of which had his body burnt before Sylla, the Dictator; who directed this to be done, because, having previously disinterred the dead body of Caius Marius, he was afraid that others might retaliate on his own.525 The term "sepultus"526 applies to any mode whatever of disposing of the dead body; while, on the other hand, the word "humatus" is applicable solely when it is deposited in the earth.

CHAP. 56. (55.)—THE MANES, OR DEPARTED SPIRITS OF THE SOUL.

After burial come the different quiddities as to the existence of the Manes. All men, after their last day,527 return to what they were before the first; and after death there is no more sensation left in the body or in the soul than there was before birth. But this same vanity of ours extends even to the future, and lyingly fashions to itself an existence even in the very moments which belong to death itself: at one time it has conferred upon us the immortality of the soul; at another transmigration; and at another it has given sensation to the shades below, and paid divine honours to the departed spirit, thus making a kind of deity of him who has but just ceased to be a man. As if, indeed, the mode of breathing with man was in any way different from that of other animals, and as if there were not many other animals to be found whose life is longer than that of man, and yet for whom no one ever presaged anything of a like immortality. For what is the actual substance of the soul, when taken by itself? Of what material does it consist? Where is the seat of its thoughts? How is it to see, or hear, or how to touch? And then, of what use is it, or what can it avail, if it has not these faculties? Where, too, is its residence, and what vast multitudes of these souls and spirits528 must there be after the lapse of so many ages? But all these are the mere figments of childish ravings, and of that mortality which is so anxious never to cease to exist. It is a similar piece of vanity, too, to preserve the dead bodies of men; just like the promise that he shall come to life again, which was made by Democritus;529 who, however, never has come to life again himself. Out upon it! What downright madness is it to suppose that life is to recommence after death! or indeed, what repose are we ever to enjoy when we have been once born, if the soul is to retain its consciousness in heaven, and the shades of the dead in the infernal regions? This pleasing delusion, and this credulity, quite cancel that chief good of human nature, death, and, as it were, double the misery of him who is about to die, by anxiety as to what is to happen to him after it. And, indeed, if life really is a good, to whom can it be so to have once lived?

How much more easy, then, and how much more devoid of all doubts, is it for each of us to put his trust in himself, and guided by our knowledge of what our state has been before birth, to assume that that after death will be the same.

CHAP. 57. (56.)—THE INVENTORS OF VARIOUS THINGS.

Before we quit the consideration of the nature of man, it appears only proper to point out those persons who have been the authors of different inventions. Father Liber530 was the first to establish the practice of buying and selling; he also invented the diadem, the emblem of royalty, and the triumphal procession. Ceres531 introduced corn, the acorn having been previously used by man for food; it was she, also, who introduced into Attica the art of grinding corn532 and of making bread, and other similar arts into Sicily; and it was from these circumstances that she came to be regarded as a divinity. She was the first also to establish laws;533 though, according to some, it was Rhadamanthus. I have always been of opinion, that letters were of Assyrian origin, but other writers, Gellius,534 for instance, suppose that they were invented in Egypt by Mercury: others, again, will have it that they were discovered by the Syrians; and that Cadmus brought from Phœnicia sixteen letters into Greece. To these, Palamedes, it is said, at the time of the Trojan war, added these four, θ, ξ, φ, and χ. Simonides,535 the lyric poet, afterwards added a like number, ζ, η, ψ, and ω; the sounds denoted by all of which are now received into our alphabet.536

Aristotle, on the other hand, is rather of opinion, that there were originally eighteen letters,537 α β γ δ ε ζ ι κ λ μ ν ο π ρ ς τ υ φ, and that two, θ namely and χ, were introduced by Epicharmus,538 and not by Palamedes. Aristides says, that a certain person of the name of Menos, in Egypt, invented letters fifteen years before the reign of Phoroneus,539 the most ancient of all the kings of Greece, and this he attempts to prove by the monuments there. On the other hand, Epigenes,540 a writer of very great authority, informs us that the Babylonians have a series of observations on the stars, for a period of seven hundred and twenty thousand years, inscribed on baked bricks. Berosus and Critodemus, who make the period the shortest, give it as four hundred and ninety thousand years.541 From this statement, it would appear that letters have been in use from all eternity. The Pelasgi were the first to introduce them into Latium.

The brothers Euryalus and Hyperbius,542 were the first who constructed brick-kilns and houses at Athens; before which, caves in the ground served for houses. Gellius543 is inclined to think that Toxius, the son of Cælus, was the first inventor of mortar, it having been suggested to him by the nest of the swallow. Cecrops544 gave to a town the name of Cecropia, after himself; this is now the citadel of Athens. Some persons will have it, that Argos had been founded before this period by King Phoroneus; others, again, that Sicyon had been previously built; while the Egyptians declare that their own city, Diospolis, had been in existence long before them. Cinyra,545 the son of Agriopas,546 invented tiles and discovered copper-mines,547 both of them in the island of Cyprus; he also invented the tongs, the hammer, the lever, and the anvil. Wells were invented by Danaus,548 who came from Egypt into that part of Greece which had been previously known as Argos Dipsion.

The first stone-quarries were opened by Cadmus at Thebes, or else, according to Theophrastus, in Phœnicia. Walls were first built by Thrason;549 according to Aristotle, towers were first erected by the Cyclopes,550 but according to Theophrastus, by the Tirynthii. The Egyptians invented weaving;551 the Lydians of Sardis the art of dyeing wool.552 Closter, the son of Arachne, invented the spindle for spinning wool;553 Arachne herself, linen cloth and nets;554 Nicias of Megara, the art of fulling cloth;555 and Tychius, the Bœotian, the art of making shoes.556 The Egyptians will have it that the medical art was first discovered among them, while others attribute it to Arabus, the son of Babylonis and Apollo; botany and pharmacy are ascribed to Chiron, the son of Saturn and Philyra.557

Aristotle supposes that Scythes, the Lydian, was the first to fuse and temper copper, while Theophrastus ascribes the art to Delas, the Phrygian.558 Some persons ascribe the working of copper to the Chalybes, others to the Cyclopes. Hesiod says, that iron was discovered in Crete, by the Idæan Dactyli.559 Erichthonius, the Athenian, or, as some people say, Æacus, discovered silver.560 Gold mines, and the mode of fusing that metal, were discovered by Cadmus, the Phœnician, at the mountain of Pangæus,561 or, according to other accounts, by Thoas or Eaclis, in Panchaia;562 or else by Sol, the son of Oceanus, whom Gellius mentions as having been the first who employed honey in medicine. Midacritus563 was the first who brought tin from the island called Cassiteris.564 The Cyclopes invented the art of working iron.565 Choræbus, the Athenian, was the first who made earthen vessels;566 but Anacharsis, the Scthian, or, according to others, Hyperbius, the Corinthian, first invented the potter's wheel. Dædalus567 was the first person who worked in wood; it was he who invented the saw, the axe, the plummet, the gimlet, glue, and isinglass;568 the square, the level, the turner's lathe, and the key, were invented by Theodorus, of Samos.569 Measures and weights were invented by Phidon, of Argos,570 or, according to Gellius, by Palamedes. Pyrodes, the son of Cilix, was the first to strike fire from the flint, and Prometheus taught us how to preserve it, in the stalk of giant-fennel.571

The Phrygians first taught us the use of the chariot with four wheels;572 the Carthaginians the arts of merchandize,573 and Eumolpus, the Athenian,574 the cultivation of the vine, and of trees in general. Staphylus, the son of Silenus,575 was the first to mix water with wine; olive-oil and the oil-press, as also honey, we owe to Aristæus, the Athenian;576 the use of oxen and the plough to Buzyges, the Athenian,577 or, according to other accounts, to Triptolemus.578

The Egyptians were the first who established a monarchical government, and the Athenians, after the time of Theseus, a democracy. Phalaris,579 of Agrigentum, was the first tyrant580 that existed; the Lacedæmonians were the introducers of slavery;581 and the first capital punishment inflicted was ordered by the Areiopagus.582 The first battles were fought by the Africans against the Egyptians, with clubs, which they are in the habit of calling phalange. Prœtus and Acrisius583 were the first to use shields, in their contests with each other; or, as some say, Chalcus, the son of Athamas. Midias, the Messenian, invented the coat of mail, and the Lacedæmonians the helmet, the sword, and the spear.584 Greaves and crests were first used by the Carians; Scythes, the son of Jupiter, it is said, invented the bow and arrows, though some say that arrows were invented by Perses, the son of Perseus.585 Lances were invented by the Ætolians; the javelin, with the thong586 attached, by Ætolus,587 the son of Mars; the spear of the light infantry588 by Tyrrhenus; the dart589 by Penthesilea, the Amazon; the axe by Pisæus; the hunting-spear, and the scorpion to hurl missiles, by the Cretans;590 the catapulta, the balista,591 and the sling, by the Syrophœnicians.592 Pisæus, the Tyrrhenian, was the first to invent the brazen trumpet,593 and Artemon, of Clazomenæ, the use of the testudo.594 The batter- ing-horse, for the destruction of walls, which is at the present day styled the "ram," was invented by Epeus, at Troy.595 Bellerophon was the first who mounted the horse;596 bridles and saddles for the horse were invented by Pelethronius.597 The Thessalians, who are called. Centauri, and who dwell along Mount Pelion, were the first to fight on horse—Back. The people of Phrygia were the first who used chariots with two horses; Erichthonius first used four.598 Palamedes, during the Trojan war, was the first who marshalled an army, and invented watchwords,599 signals, and the use of sentinels. Sinon, at the same period, invented the art of correspondence by signals. Lycaon was the first to think of making a truce, and Theseus a treaty of alliance.

The art of divination by means of birds600 we owe to Car, from whom Caria derives its name; Orpheus extended it to other animals. Delphus taught us the art of divining by the inspection of entrails; Amphiaraüs601 divination by fire; and Tiresias, the Theban, presages from the entrails of birds. We owe to Amphictyon602 the interpretation of portents and of dreams, and to Atlas,603 the son of Libya, the art of astrology, or else, according to other accounts, to the Egyptians or the Assyrians. Anaximander,604 the Milesian, invented the astronomical sphere; and Æolus, the son of Hellen, gave us the theory of the winds.

Amphion was the inventor of music;605 Pan, the son of Mercury, the music of the reed, and the flute with the single pipe; Midas, the Phrygian,606 the transverse flute;607 and Marsyas, of the same country, the double-pipe.608 Amphion invented the Lydian measures in music; Thamyris the Thracian, the Dorian, and Marsyas the Phrygian, the Phrygian style.609 Amphion, or, according to some accounts, Orpheus, and according to others, Linus, invented the lyre.610 Terpander, adding three to the former four, increased the number of strings to seven; Simonides added an eighth, and Timotheus a ninth.611 Thamyris was the first who played on the lyre, without the accompaniment of the voice; and Amphion, or, as some say, Linus, was the first who accompanied it with the voice. Terpander was the first who composed songs expressly for the lyre; and Ardalus, the Trœzenian, was the first who taught us how to combine the voice with the music of the pipe.612 The Curetes taught us the dance in armour,613 and Pyrrhus, the Pyrrhic dance, both of them in Crete.

We are indebted to the Pythian oracle for the first heroic verse.614 A very considerable question has arisen, as to what was the origin of poetry; it is well known to have existed before the Trojan war. Pherecydes of Scyros, in the time of King Cyrus, was the first to write in prose, and Cadmus, the Milesian, was the first historian.615

Lycaon616 first instituted gymnastic games, in Arcadia; Acastus funereal games,617 at Iolcos;618 and, after him, Theseus instituted them at the Isthmus.619 Hercules first instituted the athletic contests at Olympia.620 Pythus invented the game of ball.621 Painting was invented in Egypt by Gyges, the Lydian,622 or, according to Aristotle, in Greece, by Euchir, a kinsman623 of Dædalus; according to Theophrastus, again, it was invented by Polygnotus, the Athenian.

Danaüis was the first who passed over in a ship from Egypt to Greece.624 Before his time, they used to sail on rafts,625 which had been invented by King Erythras,626 to pass from one island to another in the Red Sea. There are some writers to be found, who are of opinion that they were first thought of by the Mysians and the Trojans, for the purpose of crossing the Hellespont into Thrace. Even at the present day, they are made in the British ocean, of wicker-work covered with hides;627 on the Nile they are made of papyrus, rushes, and reeds.

We learn from Philostephanus, that Jason was the first person who sailed in a long vessel;628 Hegesias says it was Paralus, Ctesias,629 Semiramis,630 and Archemachus, Ægeon. According to Damastes,631 the Erythræi632 were the first to construct vessels with two banks of oars; according to Thucydides,633 Aminocles, the Corinthian, first constructed them with three banks of oars; according to Aristotle, the Carthaginians, those with four banks; according to Mnesigiton, the people of Salamis, those with five banks;634 and, according to Xenagoras, the Syracusans, those with six; those above six, as far as ten, Mnesigiton says were first constructed by Alexander the Great. From Philostephanus, we learn that Ptolemy Soter made them as high as twelve banks; Demetrius, the son of Antigonus, with fifteen; Ptolemy Philadelphus, with thirty; and Ptolemy Philopater, who was surnamed Tryphon, with forty.635 Hippus, the Tyrian, was the first who invented merchant-ships; the Cyrenians, the pinnace; the Phœnicians, the passage—Boat; the Rhodians, the skiff; and the Cyprians, the cutter.636

We are indebted to the Phœnicians for the first observation of the stars in navigation; the Copæ invented the oar, and the Platæans gave it its broad blade.637 Icarus was the person who invented sails,638 and Dædalus the mast and yards; the Samians, or else Pericles, the Athenian, transports for horses,639 and the Thracians, long covered vessels,640—Before which time they used to fight only from the prow or the stern. Pisæus, the Tyrrhenian, added the beak to ships;641 Eupalamus, the anchor; Anacharsis, that with two flukes; Pericles, the Athenian, grappling-irons, and hooks like hands;642 and Tiphys,643 the helm and rudder. Minos was the first who waged war by means of ships; Hyperbius, the son of Mars, the first who killed an animal; and Prometheus, the first who slew the ox.644

CHAP. 58. (57.)—THE THINGS ABOUT WHICH MANKIND FIRST OF ALL AGREED. THE ANCIENT LETTERS.

There was at the very earliest645 period a tacit consent among all nations to adopt the letters now used by the Ionians.646 (58.) That the ancient Greek letters were almost the same with the modern Latin,647 is proved by the ancient Delphic inscription on copper, which is now in the Palatine library, having been dedicated by the emperors to Minerva; this inscription is as follows:

ναυσικρατης ανεθετο τηι διος κορηι. ["Nausicrates offered this to the daughter of Zeus."]648

CHAP. 59. (59.)—WHEN BARBERS WERE FIRST EMPLOYED. 649

The next point upon which all nations appear to have agreed, was the employment of barbers.650 The Romans, however, were more tardy in the adoption of their services. According to Varro, they were introduced into Italy from Sicily, in the year of Rome 454,651 having been brought over by P. Titinius Mena: before which time the Romans did not cut the hair. The younger Africanus652 was the first who adopted the custom of shaving every day. The late Emperor Augustus always made use of razors.653

CHAP. 60.—WHEN THE FIRST TIME-PIECES WERE MADE.

(60.) The third point of universal agreement was the division of time, a subject which afterwards appealed to the reasoning faculties. We have already stated, in the Second Book,654 when and by whom this art was first invented in Greece; the same was also introduced at Rome, but at a later period. In the Twelve Tables, the rising and setting of the sun are the only things that are mentioned relative to time. Some years afterwards, the hour of midday was added, the summoner655 of the consuls proclaiming it aloud, as soon as, from the senate-house, he caught sight of the sun between the Rostra and the Græcostasis;656 he also proclaimed the last hour, when the sun had gone down from the Mænian column657 to the prison. This, however, could only be done in clear weather, but it was continued until the first Punic war. The first sun-dial is said to have been erected among the Romans twelve years before the war with Pyrrhus, by L. Papirius Cursor,658 at the temple of Quirinus,659 on which occasion he dedicated it in pursuance of a vow which had been made by his father. This is the account given by Fabius Vestalis; but he makes no mention of either the construction of the dial or the artist, nor does he inform us from what place it was brought, or in whose works he found this statement made.

M. Varro660 says that the first sun-dial, erected for the use of the public, was fixed upon a column near the Rostra, in the time of the first Punic war, by the consul M. Valerius Messala, and that it was brought from the capture of Catina, in Sicily: this being thirty years after the date assigned to the dial of Papirius, and the year of Rome 491. The lines in this dial did not exactly agree with the hours;661 it served, however, as the regulator of the Roman time ninety-nine years, until Q. Marcius Philippus, who was censor with L. Paulus, placed one near it, which was more carefully arranged: an act which was most gratefully acknowledged, as one of the very best of his censorship. The hours, however, still remained a matter of uncertainty, whenever the weather happened to be cloudy, until the ensuing lustrum; at which time Scipio Nasica, the colleague of Lænas, by means of a clepsydra, was the first to divide the hours of the day and the night into equal parts: and this time-piece he placed under cover and dedicated, in the year of Rome 595;662 for so long a period had the Romans remained without any exact division of the day. We will now return to the history of the other animals, and first to that of the terrestrial.

SUMMARY.—Remarkable events, narratives, and observations, seven hundred and forty-seven.

ROMAN AUTHORS QUOTED.—Verrius Flaccus,663 Cneius Gellius,664 Licinius Mutianus,665 Massurius Sabinius,666 Agrippina, the wife of Claudius,667 M. Cicero,668 Asinius Pollio,669 M. Varro,670 Messala Rufus,671 Cornelius Nepos,672 Virgil,673 Livy,674 Cordus,675 Melis- sus,676 Sebosus,677 Cornelius Celsus,678 Maximus Valerius,679 Trogus,680 Nigidius Figulus,681 Pomponius Atticus,682 Pedianus Asconius,683 Fabianus,684 Cato the Censor,685 the Register of the Triumphs,686Fabius Vestalis.687

FOREIGN AUTHORS QUOTED.—Herodotus,688 Aristeas,689 Bæton,690 Isigonus,691 Crates,692 Agatharchides,693 Calliphanes,694 Aristotle,695 Nymphodorus,696 Apollonides,697 Phylarchus,698 Damon,699 Megasthenes,700 Ctesias,701 Tauron,702 Eudoxus,703 Onesicritus,704 Clitarchus,705 Duris,706 Artemidorus,707 Hippocrates708 the physician, Asclepiades709 the physician, Hesiod,710 Anacreon,711 Theopompus,712 Hellanicus,713 Damastes,714 Ephorus,715 Epigenes,716 Berosus,717 Petosiris,718 Necepsos,719 Alexander Polyhistor,720 Xenophon,721 Callimachus,722 Democritus,723 Diyllus724 the historian, Strabo,725 who wrote against the Euremata of Ephorus, Heraclides Ponticus,726 Aclepiades,727 who wrote the Tragodoumena, Philostephanus,728 Hegesias,729 Archima- chus,730 Thucydides,731 Mnesigiton,732 Xenagoras,733 Metrodorus734 of Scepsos, Anticlides,735 Critodemus.736

1 We here enter upon the third division of Pliny's Natural History, which treats of Zoology, from the 7th to the 11th inclusive. Cuvier has illustrated this part by many valuable notes, which originally appeared in Lemaire's Bibliotheque Classique, 1827, and were afterwards incorporated, with some additions, by Ajasson, in his translation of Pliny, published in 1829; Ajasson is the editor of this portion of Pliny's Natural History, in Lemaire's Edition.—B.

2 This remark refers to the five preceding books, in which these subjects have been treated in detail.—B.

3 We have a similar remark in Cicero, De. Nat. Deor. ii. 47.—B.

4 Ajasson remarks, that trees have two barks, an outer, and an inner and thinner one; but seems to think that by the word "gemino" here, Pliny only means that the bark of trees is sometimes double its ordinary thickness.

5 It seems to have been the custom among the ancients to place the newborn child upon the ground immediately after its birth.

6 Pliny appears to have followed Lucretius in this gloomy view of the commencement of human existence. See B. v. 1. 223, et seq.

7 This term of forty days is mentioned by Aristotle, in his Natural History, as also by some modern physiologists.—B.

8 We may hence conclude, that the practice of swathing young infants in tight bandages prevailed at Rome, in the time of Pliny, as it still does in France, and many parts of the continent; although it has, for some years, been generally discontinued in this country. Buffon warmly condemned this injurious system, eighty years ago, but without effect.—B.

9 "Feliciter natus;" this appears so inconsistent with what is stated in the text, that it has been proposed to alter it into infeliciter, although against the authority of all the MSS.; but it may be supposed, that Pliny, as is not unusual with him, employs the term ironically.—B.

10 This reminds us of the terms of the riddle proposed to Œdipus by the Sphinx: "What being is that, which, with four feet, has two feet and three feet, and only one voice; but its feet vary, and where it has most it is weakest?" to which he answered, That it is man, who is a quadruped (going on feet and hands) in childhood, two-footed in manhood, and moving with the aid of a staff in old age.

11 He alludes to the gradual induration of the bones of the head which takes place in the young of the human species, and imparts strength to it. Aristotle, in his Hist. Anim., states the general opinion of the ancients, that this takes place with the young of no other class of animated beings.

12 There is little doubt that new forms and features of disease are continually making their appearance among mankind, and even the same peoples, and have been from the earliest period; it was so at Rome, in the days of the Republic and of the Emperors. It is not improbable that these new forms of disease depend greatly upon changes in the temperature and diet. The plagues of 1348, 1666, and the Asiatic cholera of the present day, are not improbably various features of what may be radically the same disease. At the first period the beverage of the English was beer, or rather sweet-wort, as the hop does not appear to have been used till a later period. At the present day, tea and coffee, supported by ardent spirits, form the almost universal beverage.

13 Pliny forgets, however, that infants do not require to be taught how to suck.

14 According to Cicero, this opinion was more particularly expressed by Silenus and Euripides. Seneca also, in his Consolation to Marcia, expresses a very similar opinion. It was a very common saying, that "Those whom the gods love, die young." It will be observed that Pliny here uses the significant word "aboleri," implying utter annihilation after death. It will be seen towards the end of this Book, that he laughed to scorn the notion of the immortality of the soul.

15 By the use of the word "luctus" he may probably mean "tears;" but there is little doubt that all animals have their full share of sorrows, brought upon them either by the tyranny and cruelty of man, or their own unrestrained passions.

16 This is said hyperbolically by Pliny. The brutes of the field have as strong a love of life as man, although they may not be in fear of death, not knowing what it is. That they know what pain is, is evident from their instinctive attempts to avoid it.

17 Under this name he evidently intends to include all systems of religion, which he held in equal contempt.

18 Ajasson seems to think that he alludes to man's craving desire for posthumous fame; but it is pretty clear that he has in view the then prevalent notions of the life of the soul after the death of the body.

19 Pascal has a similar thought; he says that "Man is a reed, and the weakest reed of nature." The machinery of his body is minute and complex in the extreme, but it can hardly be said that his life is exposed to as many dangers dependent on the volition of, or on accidents arising from, other animated beings, as that of minute insects.

20 Ajasson refers to various classical authors for a similar statement, It is scarcely necessary to remark, that it is contrary to many well-known facts.—B. The cravings of hunger and of the sexual appetite, are quite sufficient to preclude the possibility of such a happy state of things among the brutes as Pliny here describes.

21 It was this feeling that prompted the common saying among the ancients, "Homo homini lupus"—"Man to man is a wolf;" and most true it is, that "Man's inhumanity to man makes countless thousands mourn."

22 He alludes to the description already given in his geographical Books, of man taken in the aggregate, and grouped into nations.

23 These are less known, as being less easy of access to travellers, and it is accordingly in connection with these, that we always meet with the most wonderful tales.—B.

24 This feeling is well expressed in the old and hackneyedadage, "Omne ignotum pro mirifico"—"Everything that is unknown is taken for mar- vellous."

25 Cuvier remarks, that Pliny generally employs this kind of oratorical language when he is entering upon a part of his work in which he betrays a peculiar degree of credulity, and a total want of correct judgment on physical topics.—B.

26 Being debarred from holding converse, the first great tie of sociality.

27 Ajasson does not hesitate to style this remark, "ridiculum sane;" as every one knows that the Greeks were more noted for their lively imagination, than for the correctness of their observations.—B. Surely Ajasson must have forgotten the existence of such men as Aristotle and Theophrastus!

28 Pliny has previously denominated the Scythians "Anthropophagi;" and in B. iv. c. 26, and B. vi. c. 20, he employs the word as the proper name of one of the Scythian tribes.—B.

29 See B. iii. c. 9.

30 See B. xxxvi. c. 5.

31 There can be no doubt, that cannibalism has existed at all times, and that it now exists in some of the Asiatic and Polynesian islands; but we must differ from Pliny in his opinion respecting the near connection between human sacrifices and cannibalism; the first was strictly a religious rite, the other was the result of very different causes; perhaps, in some cases, the want of food; but, in most instances, a much less pardonable motive.—B, Still, however, if nations go so far as to sacrifice human beings, there is an equal chance that a religious impulse may prompt them to taste the flesh; and when once this has been done, there is no telling how soon it may be repeated, and that too for the gratification of the palate. According to Macrobius, human sacrifices were offered at Rome, down to the time of Brutus, who, on the establishment of the Republic, abolished them. We read, however, in other authorities, that in 116, B.C. , two Gauls, a male and a female, were sacrificed by the priests in one of the streets of Rome, shortly after which such practices were forbidden by the senate, except in those cases in which they had been ordered by the Sibylline books. Still we read, in the time of Augustus, of one hundred knights being sacrificed by his orders, at Perusia, and of a similar immolation in the time of the emperor Aurelian, A.D. 270. These, however, were all exceptional cases, and do not imply a custom of offering human sacrifices.

32 Pliny, in describing the Riphæan mountains, B. iv. c. 26, calls them "gelida Aquilonis conceptacula," "the cold asylum of the northern blasts;" but we do not find the cavern mentioned in this or any other passage. The name here employed has been supposed to be derived from the Greek words,γης κλειθρον, signifying the limit or boundary of the earth.—B. "Specuque ejus dicto," most probably means "the place called its cave," and not the "cave which I have described," as Dr. B. seems to have thought.

33 They are merely enumerated among other tribes of Scythians, inhabiting the country beyond the Palus Mæotis. See B. iv. c. 26, and B. vi. c. 19.—B.

34 The figures of the Gryphons or Griffins are found not uncommonly on the friezes and walls at Pompeii. In the East, where there were no safe places of deposit for money, it was the custom to bury it in the earth; hence, for the purpose of scaring depredators, the story was carefully circulated that hidden treasures were guarded by serpents and dragons. There can be little doubt that these stories, on arriving in the western world, combined with the knowledge of the existence of gold in the Uralian chain and other mountains of the East, gave rise to the stories of the Griffins and the Arimaspi. It has been suggested that the Arimaspi were no other than the modern Tsheremis, who dwelt on the left bank of the Middle Volga, in the governments of Kasan, Simbirsk, and Saratov, not far from the gold districts of the Uralian range.

35 It has been conjectured, that these fabulous tales of the combats of the Arimaspi with the Griffins, were invented by the neighbouring tribes of the Issedonæ or Essedones, who were anxious to throw a mystery over the origin of the gold, that they might preserve the traffic in their own hands. The Altai Mountains, in the north of Asia, contain many gold mines, which are still worked, as well as traces of former workings. The representation of an animal, somewhat similar to the Griffin, has been found among the sculptures of Persepolis, and is conceived to have had some allegorical allusion to the religion of the ancient inhabitants of the place. Ælian, Hist. Anim. B. iv. c. 27, gives an account of the Griffin, and its contests with the Indians, for the gold, similar to that here given.—B.

36 We have an account of the Arimaspi, and of Aristeas, in Herodotus, B. iv. cc. 13, 15, and 27. Most of the wonderful tales related in this Chapter may be found in Aulus Gellius, B. ix. c. 4. We have an account, also, of the Arimaspi in Solinus, very nearly in the words of Pliny. We have some valuable remarks by Cuvier, on the account given by Pliny of the Arimaspi and the Griffins, and on the source from which it appears to have originated, in Lemaire, vol. iii. p. 16, and Ajasson, vol. vi. pp. 164, 165.—B.

37 The modern Himalaya range.

38 Aulus Gellius relates this, among other wonderful tales, which are contained in his Chapter "On the Miraculous Wonders of Barbarous Nations," B. ix. c. 4. He cites, among his authorities, Aristeas and Isigonus, whom he designates as "writers of no mean authority."—B.

39 In B. iv. c. 26, and B. vi. c. 29.

40 One of the pleasures promised to the Gothic warriors, in the paradise of Odin, was to drink out of the skulls of their enemies.—B.

41 The variety of the human species to which the term Albino has been applied, from the whiteness of their hair and skin, is supposed by Cuvier to be more frequently found in the close valleys of mountainous districts, and may therefore have been very often met with in Albania, which is composed of valleys in the Caucasian range.—B.

42 "Tertio die;" literally, "on the third day." In reckoning the time between two periods, the Romans included both of those periods in the computation, whereas we include but one of them.

43 In countries where serpents abound, there have been, at all times, jugglers, who profess to have a supernatural power, by which they are rendered insensible to the poison of these animals. This is the case with the Egyptians, and some of the oriental nations. They remove the poison-fang from the serpent, and in this way render it perfectly harmless. Some of the feats which were performed by the magicians in the court of Pharaoh, seem still to be practised in Egypt; by pressing upon the upper part of the spine, the animal is rendered rigid, while on removing the pressure, the animal is restored to its original state. These jugglers were also in the habit, much to the surprise of the ignorant spectators, of sucking the poison from the wounds produced by the bite of the serpent, which they accompanied by various ceremonies and incantations: but it is a well-known fact, that this may be done with perfect safety, in reference to poisons of all kinds, provided there be no breach in the cuticle of the mouth or lips.—B.

44 See B. xxviii. c. 7. The best account, probably, of the Psylli, is that found in Lucan's Pharsalia, B. ix. c. 890, et. seq.

45 This custom is referred to by Lucan, in his account of the Psylli, B. ix. 1. 890, et seq.; and by Ælian, Hist. Anim. B. i. e. 57, and B. xvi. c. 27, 28.—B.

46 Herodotus, B. iv. c. 173, gives a somewhat different account; see also Aulus Gellius, B. xvi. c. 11, who follows the narrative of Herodotus. Gellius also gives an account of the Marsi, which is similar to that of Pliny.—B.

47 It is scarcely necessary to remark, that this alleged effect of the human saliva is without foundation. The saliva of a person who has fasted for some time, is still, in this country, a popular remedy for ophthalmia. It contains a greater proportion of saline matter than saliva under ordinary circumstances.—B.

48 The Nasamones have been enumerated among the inhabitants of the northern part of Africa, near the Greater Syrtis, v. 5. See also Herodotus, B. ii. c. 32, and B. vi. c. 172 and 190.—B.

49 Certain individuals are occasionally met with, whose generative organs exhibit an unusual formation, so as to give the idea of their uniting both sexes in the same person; and there are instances, where parts peculiar to both sexes actually appear to exist, but always in an imperfect or rudimentary state; all beyond this is undoubtedly fabulous. See Todd's Cyclop. of Anat. in loco.—B.

50 There are, at the present day, individuals among the negroes, who profess to have the power of enchantment, which, however, appears to consist in their possessing the knowledge of various poisons, which they not unfrequently administer, and by these means obtain great influence over the minds of the people.—B.

51 This power of the eye is referred to by Virgil, Eel. iii. 1. 103: "What eye is it that has fascinated my tender lambs?" The evil eye is still an article of belief in Egypt and in some parts of the East. Witchcraft, in various forms, was greatly credited in the most enlightened parts of Europe, not more than two centuries ago, and is not yet excluded from the vulgar creed.—B.

52 It is well known that nothing of this kind was ever observed in any human eye, nor have we any method of accounting for the origin of this singular notion.—B. Brand, in his Popular Antiquities, says that he has no doubt whatever that the common expression "no one can say 'black is my eye"' [or rather "black is the white of my eye"]—meaning that no one can justly speak ill of me, was derived from the notion of the An- chanting, or bewitching, eye. He quotes from Reginald Scott's "Discovery of Witchcraft:" "Many writers agree with Virgil and Theocritus in the effect of bewitching eyes, affirming ' that in Scythia there are women called the Bythiæ, having two balls, or rather blacks, in the apples of their eyes.' These, forsooth, with their angry looks, do bewitch and hurt, not only young lambs, but young children." See Brand's Popular Antiquities, vol. iii. pp. 44–46. See also Ennemoser's Hist. of Magic, vol. ii. pp. 160, 161. Bohn's Editions.

53 Some of the commentators have supposed, that Pliny, or Phylarchus, from whom he borrows, was misled by the ambiguity of the Greek term ἵππος, which signifies either a horse, or a tremulous motion of the eye. But, even admitting this to be the case, the wonder is scarcely diminished; for we have the double pupil in one eye, while this supposed tremulous motion is confined to the other.—B.

54 In all ages, it has been a prevalent superstition, that those endowed with magical qualities will not sink in water, encouraged, no doubt, by the cunning of those who might wish to make the charge a means of wreaking their vengeance. If they sank, they were to be deemed innocent, but were drowned; if, on the other hand they floated, they were deemed guilty, and handed over to the strong arm of the law. In reference to this usage, Brand says ("Popular Antiquities," vol. iii.), "Swimming a witch was another kind of popular ordeal. By this method she was handled not less indecently than cruelly: for she was stripped naked and cross bound, the right thumb to the left toe, and the left thumb to the right toe. In this state she was cast into a pond or river, in which, if guilty, it was thought impossible for her to sink."

55 This is probably the meaning of the word "tabem" here; though it may possibly signify "rottenness," or "putrefaction."

56 This remark is not contained in any of the works of Cicero now extant.—B.

57 Cuvier observes, that these people probably exercise some deception, analogous to that practised by a Spaniard, who exhibited himself in Paris, and professed to be incombustible, but who, eventually, was the dupe of his own quackery, and paid the penalty with his life. It would appear, that the Hirpi were not confined to one district, but dispersed over different parts of Italy. See the note of Heyne, on the prayer of Aruns, Æn. B. xi. 1. 785, et seq.-B.

58 Plutarch relates these supposed facts in his life of Pyrrhus; this statement may be considered analogous to what has been recorded in modern times, respecting the efficacy of the royal touch in curing certain diseases, especially what has been termed the "King's evil."—B.

59 Horace, Odes, B. i. O. 22, characterises the Hydaspes, a river of India, by the title of "fabulosus."—B.

60 See B. viii. c. 40.

61 Ælian, Hist. Anim. B. xvi. c. 11, and B. xvii. c. 26, refers to the large size of many of the animals of India; and in B. iv. c. 19, he especially describes the size and fierceness of the Indian dog.—B.

62 The Ficus religiosa of Linnæus, the branches of which have the property of taking root when they are bent down to the ground, and of forming new stems, which again produce other branches, that may be bent down in the same way, so as to cover an indefinite space.—B. More popularly known as the "banyan tree." See B. xii. c. 11.

63 The bambos arundinacea, or bamboo cane, is a reed or plant of the gramineous kind, which frequently grows to the height of the tallest trees. The stem is hollow, and the parts of it between the joints are used by the natives to form their canoes. We have an account of them in Herodotus, B. iii. c. 98.—B. See also B. xvi. c. 65 of this work.

64 It does not appear that the stature of the Indians exceeds that of the inhabitants of the temperate zones.—B.

65 Some practices very similar to these exist in certain parts of India, by the Fakirs, a peculiar class of devotees, and are regarded either in the light of religious ceremonies, or of modes of performing penance.—B.

66 Henderson states, in his "Biblical Researches," that there is a race of people found in the Caucasus, and known as the Ingusch, and that it is their belief that a race of dæmons exists, which assume the appearance of armed men, and have the feet inverted.

67 Cuvier remarks, that these wonderful tales are generally related of the inhabitants of mountainous districts, as being less known and less accessible to travellers.—B.

68 This account probably originated in a species of monkey, with a projecting muzzle, called, from this circumstance, "cynocephalus," or the "Dog's head." This account of the cynocephali is repeated by Aulus Gellius, B. ix. c. 4.—B. The cynocephalus is generally considered to be the baboon.

69 So called, ἀπὸ τοῦ μονοῦ κώλου, "from having but one leg." It is not improbable that these stories were first told of these nations from the resemblance of their names to the Greek words having these significations.

70 We have no method of explaining the origin of this story. It is to be regretted, that Pliny should have adopted so many ridiculous fables, on the doubtful authority of Ctesias.—B.

71 From σκιαπο̂υς, "making a shadow with his foot."—B.

72 Or "dwellers in caves."

73 It has been conjectured, that this account may have originated in the dwarfish stature and short necks of the northern tribes, according to the usual exaggerated statements of the ancient travellers. Aulus Gellius also repeats this fable, B. ix. c. 4.—B.

74 These are the great apes, which are found in some of the Oriental islands; this name was given them from their salacious disposition, which, it would seem, they have manifested in reference to even the human species. We have an account of the Satyrs in Ælian, Hist. Anim. B. xvi. c. 21.—B.

75 We may suppose that this description is taken from some incorrect account of a large kind of ape; but it seems impossible to refer it to any particular species.—B.

76 "Sparrow," or "ostrich-footed;" it does not appear that the commentators have attempted to explain this passage; may we not conjecture that it refers to the Chinese? With respect to the word employed, it has been generally derived from στρο̂υθος, "a sparrow;" Dalechamps, how- ever, as it would appear, with much plausibility, thinks that it is derived from "struthio," the ostrich.-B. It is not improbable, however, that these were so called, from the resemblance of their gait to that of a sparrow, as they would be unable to step out, and be obliged to jump from place to place.

77 Or "wandering tribes."

78 On this subject see B. vi. c. 20. It is clear that either silk or cotton is here alluded to.

79 In Eastern stories we find not uncommonly, wonderful effects attributed to the smell of the apple. See the Arabian Nights, passim

80 Cuvier remarks, that these accounts of the Struthopodes, the Scyritæ, and the Atomi, are not capable of any explanation, being mere fables.—B.

81 From τρεῖς, "three," and σπιθαμαὶ, "spans," the span being about nine inches English.

82 He alludes to the wars between the Cranes and the Pygmies in the Iliad, B. iii. 1. 3–6. Their story is also referred to by Ovid and Juvenal.

83 On the subject of the Pygmies, Cuvier remarks, "I am not surprised at finding the Pygmies in the works of Homer; but to find them in Pliny, I am surprised, indeed."—B.

84 Or the "long livers," from the Greek , μακρὸς, "long," and βιος, "life."

85 Of course, there is no truth in this statement; there are, no doubt, various circumstances in these countries favourable to longevity; but these are more than counter-balanced by certain peculiarities in their mode of life, and by the fatal epidemics to which they are occasionally subject.—B.

86 Pliny, in B. xxix. c. 38, speaks of the use of vipers' flesh as an article of diet, and gives some minute directions for its preparation. It was supposed to be peculiarly nutritive and restorative, and it has been prescribed for the same purpose by modern physicians. There is a medal in existence, probably struck by the Emperor Commodus, in order to commemorate the benefit which he was supposed to have derived from the use of the flesh of vipers.—B.

87 See B. ii. c. 75.

88 The cubitus and the palmus of the Romans, estimated, respectively, at about one foot and-a-half and three inches; this would make the height of these people eight feet.—B.

89 From the Greek γυμνητὴς, "one who takes much exercise of the body."

90 There appears to be no foundation for this statement.—B.

91 See B. vi. c. 35.

92 In many of the warmer climates, where the locusts are of large size and in great abundance, they are occasionally used as food; but we have no reason to believe that they constitute the sole, or even the principal article of the food of any tribe or people.—B.

93 In warm climates, the females arrive at maturity considerably earlier than in the more temperate regions, but the age here mentioned is an ex- aggeration. The female also, in such climates, ceases to bear at an earlier age, probably before the fortieth year.—B.

94 This is the Island of Ceylon, of which Pliny has given an account in the last Book, c. 24.

95 Such unnatural unions may have taken place occasionally, but nothing has ever been produced from them.—B.

96 This is a still greater exaggeration than that mentioned above, in Note 95.—B.

97 Cuvier remarks that this story must have been originally told with re- ference to the race of large apes. He says, however, that some men have the "os coccygis" greatly prolonged, and mentions a painter of celebrity in Paris who had this malformation. "But from this to an actual tail," says he, "the distance is very great." In these times we have the (perhaps doubtful) account by M. de Couret, of the Niam Niams, a race in Abyssinia or Nubia, with tails at least two inches in length. Few will fail to recollect Lord Monboddo's theory, that mankind originally had tails, but wore them off in lapse of time by climbing up the trees.

98 As far as there is any truth in this account, it must refer to certain kinds of apes: but with respect to the size' of the ears, it is, of course, greatly exaggerated.—B.

99 Or Cophes, see B. vi. c. 25.

100 There are many tribes who live on the sea-coast, and who inhabit a barren country, with a bad climate, whose diet is almost confined to fish and who feed their cattle on it. This is the case in some parts of Iceland, and even, to a certain extent, among the people of the Hebrides.—B.

101 Or dog's-headed ape, the baboon: see B. vi. c. 35, and Note 70, p. 130.

102 Perhaps these appearances may be referred to effects of what is termed "mirage," a phenomenon which is described by travellers in different parts of the torrid zone.—B. And in the temperate regions as well; Switzerland and the Hartz mountains, for instance.

103 Columella, B. viii. c. 8, speaks of the fecundity of the Egyptians, but without ascribing any particular cause for it.—B.

104 "Quinos." The old reading was "binos," "two" children only but Aristotle, in reference, no doubt, to the same circumstance, says, Hist. Anim. B, vii., "One woman, at four births, gave birth to twenty children. For she brought forth five at a time, and the greater part of them were reared."

105 It was a very general opinion, that the waters of the Nile possess the property of promoting fecundity. Seneca mentions it as an acknowledged fact, Nat. Quæst. B. iii. c. 25.—B.

106 There are well-authenticated accounts of four children having been produced at one birth; but, beyond this, we have no statements in which we can place much confidence. In a note by Dalechamps, we have an example of the credulity of the authors who have treated on this topic, as well modern as ancient.—B. In the recent volumes, however, of "Notes and Queries," we find some apparently well-authenticated cases of women being delivered of five children at a birth. Nathaniel Wanley, in his "Wonders of the Little World," also gives some apparently authentic instances of as many as five children being born at a birth: but we must be excused giving credit to the story, quoted by him, of Matilda or Margaret, Countess of Henneberg, who was said to have been delivered, on the Friday before Palm-Sunday, in 1276, "of 365 children, half sons and half daughters, with the exception of one, which was an hermaphrodite, all complete and well-fashioned, of the bigness of chickens new hatched, saith Camerarius."

107 From Hermaphroditus, the son of Hermes or Mercury, and Aphrodite or Venus. According to the poetic story as told by Ovid, Met. B. iv., he was united in one body, which bore the characteristics of both sexes, with the nymph Salmacis.

108 Two cases of this description are mentioned by Livy, B. xxvii. c. 37, and B. xxxi. c. 12. In this latter passage, Livy enumerates the following prodigious births; among the Sabines, two children of doubtful sex; at Frusino, a lamb with a sow's head; at Sinuessa, a pig with a human head; and among the Lucani, a foal with five feet. He informs us that the hermaphrodites were thrown into the sea.—B.

109 Cuvier says, "From time to time we do see persons of this nature; and it is not long ago that such a being was exhibited in Paris, though certainly not of a nature to have been ' in deliciis,' at the present day."

110 Pliny gives further particulars of this theatre in B. xxxvi. c. 24. It was the first stone theatre erected at Rome, and was built B.C. 55, and contained 40,000 spectators.

111 Solinus, the ape of Pliny, absolutely takes the meaning of this passage to be, that Eutychis herself was exhibited on the stage by the orders of Pompey.

112 For Tralles, in Asia Minor, see B. v. c. 29.

113 Cuvier speaks of the wife of a porter at the Jardin du Roi, at Paris, who, to his knowledge, had been the mother of thirty children.

114 It seems doubtful whether Pliny means that the statue of Alcippe was also to be seen in the Theatre of Pompey. Tatianus tells the same story of one Glaucippe, and it is not improbable that under that name he refers to the same person. He says that a bronze statue of her was made by Niceretus, the Athenian. Hardouin suggests that this is the story alluded to by Livy, B. xxvii., and by Valerius Maximus, B. i. e. 6, in their statement that, among other portents, a boy was born with the head of an ele- phant.

115 Cuvier remarks, that it is not an uncommon circumstance, both in man and in other animals, for an atrophy of the maxillary bones to cause the nose to sink down, and produce some resemblance to the trunk of an elephant. To this circumstance, he refers the tales met with, of women, sows, and dogs having produced elephants; see also Val. Maximus, B. vi. c. 5.—B.

116 As to this war, see B. ii. c. 85. The portents observed on this occasion were collected by the historian Sisenna, as we learn from Cicero, De Divin. B. ii.

117 We find that this incredible tale is not only told by Julius Obsequens, but, according to Dalechamps, by Cornelius Gemma, a comparatively modern writer.—B.

118 Cuvier remarks, that, in certain quadrupeds, individuals are occasionally born with the upper jaw preternaturally small, so much so, that the lower jaw, by its projection, bears some resemblance to a human chin. He had seen a case of this description at Geneva, in a calf, supposed, even by persons of information, to be the produce of an unnatural connection of a cow with a Savoyard shepherd. This subject is treated very philosophically by Lucretius, B. v. c. 876, et seq. With respect to the supposed Hippocentaur of Thessaly, Cuvier remarks upon the successive additions which the story had gained, in the writings of various authors. Cicero, in various parts of his writings, refers to the account of the Hippocentaur as a fabulous tale; Tusc. Quæst. B. i. e. 27; de Nat. Deor. B. ii. c. 38, and B. ii. c. 2; De Divin. B. ii. c. 21.—B.

119 Consuls A.U.C. 581.

120 See B. iii. c. 9. Hardouin remarks that Aulus Gellius, in copying from this passage, seems to have read the word "Casini," as though it were C. Asinü, meaning that the boy belonged to one C. Asinius. However, it is pretty clear that the reading adopted is the right one, Pliny having been careful to give the various localities at which these wonderful facts occurred.

121 Phlegon tells us that this happened in the first year of Nero, and that the name of the youth, while supposed to be a girl, was Philotis.

122 See B. v. c. 4, 5.

123 A case of this description is mentioned by Ambrose Paré. The individual was brought up as a girl, but, in consequence of a sudden muscular exertion, the organs of the male were developed, which had previously been concealed internally. It may be remarked, that a great proportion of the well-authenticated cases of a supposed change of sex have been from the female to the male, evidently of the kind mentioned by Paré, where the male organs have been concealed in childhood, and become subsequently developed. Cases, however, have occasionally occurred of the contrary kind, arising probably from the unusual size of the clitoris; there are also certain cases, where, from the malformation of the parts, the sex is actually doubtful, or where even a certain degree of the two may exist, as has been stated above, in Note 51 to Chapter 2. This paragraph of Pliny is quoted by Aulus Gellius, B. ix. c. 4.—B.

124 This does not correspond with the fact, as it exists in our time; a circumstance which may probably depend upon our improvement in the obstetrical art. Nor is the opinion, that both twins are less likely to live, if of different sexes, sanctioned by modern experience.—B.

125 "Feminas gigni celerius quam mares;" there has been much discussion among the commentators, both with respect to the meaning of these words, and the fact to which they are supposed to refer. Hardouin interprets the phrase, "crescere, perfici, vigere, adolescere;" Cuvier translates it, "les filles sont portées moins long-temps par leur mere." There is, however, no foundation for this opinion as to a difference in the period of the gestation.—B.

126 There may be some ground for this opinion; it is maintained by Aristotle in his Hist. Anim.—B. As also by Gale.

127 This statement is made upon the authority of Hippocrates, Aphor. B. v. c. 48, and Aristotle, Hist. Anim.; but is probably without foundation.—B.

128 Animals have a certain period for generation, because they are more immediately affected by the seasons, whereas, in the human race, the arts of life render these fixed terms unnecessary.—B.

129 Notwithstanding all the observations of the moderns, the question is scarcely decided respecting the length of time to which pregnancy may be prolonged. Cuvier says, that the experiments of Tessier have shewn, that there is a greater latitude in animals than had previously been supposed; he also remarks, that the same animals when domesticated, become less regular in this respect than in the wild state.—B.

130 Dalechamps has collected authorities to prove, that a child may survive, when born even at an earlier period; but this, although not absolutely impossible, is improbable in the highest degree.—B.

131 Ajasson expresses himself at a loss to identify this Pomponius; but thinks that it may have been either Julius Pomponius Græcinus, consul A.U.C. 759, or L. Pomponius, consul A.U.C. 794, A.D. 41.

132 Caius Caligula. The name of this woman, who was first his mistress and then his wife, was Milonia Cesonia. She was neither handsome nor young when Caligula first admired her: but was noted for her extreme licentiousness, and at the time when she first became intimate with Caligula, had already had three children. She and her daughter, by him, were put to death on the day on which he was murdered. Corbulo has been mentioned in B. vi. c. 8.

133 Celsus, B. ii. c. 1, speaks of the fortieth day, as one of the critical periods of childhood; the others are the seventh month, the seventh year, and the period of puberty.—B.

134 Who appears to have urged the great lapse of time that had intervened between the death of the alleged father and the birth of his opponent.

135 Questions of this nature, of great importance, involving property and title, have been the subject of judicial consideration in our times; the longest period to which pregnancy may be protracted seems still not to be determined, but the general result has been to shorten it. Aulus Gellius, B. iii. c. 16, has collected the opinions of many of the ancients on this subject.—B.

136 Most of the statements made in this Chapter appear to be taken from Aristotle's History of Animals; they are, however, either without foundation or much exaggerated, and very incorrect.—B.

137 This opinion, although without foundation, is supported by the authority of Hippocrates, Aphor. B. v. c. 42.—B.

138 This singular opinion is referred to by Aulus Gellius, B. iii. c. 16.—B.

139 Ælian, Hist. Anim. B. ix. c. 54, mentions the smell of an extin- guished lamp, as producing abortion in a mare.—B.

140 "Tinctoria mens;" there has been much discussion, whether the text does not require correction here; and various conjectural emendations have been proposed, but not with much success. If the word "tinctoria" was employed by Pliny, it may be regarded as one of those bold, and somewhat metaphorical expressions, which are not unfrequently found in his writings.—B.

141 Valerius Maximus makes the same statement as to the death of Anacreon, and says that "having lived to an extreme old age, he was supporting his decayed strength by chewing raisins, when one grain, more obstinate than the rest, stuck in his parched throat, and so ended his life." This story has been looked upon by some of the modern scholars as a fiction of the poets.

142 This explanation of the name is given by Aulus Gellius, B. xvi. c. 6. —B. It is very doubtful what are the roots from which it is formed; though Pliny evidently thinks that the word is only a corruption of the Latin "ægre partus," "born with difficulty;" a notion savouring of absurdity.

143 M. Vipsanius Agrippa, the son-in-law of Augustus, having married his dissolute daughter, Julia. He was the son of Lucius Agrippa, and was descended from a very obscure family. He divorced his wife Marcella, to marry Julia, the widow of Marcellus, and the daughter of Augustus, by his third wife, Scribonia.

144 Agrippina, the daughter of Agrippa and Julia, was the mother of the Emperor Caligula; and of a second Agrippina, who became the mother of Nero, by whose order she was put to death.—B.

145 Julia, the daughter of Augustus, so notorious for her depravity, who, as already stated, was the wife of Agrippa.—B. See c. 46 of the present Book.

146 From cædo, "to cut," apparently. The Cæsones were a branch of the Fabian family. There has been considerable difference of opinion among the commentators respecting the individuals referred to in this Chapter. The subject is discussed at length in the Notes of Hardouin, Lemaire, vol. iii. p. 62.—B. So in Macbeth, act v. sc. 7, Macduff says to Macbeth— "And let the angel whom thou still hast serv'd,
Tell thee, Macduff was from his mother's womb
Untimely ripp'd."

147 The commentators are not agreed respecting the origin of this name; Dalechamps suggests, that it was originally Opiscus, from ὀπίσθιον, "because one follows close upon another."—B.

148 Hardouin says, that this is the case with the hare and the dasypus, which is a species of hare; but there is probably no foundation for the statement. Pliny repeats it in a subsequent passage, B. viii. c. 81.—B.

149 Pliny evidently considers this a case of superfœtation, and looks upon it as not uncommon in the human species: whereas it is now considered impossible.

150 This refers to the mythological tale of Jupiter and Amphitryon.—B.

151 See B. v. c. 41.

152 Most of these statements appear to be taken from Aristotle, Hist. Anim.—B.

153 There has been much discussion respecting the meaning of this passage and the fact to which it refers. Aristotle, Hist. Anim., says, that marks made on the arm are transmitted for three generations; and Pliny, in B. xxii. c. 2, informs us, that the Daci and the Sarmatæ "make written marks upon their bodies." The same custom prevails among the lower orders, sailors especially, in our own times. We may also remark the analogy which it bears to the practice of tattooing, so general among the Polynesian and other barbarous nations.—B.

154 The reader may be amused by a perusal of the collection of wonderful cases of this kind, which has been made by Dalechamps; see Lemaire, vol. iii. p. 65, note 4.—B.

155 Aristotle, in his History of Animals, relates a similar, but not the same, story; he says that it occurred in Sicily, though he afterwards speaks of it as having happened in Elis. It is conjectured by Ajasson, that the individual might have been born in Sicily, and have exhibited himself in Elis, as a wrestler. If we are really to believe that his complexion was that of an Æthiopian, it is much more probable that his mother may have had connection with a negro.—B.

156 Few readers will fail here to recall to mind the story about the clock, in the opening chapter of "Tristram Shandy."

157 Dalechamps refers us to a remark of the same kind in Cicero, Tusc. Quæst. B. i. e. 80; but Ajasson remarks, that the resemblance mentioned by Cicero refers to the mind and manners, not to the body; Lemaire, vol. iii. p. 67.—B.

158 Aulus Gellius says, that he was one of the royal family.

159 This man resembled Antiochus III., surnamed the Great, to such a degree, that when that monarch had been slain in a tumult by his people, his wife, Laodice, daughter of Mithridates V., King of Pontus, put Artemon into a bed, pretending that he was the king, but dangerously ill. Many persons were admitted to see him; and all believed that they were listening to the words of their king, when he recommended to them Laodice and her children.

160 This circumstance is related by Valerius Maximus, but he speaks of Vibius as being "ingenuæ stirpis," "of good family."—B.

161 Hardouin expands the words "os probum," into "liberale, venustum, gratum, venerandum, probandum," B. xxxvii. c. 6.—B.

162 See B. xxxvii. c. 6.

163 The Latin word "strabo," means "squinting," or "having a cast" or "defect in the eye."

164 The word "mimus" was applied by the Romans to a species of dramatic performance, as well as to the persons who acted in them. The Roman mimes were imitations of trivial and sometimes indecent occurrences in life, and scarcely differed from comedy, except in consisting more of gestures and mimicry than of spoken dialogue. Sylla was very fond of these performances, and they had more charms for the Roman populace than the regular drama. As to the mime Salvitto, here mentioned, see B. xxxv. c. 2.

165 This anecdote, and the one respecting Spinther and Pamphilus, are mentioned also by Val. Maximus, B. ix. c. 24.—B.

166 A celebrated orator and satirical writer of the time of Augustus and Tiberius. He is mentioned in the Index of authors at the end of B. xxxvi., where he is called Longulanus, as being a native of Longula, a town of Latium. It was even thrown in his teeth, that he was the offspring of adultery, and that this low-born person was his father.

167 "Mirmillonis." Many of the editions make this word to be a proper name, and "Armentarius" to signify the calling of the person described, as being a herdsman. The "Mirmillones" were a peculiar class of gladiators, said to have been so called from their having the image of a fish, called "mormyr," on their helmets.

168 We assume the sestertium to be equivalent to somewhat more than eight pounds sterling; this sum will be about £1600.—B.

169 "Proscripter animus." According to Hardouin, this means "delighting in proscription," alluding to the well-known proscriptions of the triumvirate, in which Antony acted so conspicuous a part.—B.

170 This opinion is maintained by Hippocrates, and by Aristotle, Hist. Anim. B. vii. c. 8, and is referred to by Lucretius, B. iv. c. 1242, et seq.—B.

171 The case of Livia and that of Agrippina, referred to by Pliny, are mentioned by Suetonius, in the Life of Augustus, c. 63; and that of Caligula, c. 7.—B.

172 M. Junius Silanus, consul under Claudius, A.D. 46, with Valerius Asiaticus. He was poisoned by order of the younger Agrippina, that he might not stand in the way of Nero.

173 He is first mentioned in B.C. 168, when he was serving in the army of Æmilius Paulus, in Macedonia, and was sent to Rome with two other envoys to announce the defeat of Perseus. He united with the aristocracy in opposing the measures of the Gracchi; and the speech which he delivered against Tiberius Gracchus, is spoken of by Cicero m high terms, as replete with true eloquence.

174 He left four sons and two daughters; some writers say three. The ten individuals, over and above his children and grandchildren, may have consisted of the wives and husbands of his sons and daughters then living, as also of others who had died in his lifetime.

175 11th of April.

176 See B. iii. c. 8.

177 This fact is mentioned by Valerius Maximus, B. viii. c. 13. There is some variation in the spelling of the name of the son of Masinissa; Solinus calls him Mathumannus.—B.

178 Hardouin gives a detailed account of the children of Cato, by which it appears that the Licinian branch descended from the issue by his wife Licinia, and the Saloniani, of whom Cato of Utica was one, from his son Salonianus, by his second wife, Salonia.—B

179 Volusius Saturninus is again mentioned in the 49th Chapter, as a re- markable instance of longevity; also by Tacitus, B. xiii. c. 30.—B

180 This reading seems preferable to sixty-second, adopted by Sillig; as there would be nothing very remarkable in a man becoming a father when sixty-two years of age.

181 Some of the "simiæ " are subject to a periodical discharge, analogous to that of the human female; but, according to Cuvier, it is in smaller quantity, and not at stated periods. The females of various other animals, when in a state to receive the male, have a discharge from the same parts, but totally different in its properties, and the mode in which it makes its appearance. Virgil, Geor. B. iii. 1. 280, et seq., refers to this subject.—B.

182 Pliny makes some further remarks on these substances in a subsequent place, see B. x. c. 84; where he says they are produced without the intercourse of the male; this point has been much discussed, and is perhaps scarcely yet decided.—B.

183 There is no actual resemblance between moles and schirri; they are produced by different causes, and exist in different parts of the body. Moles are always formed in the womb, and probably have some connection with the generative functions; while schirri are morbid indurations, which make their appearance in various parts of the body. Hippocrates gives some account of moles, in his work on the Diseases of Women. They are also noticed by Aristotle.—B.

184 All the poisonous and noxious effects which were attributed by the ancients to the menstrual discharge, are without the slightest foundation. The opinions entertained on this point by the Jews, may be collected from Leviticus, c. xv. ver. 19, et seq. Pliny enlarges upon this subject in a subsequent place. See B. xxviii. c. 23.—B.

185 Both Josephus, Bell. Jud. B. iv. c. 9, and Tacitus, Hist. B. v. c. 6, give an account of this supposed action of this fluid on the bitumen of Lake Asphaltites; the statement is no doubt entirely unfounded, but it is a curious instance of popular credulity.—B.

186 There are still somewhat similar superstitions in existence, even in this country among others; it is not uncommonly believed that meat will not take salt from the hands of a female during the discharge of the catamenia.

187 This statement is without foundation.—B.

188 The fact is true, that females in whom the menstrual discharge does not take place, are seldom, if ever, capable of conception; but it does not depend on the cause here assigned. See the remarks of Cuvier, Lemaire, vol. iii. p. 82, and Ajasson, vol. vi. p. 173.—B.

189 Pliny clearly alludes to an opinion expressed by Galen, in which he says, "that if women while giving suck, have sexual intercourse, the milk becomes tainted." Hardouin remarks, that Pliny shows considerable caution here in bringing forward Nigidius as the propounder of these opinions, the truth of which he himself seems to have doubted.

190 It is generally admitted, that the female is more disposed to conceive just after the cessation of each periodical discharge. We are informed by the French historians, that their king, Henry II., and his wife Catharine, having been childless eleven years, made a successful experiment of this description, by the advice of the physician Fernel; see Lemaire, vol. iii. p. 83.—B.

191 This is one of the many idle tales referred to by Pliny, entirely without foundation.—B.

192 This account is correct, to the extent that the first teeth that appear are the two central incisors of the upper jaw; the next are the two lower central incisors, then the upper lateral incisors, the lower lateral incisors, and the upper and lower canines. The molars follow a different order, the lower ones appearing before the upper.—B.

193 Hardouin mentions a number of authors who relate cases of this nature. It is said to have taken place with our king Richard III. See Shakespeare, Richard III., Act i. Scene 4. An individual of very different character and fortune, Louis XIV., is said to have been born with two teeth in the upper jaw.—B.

194 A town of Latium we learn from Livy, B. i. c. 53, that it was captured and plundered by Tarquinius Superbus, but he makes no mention of Valeria. See B. iii. c. 9.

195 It is stated by Seneca, De Consol. c. 16, that Cornelia survived a large family of children, all of whom were carried off early in life; of these the two celebrated Gracchi, Tiberius and Caius, met with violent deaths. The peculiarity here referred to, probably consisted in an imperforated hymen, a mal-formation which not very unfrequently exists, and requires a surgical operation.—B.

196 This circumstance is mentioned by Val. Maximus, B. i. c. 8.—B. We learn from Plutarch, that the same was the case also with Pyrrhus, king of Epirus: Euryphæus also, the Cyrenian, and Euryptolemus, the king of Cyprus. Herodotus, B. ix., speaks of a skull found on the plain of Pla- tæa, with a similar conformation.

197 Although the teeth, and especially their enamel, form the most indestructible substance which enters into the composition of the body, it is not absolutely so; a certain proportion of them consisting of animal matter, which is consumed, when exposed to a sufficient heat; the earthy part may also be dissolved by the appropriate chemical re-agents.—B.

198 Powerful acids for instance; but they destroy the enamel. Lord Bacon recommends the ashes of tobacco as a whitener of the teeth; but that has been found to have a similar effect.

199 We find in Haller, El. Phys. B. ix. c. 2, 4, 8, and in other physiologists, a minute account of the effects produced by the teeth in the articulation of the various letters which compose the alphabet.—B.

200 See B. iii. c. 3, and B. iv. c. 35. He does not say how many teeth the Turduli naturally had, but no doubt he is mistaken.

201 Pliny repeats this statement in B. xi., c. 63, and extends it to the females of the sheep, goat, and hog. In the natural condition of the mouth, the number of the teeth is the same in both sexes; but, according to the observations of Cuvier, what are called the "wisdom" teeth, though occasionally deficient in both sexes, are most frequently so in the female.—B.

202 He seems to allude to the younger Agrippina, the mother of the emperor Domitius Nero; neither her life, her character, nor her ultimate fate seem, however, to have entitled her to be called a favourite of Fortune. Her mother, the first Agrippina, grand-daughter of Augustus, appears, on the other hand, to have been a woman of virtuous character, and spotless chastity, without a vice, with the exception, perhaps, of ambition.

203 See B. x. c. 10.

204 It was one of the tenets of the Stoics, that the world was to be alternately destroyed by water and by fire. The former element having laid it waste on the occasion of the flood of Deucalion, the next great catastrophe, according to them, is to be produced by fire. Pliny has previously alluded to this opinion, B. ii. c. 110.—B.

205 Cuvier remarks, that in the alluvial tracts throughout Europe, Siberia, and America, and probably also in other parts of the world, bones have been found, which have belonged to very large animals, such as elephants, mastodons, and whales; and when discovered, the common people, and sometimes even anatomists, have mistaken them for the bones of giants. He especially mentions the case of the bones of an elephant, found near Lucerne, in the sixteenth century, and supposed by Plater to have belonged to a man seventeen feet in height. Cuvier conceives that no man in modern times has exceeded the height of seven feet, and even these cases are extremely rare; for further information he refers to his Recherches sur les Ossemzens Fossiles. Some of the best authenticated facts of unusually tall men are in Buffon, Nat. Hist. vol. ii. p. 276, and vol. iii. p. 427.—B. The skeleton of O'Brien, in the Museum of the College of Surgeons, in London, is about seven feet and a half in height.

206 The story of the birth of Orion is beautifully told by Ovid, Fasti, B. v. 1. 493. et seq. He was often represented by the poets as of gigantic stature, and after his death was fabled to have been placed among the stars, where he appears as a giant. It is not improbable that, like the Cyclopes, Hercules, and Atlas, he may have been one of the earliest benefactors of mankind, and an assiduous improver of their condition; whence the story of his gigantic size.

207 A gigantic son of Poseidon or Neptune, and Iphimedeia, one of the Alöeidæ.

208 We have an account of this supposed discovery of the body of Orestes in Herodotus, B. i. c. 68, and a reference to it, with some pertinent remarks, in Aulus Gellius, B. iii. c. 10.—B.

209 Il. B. v. 1. 303, 4, B. xii. 1. 449: this opinion of Homer was adopted by many of the Latin poets; for example, by Virgil, B. xii. 1. 900; by Ju- venal, Sat. xv. 1. 69, 70; and by Horace, Od. B. iii. O. 6, sub finem.

210 Columella speaks of Cicero as mentioning this Pollio, and stating that he was a foot taller than any one else. It is most probably in Cicero's lost book, "De Admirandis," that this mention was made of him.

211 Hardouin supposes that this was not an individual name, but a term derived from the Hebrew, descriptive of his remarkable size.—B. He supposes also that not improbably this was the same individual that is mentioned by Tacitus, Annals, B. xii. c. 12, as Acharus, a king of the Arabians.

212 According to our estimate of the Roman measures, this would correspond to about nine feet four and a half inches of our standard.—B.

213 "Conditorio Sallustianorum." The more general meaning attributed to the word "conditorium," is "tomb" or burial-place. We learn from other sources that the famous "gardens of Sallust" belonged to the emperor Augustus, and it is not improbable that there was a museum there of curiosities, in which these remarkable skeletons were kept.

214 "Loculis." It is not quite clear whether this word has the meaning here of chest or coffin, or of a niche or cavity made in the wall of the tomb.

215 Among the objects of curiosity which were exhibited by Augustus to the Roman people, as related by Suctonius, c. 43, was a dwarf named Lucius, who is there described; but he would appear to be a different person from any of those here mentioned.—B.

216 Seneca also mentions him in his Consolation to Marcia, c. 23.

217 The procurator of a province was an officer appointed by the Cæsar to perform the duties discharged by the quæstor in the other provinces.

218 We have an ingenious dissertation by Ajasson, the object of which is to show, that the Tacitus here referred to, is not the historian, but his father, and consequently, that the boy prematurely born must have been the historian's brother, not his son.—B.

219 It is not clear whether Pliny intended to apply all these three observations to the female, or only the last of them; it appears, however, that the remark is, in either case, without foundation.—B. He appears to intend that his observations should apply more especially to the strength of the arm.

220 This is incorrect; the human body, after death, does not float until decomposition has commenced, when it becomes more or less buoyant, in consequence of the formation of gases, which partially distend the cavities; but we do not observe any difference in the two sexes in this respect.—B.

221 This statement is altogether incorrect.—B.

222 The total abstinence from liquids in dropsy, was a point much insisted upon by medical practitioners, even in modern times; but it is now generally conceived to have been derived from a false theory, and not to be essential to the cure of the disease, while it imposes upon the patient a most severe privation. A moderate use of fluids is even favourable to the operation of the remedies that are employed in this disease.—B.

223 From the Greek ἀγελαστὀς, "one who does not laugh." Cicero refers to this peculiarity in the character of Crassus, in his treatise De Finibus, B. v. c. 92; and in the Tusc. Quest. B. iii. c. 3, he informs us, on the authority of Lucilius, that Crassus never laughed but once in his life.—B. And then, on seeing a donkey eating thistles; upon which he exclaimed, "Similem habent labia lactucam," "Like lips, like lettuce."

224 "Without passion;" equivalent to our English word "apathetical."—B.

225 The daughter of M. Antony by Octavia. She was the mother of Germanicus Cæsar, and the grandmother of the emperor Caligula, whom she lived to see on the throne, and who is supposed to have hastened her death. She was celebrated for her beauty and chastity-a rare virtue in those days.

226 Pliny, B. xxxi. c. 45. says, that this state of the bones is found in fishermen, from their being exposed to the action of the sea and salt water; but both the fact and the supposed cause are without foundation.—B.

227 "Cornei."

228 It would appear that the Samnites were not only one of the most warlike people, with whom the Romans had to contest in the infancy of their state, but that they were particularly celebrated as gladiators.—B.

229 The gladiators, called Samnites, were armed with the peculiar "scutum," or oblong shield, used by the Samnites, a greave on the left leg, a sponger on the breast, and a helmet with a crest.

230 The term "nervus" was generally applied by the ancients to the sinews or tendons; they had a very indistinct knowledge of what are properly called the "nerves."—B.

231 Pintianus suggests another reading here, which would appear to be much more consistent with probability. "Inermi dextrâ superatum, et uno digito postremo correptum in castra," &c.—"Conquered him with the right hand, and that unarmed, and then with a single finger dragged him to the camp."

232 "Rusticellus."

233 Philonides has been already mentioned, B. ii. c. 73, as being in the habit of going from Sicyon to Elis in nine hours.—B.

234 We may consult the learned notes of Ajasson, Lemaire, vol. ii. p. 99, respecting the exact distances here indicated by Pliny. We may remark, that a stadium is about one-eighth of a mile, according to which estimate, Philippides must have gone 142 miles in two days, and the other 150 miles in one day; as it is implied, that these journeys were performed on foot, even the former of them is obviously impossible.—B. Query, however, as to this last assertion; according to recent pedestrian feats, it does not appear to be absolutely impossible.

235 See B. ii. c. 72.

236 This feat is no less incredible than those mentioned above.—B.

237 We have an account of this journey of Tiberius in Dion Cassius. Val. Maximus, B. v. c. 6, also enumerates this among the extraordinary examples of fraternal affection.—B. We learn also from Suetonius, that on learning the accident, a fall from his horse, which had happened to his brother Drusus, Tiberius took horse at Ticinum, and travelled night and day till he reached his brother, who was then in Germany, near the Rhine. He accompanied the body to Rome, preceding it on foot all the way. There is extant a "Consolation to Livia Augusta," written on this occasion, some have thought, by Pedo Albinovanus, but it is more likely to have been the work of Ovid.

238 This statement must have been in some of his lost works.

239 Pliny probably here refers to a passage in the Acad. Quæst. B. iv. c. 81, where Cicero speaks of a person who could see objects, it was said, at a distance of 1800 stadia, equal exactly to 125 miles.—B.

240 The actual distance between the promontory of Sicily and the nearest part of Carthage is between fifty and sixty miles. The acute vision of Strabo is mentioned by Val. Maximus, B. i. e. 8.—B.

241 See also B. xxxvi. c. 4. He was a Lacedæmonian sculptor, who, according to Athenæus, also executed embossed work on vases.

242 His works in ivory were said to have been so small, that they could scarcely be seen without placing them on black hair.

243 Cicero, Acad. Quæst. B. iv. c. 120, speaks of "one Myrmecides, a maker of minute objects of art;" Ælian, Vac. Hist. B. i. c. 17, also speaks of these minute performances of Myrmecides, and styles them "a waste of time." Pliny, in a subsequent part of his work, B. xxxi. c. 4, speaks of similar minute works, executed by these artists in marble; but the account which he gives is scarcely credible.—B.

244 See B. xxxvi. c. 5.

245 It would appear that there is a little confusion here of events. Sybaris, so noted for its luxury and effeminacy, was destroyed by the people of Crotona, under the command of the athlete Milo, B.C. 510. In B.C. 360, the Crotoniats were defeated at the river Sagras, by the Locrians and Rhegians, 10,000 in number, although they are said to have amounted to 130,000. Now it was on the occasion of this latter battle, that, according to Cicero, De Nat. Deor. B. ii., the noise was heard at Olympia, where the games were being celebrated. Be it as it may, the story is clearly fabulous. Evelyn is much more deserving of credit, where we find him stating in his Diary, that in his garden, at Say's Court, at Deptford, he heard the guns fired in one of our engagements with the Dutch fleet, at a distance thence of nearly 200 miles.

246 Ajasson discusses at some length, the possibility of the fact here mentioned, and concludes, that it is not to be credited: he estimates the distance between these two places at 120 miles.—B.

247 As to the miraculous annunciation of the victory of Marius and Catulus over the Cimbri, see B. ii. c. 58.

248 Meaning, thereby, the twin brothers, Castor and Pollux; who were said to have announced at Rome the victory gained the day before by Paulus Æmilius over King Perseus.

249 This circumstance is mentioned by Pausanias, in his Attica. She was an Athenian hetæra, or courtesan, beloved by Aristogiton, or, according to Athenæus, by Harmodius. On the murder of Hipparchus, the son of Pisistratus, she was put to the torture, being supposed to have been privy to the conspiracy; but she died under her sufferings without making any disclosure, and, according to one account, bit off her tongue, that no secret might be betrayed by her. The Athenians erected in her honour a bronze statue of a lioness (in reference to her name), without a tongue, in the vestibule of the Acropolis.

250 This story is related by Val. Maximus, B. iii. c. 3, it is also alluded to by Cicero, Tus. Quæst. B. ii. c. 22, and De Nat. Deor. B. ii. c. 33; but he only speaks of his tortures, without mentioning what Pliny states of his biting off his tongue.—B. He was a philosopher of Abdera, of the school of Democritus, and flourished about B.C. 340. Towards Alexander the Great, whom he accompanied into Asia, he acted the part of a base flatterer. He was pounded to death in a mortar, by order of Nicocreon, king of Cyprus.

251 This statement is also made by Val. Maximus, B. viii. c. 7. Xenophon, Cyropædia, B. v., speaks of the retentive memory of Cyrus, but considerably qualifies the account here given: he says that Cyrus knew the names of all his commanders or prefects, and of all those to whom he had occasion to give particular orders.—B.

252 This account is similar to that given by Val. Maximus, B. viii. c. 7, and by Aulus Gellius, B. xvii. c. 7. We have a learned dissertation by Ajasson, in which he discusses the possibility of one individual understanding so great a number of languages, as well as the question, whether it is possible that so great a number of languages were spoken by the subjects of Mithridates. His conclusions greatly tend to prove both these points; Lemaire, vol. iii. p. 295.—B.

253 This invention is referred to by Cicero, De Nat. Deor., B. ii. c. 86. Cicero also speaks of the remarkable powers of memory possessed by Charmidas and Metrodorus, De Oratore, B. ii. c. 88, and Tusc. Quæst. B. i. e. 24.—B.

254 Ajasson gives an account of some of the principal writers in what has been termed the science of Mnemonics, or artificial memory: he particularly commends the lectures of Aimé of Paris on the subject; Lemaire, vol. iii. p. 310, et seq.—B.

255 This circumstance is related by Val. Maximus, B. i. e. 8.—B.

256 This is not always the case. In dreams we often recollect past events and localities; we know in what part of the world we are, and even remember the substance of former dreams, and the fact that we have dreamt of a similar subject before.

257 The conqueror of Syracuse, and five times consul at Rome. He was born B.C. 268, and was slain in an engagement with Hannibal, B.C. 208, in the vicinity of Venusia.

258 Ajasson remarks concerning the number of battles in which Cæsar is said to have been engaged, that it has probably been much exceeded by some of the great warriors of later times. He says that an individual, "who was raised over our heads and over all Europe, and so reigned much too long," was personally engaged in nearly 300 battles.—B.

259 Who infested the coasts of Cilicia, and whom he dislodged from their strongholds, and almost utterly extirpated.

260 This fact is mentioned by Seneca, de Ira, B. ii. c. 26. Plutarch mentions a similar circumstance with respect to Pompey.—B.

261 Or Bacchus.—"Father Liber" is the name always given to him by Pliny.

262 "Magnus." Plutarch states, that, on his return from Africa, Sylla saluted him with the name of "Magnus," which surname he ever afterwards retained.—B.

263 Plutarch says, that the law did not allow a triumph to be granted to any one who was not either consul or prætor.—B.

264 Sertorius had joined the party of Marius and Cinna, in opposition to that of Sylla. He fled into Spain, and maintained the war successfully in that country, until he was treacherously assassinated by one of his supposed partisans. This may appear a sufficient reason for his not being mentioned by Pompey.—B.

265 "Toties imperator antequam miles." He had been raised to the highest rank without passing through the various gradations of military life.—B.

266 Speaking of this honorary crown, Pliny says, B. xvi. c. 4, "At the present day it is not given to the victor himself, but proclamation is made that he confers the crown upon his country."

267 It is noticed by the commentators, that Aulus Gellius, speaking of this building, calls it the Temple of Victory, B. x. c. 1; the error, it is supposed, may have arisen from Pompey having placed a statue of Victory in the Temple.—B.

268 29th of September.

269 Pliny, referring to these events, in a subsequent place, B. xxvii. c. 6, says that it took place "pridie Kalend. Octob. die natalis sui." Plutarch informs us, that the triumph lasted two days, a circumstance which may assist us in reconciling these dates. The same author gives a very minute detail of all the transactions here referred to.—B.

270 According to the chronology ordinarily adopted, this would be in the year of the City 692.—B.

271 By Asia, as we see from the geographical portion of this work, the ancients often designated not the large tract to which we now apply the name, but a comparatively small district lying on the east of the Ægean sea.—B.

272 See B. xiv. c. 5.

273 Val. Maximus adds, that he was the best lawyer of his time.—B.

274 We meet with a passage in Livy, B. xxxix. c. 44, illustrative of this view of Cato's character. In Cicero's treatise, De Senectute, where Cato bears a prominent part, frequent allusion is made to the strictness and even severity of his principles, although the general impression which we re- ceive of his character and manners is highly interesting, and, upon the whole, not unamiable.—B.

275 Plutarch says, that nearly fifty impeachments were brought against him, the last when he was eighty-six years of age.—B.

276 There has been considerable difficulty in ascertaining who was the individual here referred to; the subject is discussed at some length by Hardouin, who shows that it is probable, that it was Lucius Cæcilius, who was slain in a battle with the Gauls, A.U.C. 470, and in the consulship of Dolabella and Domitius.—B.

277 The name of this consul has been the subject of much discussion among the commentators. Livy, B. iii. c. 31, has been referred to, as calling him Atermius; but in some of the best editions, he is named Aterius. The tribunate of Dentatus took place A.U.C. 299, fifty-five years after the expulsion of the kings.—B.

278 When a Roman overcame an enemy with whom he had been personally engaged, he took possession of some part of his armour and dress, which might bear testimony to the victory; this was termed the "spolium." —B.

279 "Hasta pura;" these words, according to Hardouin, signify a lance without an iron head. We are told that it was given to him who gained the first victory in a battle; it was also regarded as an emblem of supreme power, and as a mark of the authority which one nation claimed over another.—B.

280 "Phaleris." These were bosses, discs or crescents of metal, sometimes gold, They were mostly used in pairs, and as ornaments for the helmet; but we more commonly read of them as attached to the harness of horses, and worn as pendants from the head, so as to produce a terrific effect when shaken by the rapid movements of the horse.

281 The "torques" was an ornament of gold, twisted spirally and bent into a circular form, and worn among the upper classes of the Persians, the Gauls, and other Asiatic and northern nations. They are often found both in France and Ireland, as well as in this country, but varying greatly in size and weight.

282 Golden "armillæ," or bracelets, were worn by the Gauls on the arms and the legs. The Sabines also wore them on the left arm, at the time of the foundation of Rome.

283 The word "fiscus" signifies a wicker basket or pannier, probably of peculiar construction, in which the Romans were accustomed to keep and carry about large sums of money. In process of time the word came to signify a treasure or money-chest.

284 We have nearly the same detail of the honours bestowed on Dentatus by Val. Maximus, B. iii. c. 2. Pliny again speaks of Dentatus, and the honours bestowed upon him, B. xxii. c. 5; and especially notices the "corona graminea," the grass or obsidional crown, as the highest of his honours. The different kinds of honorary crowns are very fully described in B. xvi. c. 3, 4, and 5; in B. xxii. c. 4, we have a particular account of the "corona graminea;" in c. 5, mention is made of its having been given to Dentatus, and, in the next, other individuals are enumerated to whom it had been presented.—B.

285 T. Romilius Rocus Vaticanus was consul B.C. 455. Having defeated the Æqui, and gained immense booty, instead of distributing it among the soldiers, he and his colleague sold it, on account of the poverty of the treasury. They were, in consequence, brought to trial, and Veturius was sentenced to pay 10,000 asses. He was, however, elected augur in 453, as some compensation for the ill-treatment he had experienced.

286 Livy, B. iii. c. 31, gives an account of the conviction of Romilius, but says, that it was effected by C. Claudius Cicero, the tribune of the people. To obviate the discordance in the names, some commentators have proposed to substitute the words "Lucio Siccio" for "Claudio Cicerone."—B.

287 We have an account of the victories, honours, and unfortunate fate of Manlius in Livy, B. vi. c. 14—20. In enumerating the honours conferred upon him, the numbers are given somewhat differently in c. 20; thirty spoils of enemies slain, forty donations from the generals, two mural and eight civic crowns.—B.

288 M. Sergius Silus. He was one of the city prætors B.C. 197.

289 Among the Jews and other nations of antiquity, it was considered an essential point for the priests to be without blemish, perfect and free from disease.—B.

290 In allusion to the compliment paid by the senate to the consul, M. Terentius Varro, by whose rashness the battle of Cannæ was lost. On his escape and safe return to Rome, instead of visiting him with censure, he received the thanks of the senate, "that he had not despaired of the republic."

291 It appears somewhat remarkable, considering the extraordinary acts of valour here enumerated, as performed by Sergius, that we hear so little of him from other sources.—B.

292 Hardouin takes the meaning to be, that though ill fortune overtook the Romans in their wars with Hannibal, nevertheless Sergius defeated Fortune herself, in dying before his country was overwhelmed by those calamities.

293 Pliny informs us, B. xiii. c. 1, that the art of making perfumes originated with the Persians.—B.

294 The city was taken by him by assault, and all its buildings, with the exception of the house of Pindar, levelled to the ground; most of the inhabitants were slaughtered, and the rest sold as slaves.

295 Stagirus, or Stagira, a town of Macedonia, in Chalcidice, on the Strymonic Gulf. It was a colony of Andros, founded B.C. 656, and originally called Orthagoria. It was destroyed by Philip, and, according to some accounts, was rebuilt by him, as having been the native place of Aristotle.

296 Archilochus of Paros was one of the earliest Ionian lyric poets, and was the first who composed in Iambic verse according to fixed rules. He flourished about 714—676 B.C. Pliny speaks here of his murderers; but it is generally stated by historians that he was murdered by one individual, by some called Calondas, or Corax, a Naxian, by others Archias.

297 We may here refer to some remarks by Hardouin and Ajasson on the actual sum obtained by Isocrates; Lemaire, vol. iii. pp. 126, 127.—B.

298 This anecdote is related by Cicero, De Oratore, B. iii. c. 56, and by Val. Maximus, B. viii. c. 10.—B.

299 This is rather a strong expression, and it is doubtful if the great historian at all deserves it. The facts of the case seem to have been as follow. Thucydides was employed in a military capacity, and was in command of an Athenian squadron of seven ships at Thasos, B.C. 424, when Eucles, who commanded in Amphipolis, sent for his assistance against Brasidas, who was before that town with an army. Fearing the arrival of a superior force, Brasidas offered favourable terms to Amphipolis, which were readily accepted, as there were but few Athenians in the place. Thucydides arrived at Eion, on the mouth of the Strymon, the evening of the same day on which Amphipolis surrendered: and though too late to save Amphipolis, prevented Eion from falling into the hands of the enemy. It was in consequence of this failure, that he became voluntarily an exile, perhaps to avoid the still severer punishment of death, which appears to have been the penalty of such a failure as that which he had, though unavoidably, committed. It is most probable that he returned to Athens about B.C. 403, the period of its liberation by Thrasybulus.

300 The following passage in Livy, B. vi. c. 34, may serve to illustrate this remark of Pliny:—"The lictors of Sulpicius, the military tribune, when he went home from the forum, knocked at the door with his staff, as the usual custom is."

301 Of Cyrene, the Academic philosopher. In B.C. 155, being then fifty- eight years old, he was chosen with some others to deprecate the fine of 500 talents which had been imposed on the Athenians for the destruction of Oropus. It was then that, in presence of Cato the Elder, he delivered his famous orations on Justice. The first oration was in commendation of the virtue, and on the ensuing day the next was delivered, by which all the arguments of the first were answered, and justice shown to be not a virtue, but only a matter of compact for the maintenance of civil society. The honesty of Cato was greatly shocked at this, and he moved the senate to send the philosopher back to his school, and save the Roman youth from his demoralizing doctrines. He lived twenty-eight years after this, and died at Athens B.C. 129, aged eighty-five, or, according to Cicero, ninety.

302 This is related by Plutarch, in his Life of Cato. His general dislike of the Grecian character is again mentioned, B. xxix. c. 7.—B.

303 See B. xxxiv. c. 19.

304 We have an account of this embassy in Plutarch. Pliny informs us, B. xxxiv. c. 20, that the only article which Cato retained, of the works of art that he brought from Cyprus, was the statue of Zeno, "not for its intrinsic merit, but because it was the statue of a philosopher." Valerius Paterculus, B. ii. c. 45, and Plutarch refer to this transaction.—B.

305 This circumstance is related by Valerius Maximus, B. viii. c. 14, and is referred to by Cicero in his defence of Archias, sec. 9.—B.

306 M. Varro, the philosopher, sometimes called "the most learned" of the Romans. His command under Pompey, in the war against the Pirates, has been already mentioned in B. iii. c. 16. He also served under him against Mithridates, and was his legatus in Spain, at the first outbreak of the civil wars.

307 Pliny refers to the same subject: in B. xxxv. c. 2, he speaks of Pollio as "qui primus, bibliothecam dicando, ingenia hominum rempublicam fecit"—"The first who, by forming a public library, made public property the genius of learned men." Aulus Gellius, B. vi. c. 18, informs us, that the first library, formed for the use of the public, was that collected at Athens by Pisistratus.—B. Ptolemy Philadelphus, the king of Pergamus, and Lucullus, had formed extensive libraries, but solely for their own use, and not that of the public.

308 Some of these are given by Val. Maximus, B. viii. c. 15.—B. It is very doubtful, however, if Greece did not greatly excel Rome in this respect.

309 Meaning Cicero, the orator and philosopher.

310 Cicero, in an Epistle to Atticus, B. ii. c. i., enumerates what he styles his consular orations: the total number is twelve, and among them we find all those here referred to by Pliny.—B.

311 The individual referred to is L. Roscius Otho; by his law the Roman equites, who, before this time, sat mingled with the people generally, had appropriate seats allotted to them. Cicero designates this oration, "De Othone."—B.

312 This title was bestowed upon him by the general acclamation of the people, at the end of his consulship. We have an account of it in Plutarch.—B.

313 This remark is not found in any of Cesar's works now extant.—B.

314 These terms signify "acute" and "judicious" they are derived respectively from "cautus " and "cor."—B.

315 Son of Damagetus, and one of the Seven Sages. He flourished towards the beginning of the sixth century B.C. Herodotus says that he held the office of Ephor Eponymus in Ol. 56. He was a man remarkable for his wisdom and his sententious brevity, so characteristic of his Spartan origin.

316 It appears somewhat doubtful to which of the Grecian sages the credit of this maxim is due.—B.

317 We have an account of Melampus, probably the same as the person here styled Melampodes, in Herodotus, B. ii. c. 49, and B. ix. c. 34; Ajasson, in Lemaire, vol. iii. p. 135, has given a list of writers who have referred to him as an eminent soothsayer. Pliny mentions him in a subsequent passage, B. xxv. c. 21, as celebrated for his skill in the art of divination.—B.

318 Marcius is said by Cicero, De Divin. B. i. c. 50, to have given his predictions in verses.—B.

319 We have an account of this in Livy, B. xxix. c. 14, and B. xxxvi. c. 40; it is also referred to by Valerius Maximus, B. viii. c. 15.—B.

320 In consequence of the number of eminent men who bore the name of Scipio, it is not easy, in all cases, to decide to which of them certain transactions ought to be referred. In this instance, it has been doubted, whether it was the same Scipio who was twice an unsuccessful candidate for the consulship, and who died in a foreign country. Livy, B. xxxv. c. 24, remarks, "P. Corn. Cn. F. Scipio" had been an unsuccessful candidate for the consulship; and afterwards, B. xxxix. c. 40, that "P. and L. Scipio" were unsuccessful candidates for the office of censor. Val. Maximus expressly states, B. v. c. 3, that it was Scipio Nasica, who, in consequence of the little estimation in which he was held by his fellow-citizens, went to Pergamus, and "lived there the remainder of his life, without feeling any regrets for his ungrateful country."—B.

321 We have this anecdote related by Valerius Maximus, B. viii. c. 15. He informs us, that it was the statue of Venus Verticordia which was ordered to be consecrated; the more readily to win the hearts of the maidens and matrons from wanton thoughts to a life of chastity.—B.

322 Her story is told at great length by Ovid, in the Fasti, B. iv. 1. 305, et seq. Her name was Claudia Quinta, and she is supposed to have been the sister of Appius Claudius Pulcher, and grand-daughter of Appius Claudius Cæcus. The vessel which was conveying the statue of Cybele from Pessinus to Rome having stuck fast on a shallow at the mouth of the Tiber, the soothsayers declared that none but a really chaste woman could move it. Claudia, who had been previously accused of unchastity, being in the number of the matrons who had accompanied Scipio to Ostia to receive the statue, immediately presented herself, and calling upon the goddess to vindicate her innocence, seized the rope, and the vessel moved forthwith. A statue was afterwards erected to her in the vestibule of the temple of the goddess.

323 Solinus and Festus differ somewhat from Pliny, in stating that it was her father whose life was thus saved by the affectionate daughter. Valerius Maximus, who tells the story, says that the family was "ingenui sanguinis," meaning "of genteel origin." Such families were, however, sometimes reduced, even among the Romans, to a level with the plebeian classes.

324 A.U.C. 604.

325 This theatre is again mentioned in B. xxxvi. c. 12. It was built of stone, and erected by Augustus in honour of his nephew Marcellus.

326 This is related by Valerius Maximus, B. v. c. 8, somewhat more in detail, and with a degree of animation, which is not frequently to be met with in that author.—B.

327 Cicero, De Divin. B. i. c. 18, Val. Maximus, B. iv. c. 6, and Plutarch, relate this more circumstantially. The serpents were of different sexes; if the male serpent was killed, his own death was to be the consequence; if the female, that of his wife, Cornelia.—B.

328 Pliny gives an account of the circumstances which attended the death of Lepidus, in the 54th Chapter. He was the father of the triumvir.—B.

329 Or Rutilius, consul B.C. 132, the year after the death of Tiberius Gracchus, whose adherents he prosecuted with the greatest cruelty. He also obtained a triumph for bringing to a conclusion the Servile war. He was an intimate friend of the younger Scipio Africanus, who obtained the consulship for him, but failed in gaining that honour for his brother Lucius. About the same period, he was condemned, in the tribuneship of Caius Gracchus, for his illegal acts in the prosecution of the adherents of Tiberius Gracchus. It has been suggested that this indignity may have had a greater share than the ill success of his brother in causing his death.

330 Pliny again speaks of the great talents of Hippocrates, B. xxvi. c. 6, and B. xxix. c. 2.—B.

331 We have an account of the origin of these games in Livy, B. xxix. c. 14.—B.

332 Cleombrotus is supposed to be the same person who is mentioned in B. xxix. c. 3, as Erasistratus, the grandson of Aristotle. From Suidas we learn that a near relative of his was called Cleombrotus, though, from his perplexed language, it is impossible to say whether father or uncle. The story to which Pliny is supposed here to refer is a curious one. Antiochus, the son of Seleucus Nicator, fell in love with Stratonice, whom his father had married in his old age, but struggled to conceal his passion. The skilful physician discovered the nature of his disease; upon which he reported to Seleucus that it was incurable, for that he was in love, and it was impossible that his passion could be gratified. The king, greatly surprised, inquired who the lady was; to which Erasistratus replied that it was his own wife; whereupon Seleucus began to try and persuade him to give her up to his son. The physician upon this asked him if he would do so himself, if it were his own wife. Seleucus declared that he would; upon which Erasistratus disclosed to him the truth. Seleucus not only gave up Stratonice to his son, but resigned to him several provinces. Erasistratus was one of the most famous physicians and anatomists of antiquity.

333 It was on this occasion that a label was said to have been fastened on the arrow, inscribed, "To Philip's right eye." The inhabitants were permitted to depart, however, when the city was taken, with one garment to each person.

334 This accident occurred to Philip, at the siege of Methone, of which we have a brief account in Diodorus Siculus, B. xvi. c. 7, and in Justin, B. vii. c. 6; but neither of these authors makes any mention of Critobulus. Quintus Curtius, B. ix. c. 5, informs us, that Critobulus exhibited great skill in relieving Alexander the Great from the effects of a dangerous wound, which he received in India; but he does not refer to the fact here mentioned.—B.

335 At the present day, this mode of treatment would have figured as the wine-cure."

336 See B. xxvi. c. 8.

337 Pliny again speaks of Asclepiades, in B. xxvi. c. 7, and B. xxix. c. 5. The anecdote respecting the man who was saved from the funeral pile is referred to by Celsus, B. ii. c. 6.—B. Pliny says, in B. xxvi. c. 7, that Asclepiades first came to Rome as a teacher of rhetoric, and that being unsuccessful, he turned his attention to medicine. Bruce, the Abyssinian traveller, also met his death by falling down stairs. Rabelais, in the prologue to his Fourth Book, refers to this peculiar death of Asclepiades.

338 This is related more at large by Val. Maximus, B. viii. c. 7, and by Plutarch.—B.

339 Mentioned in B. xxxvi. c. 31.

340 Val. Maximus refers to Philon and his public works, in B. viii. c. 12. —B. He was an architect of eminence in the reign of the successors of Alexander. He built for Demetrius Phalereus, about B.C. 318, the portico of twelve Doric columns to the great temple at Eleusis. He also formed a basin in the Piræus, which was destroyed at the taking of Athens by the Romans under Sylla.

341 See B. v. c. 11, and B. xxxiv. c. 42.

342 Plutarch, in his life of Alexander, mentions the restriction made in favour of Lysippus, but does not extend it to Apelles; he does not speak of Pyrgoteles. We have an apposite allusion to this circumstance by Horace, Ep. B. i. 1. 239, 240. Boileau has elegantly imitated Horace, in his "Discours au Roi."—B. For further particulars of him, see B. xxxiv. c. 17 and 19. He was a native of Sicyon, and at first a simple worker in bronze, but eventually obtained the highest rank among the Grecian statuaries.

343 According to the usual estimate of the value of the Attic talent, £193 12s., the sum given for this picture would be about £19,000.—B.

344 Nearly all the topics here treated of are again mentioned in B. xxxv., which is devoted to the fine arts. The 34th, 35th, and 36th Chapters of that Book, contain an account of all the celebrated painters of antiquity, and their principal works.—B.

345 Between £15,000 and £16,000.—B.

346 "Polioreetes."

347 We have a further account of this artist in B. xxxiv. c. 19, B. xxxv. c. 39 and 40, and B. xxxvi. c. 4.

348 This is referred to by Pliny, B. xxxvi. c. 4, and by Valerius Maximus, B. viii. c. 4.—B.

349 He is again mentioned in B. xxxiv. c. 19, B. xxxv. c. 34, and B. xxxvi. c. 4.—B.

350 Mentor is noticed for his skill in carving, B. xxxiii. c. 55.—B. Littré says, on referring to that passage, "we find that he was a worker in silver, and a maker of vases of great value." He seems disinclined to believe that he was a statuary. As Pliny tells us, ubi supra, none of his public works were in existence in Pliny's time. Some small cups, however, existed, which were highly prized, though some were undoubtedly spurious.

351 Now Pesaro.

352 We have the same difficulty in ascertaining the sums here mentioned, as in all former cases. Holland estimates the sum given for Daphnus at 300,700 sesterces, vol. i. p. 175.—B.

353 "Dispensator;" we have an explanation of this term, B. xxxiii. c. 13.—B.

354 Holland estimates the sum paid for the enfranchisement of this man at 120,000 sesterces, vol. i. p. 175.—B.

355 In his capacity, probably, of contractor for provisions and stores.

356 Holland estimates the price paid on this occasion at 3,500 sesterces, ubi supra, thus differing exceedingly from Ajasson's estimate.—B.

357 "Quam quidam injuriam lucri fecit ille mercatus in luctu civitatis, quoniam arguere nulli vacabat." We can see the meaning of this passage, but a literal translation of it, as it stands, is out of the question.

358 "Virtus"—"manliness," that being esteemed by the Romans the ideal of true virtue.

359 It appears that a similar custom prevailed among the Scythians, according to Phylarchus, from whom Pliny probably took his account of it; Lemaire, vol. iii. p. 151.

360 As being fraught with an intensity of pain, which no number of days passed in pleasure can compensate.

361 She was the daughter of Leotychides, and the wife of Archidamas, and mother of Ægis. Ajasson expresses his surprise, that so diligent a collector of facts as Pliny, should have been acquainted with only one example of this kind.—B. " The following are additional instances collected by Ajasson :-1. Olympias, daughter of Neoptolemus, king of Epirus, wife of Philip II., king of Macedon, and mother of Alexander the Great, kind. of Macedon. 2. Roxana, daughter of king Darius Codomannus, and wife of Alexander the Great; her son by whom was proclaimed king by certain generals of Alexander, but was shortly after slain at Amphipolis. 3. Laodice the Younger, daughter of king Antiochus Soter, sister and wife of Antiochus Theös, and mother of king Seleucus Callinicus. 4. Berenice, daughter of king Ptolemy Philadelphus; married to her brother king Ptolemy Euergetes, and mother of Ptolemy Philopater, by whom she was put to death. 5. Cleopatra, daughter of Antiochus the Great, king of Syria: she became the wife of king Ptolemy Epiphanes, and was mother of king Ptolemy Philometor. 6. Cleopatra Cocce, daughter of Ptolemy Philometor, married her uncle, king Ptolemy Physcon, and became mother of kings Ptolemy Lathyrus and Alexander I. 7. Cleopatra, another daughter of Ptolemy Philometor, married first to Alexander Balas, the usurper of the throne of Scythia, then to king Demetrius Nicator, and then to Antiochus Venator. Her sons by Nicator were Seleucus V. and Antiochus Gryphus, both of whom became kings of Syria; and her son Cyzicenius by Antiochus Venator, likewise became king of Syria. 8. Selene or Cleo- patra, daughter of king Ptolemy Physcon, was married, first, to king Ptolemy Lathyrus, secondly, to king Antiochus Gryphus, and thirdly, to king Antiochus Eusebes. She was mother of king Antiochus Asiaticus. In all, she had nine kings as her near relations or connections. 9. Stratoniee, daughter of king Demetrius Poliorcetes, was married first to king Seleucus Nicator, and then to king Antiochus Soter, and was mother of king Antiochus Therös.

362 Val. Maximus, B. viii. c. 15, gives nearly the same account of a person whom he calls Pherenice; from the resemblance of the names, it has been supposed, that they may both refer to the same individual.—B.

363 He alludes to the three persons, father, son, and grandson, known by the name of C. Scribonius Curio. The first was prætor B.C. 121, one of the most distinguished orators of his time. His son, who acquired some reputation as an orator, was tribune of the people B.C. 90, prætor B.C. 82, and consul in B.C. 76, with Cn. Octavius. He is represented as being possessed of great eloquence, and of extreme purity and brilliancy of diction, but to have had none of the other requisites of an orator. Like his son, he enjoyed the friendship of Cicero. The younger Curio was an orator of great talents, which, from want of industry, he left uncultivated. Cicero endeavoured to direct his talents into a proper channel, but all in vain, and he remained to the end a man of worthless and profligate character. He was married to Fulvia, who afterwards became the wife of Antony.

364 Hardouin observes, that M. Fabius Ambustus was three times consul, Quintus Fabius Rullianus five times, and Q. Fabius Gurges three times.—B.

365 We have a similar account of the fate of Fidustius in Dion Cassius, by whom he is named Filuscius.—B. He was at length slain by order of Antony.

366 We have an account of the vicissitudes in the life of Ventidius Bassus in A. Gellius, B. xv. c. 4, and in Valerius Paterculus, B. ii. c. 65. We learn from these writers, that Ventidius was a native of Picenum, and that, when that city was taken by Cneius Pompeius, in the Social war, Ventidius, then an infant, was carried in his mother's arms, before the car of the conqueror.—B.

367 The passage of Cicero referred to, occurs in a letter to Plancus, Ep. ad Fam. B. x. Ep. 18, where, speaking of Ventidius, who had united himself to the party of Antony, he says, "And I look down upon the camp of the mule-driver, Ventidius."

368 "Caliga." A strong heavy sandal worn by the Roman soldiers and centurions; but not by the superior officers. The term "a caligâ," therefore, had the same meaning as our expression, "from the ranks." The Emperor Caligula received that surname when a boy, in consequence of wearing the caliga, and being inured to the life of a common soldier.

369 In the year A.U.C. 704.

370 He was a native of Gades, in Spain. A party of the Roman nobles induced an inhabitant of Gades to accuse him of having illegally assumed the privileges of a Roman citizen. The cause was tried B.C. 55, and he was supported by Pompey and Crassus, and defended by Cicero. One of the tests of the being a Roman citizen, was the immunity from being scourged, according to the provisions of the Porcian law. So St. Paul, who, as a citizen of Tarsus, enjoyed the rights of a Roman citizen, says to the centurion, Acts xxii. 25, "Is it lawful for you to scourge a man that is a Roman, and uncondemned?"

371 The accusation against Balbus appears to have been his illegal usurpation of the rights of a Roman citizen, being born a foreigner. Pliny has previously informed us, B. v, c. 5, that he was a native of Gades or Cadiz. He was elected consul A.U.C. 713.—B.

372 L. Fulvius Curius. consul B.C. 322. In B.C. 313 he was master of the horse to the dictator, L. Æmilius.

373 "Felix." Hardouin informs us, that he transmitted this surname to his descendants; among them was Felix, the governor of Judæa, before whom St Paul was taken for judgment.—B.

374 "Infelix."

375 According to Pliny, B. xi. c. 39, and Plutarch, Sylla was affected by what has been termed the "Morbus pediculosus" or "Lousy disease." Plutarch, however, ascribes his death to the bursting of an internal abscess; and the same cause is assigned by Val. Maximus, B. ix. c. 3.—B. It was probably of a similar disease that Herod Agrippa died, whom we find mentioned in Acts xii. 23, as being eaten of worms.

376 Plutarch refers to a dream which Sylla had a short time before his death, but it does not seem to correspond to the one here alluded to.—B. "Plutarch relates that shortly before his death, Sylla dreamed that his son Cornelius, who died before his wife, Cecilia Metella, appeared to him, and summoned him away to join his mother. Appian also states that just before his death, Sylla beheld a spirit in a dream, which summoned him by name; upon which he called together his friends, made his will, and died soon after of a fever. Only two days before his death he finished the twenty-second book of his Memoirs, in which, foreseeing his end, he boasted of the prediction of the Chaldæans, that it was his fate to die after a happy life, and in the height of his prosperity.

377 This is referred to by Tacitus, Hist. B. iii. c. 73.—B. Plutarch tells us that Catulus performed this ceremony of dedication.

378 His consulships were A.U.C. 502 and 506—B.

379 Hardouin informs us, that a certain number of public officers, which varied from three to twenty, were appointed to divide the lands of the conquered people among the Roman colonists. Lemaire, vol. iii. p. 159.—B.

380 The commentators have endeavoured to prove, and not without some success, that Pliny is not correct in the remark, that the first elephants brought to Rome, were those which followed in the triumph of Metellus. He has himself informed us, B. viii. c. 6, that they were introduced by Curius Dentatus, in his triumph over Pyrrhus, some years before that of Metellus. The same fact is also stated by Florus, B. i. c. 18.—B.

381 Ovid, Fast. B. vi. 1. 436, et seq., and Val. Maximus, B. i. c. 4, allude to this circumstance.—B.

382 This fact has been supposed by Hardouin to be controverted by the statement of Aulus Gellius, who says, B. iii. c. 18, that all the senators, who had passed the curule chair, were carried to the curia or senate-house, in a chariot. But, as Ajasson correctly observes, Aulus Gellius does not assert that the senators were carried at the public expense, which was the case with Metellus.—B.

383 Val. Maximus, B. vii. c. 1, details the various fortunate circumstances which occurred to Q. Metellus; he makes no mention, however, of the violent attack made upon him by Labeo; indeed, he expressly states, that his good fortune continued to the last moments of his life.—B.

384 Val. Maximus, ubi supra, and Velleius Paterculus, B. i. c. 11, speak of the honours obtained by the four sons of Q. Metellus; they are also alluded to by Cicero in his 8th Philippic, sec. 4., and his Tusc. Quæst. B. i. c. 35.—B.

385 Dalechamps remarks, that we find in the ancient historians a similar account relative to M. Drusus, who, when tribune of the people, hurried off the consul Philippus with such violence to prison, that the blood started from his nostrils: also of P. Sempronius, the tribune of the people, who, had it not been for the opposition offered by his colleague, would have carried the censor Appius Claudius to prison.

386 This attack of Labeo on Metellus is mentioned in the Epitome of Livy, B. lix. The tribunes of Rome were styled "sacrosancti," and it was considered a capital crime to offer personal violence to them, under any circumstances. Hardouin remarks, that the tribune who came to the rescue of Metellus must have been a military tribune, who, in virtue of his office, had a right to claim the services of Metellus for the army.—B.

387 Cicero, in his oration "Pro Domo suâ," sec. 47, refers to the consecration of the property of Metellus, as a case analogous to that of his own house, which had been similarly consecrated by Clodius.—B. It seems to have been the custom, when a person had been capitally condemned, for the tribune of the people to consecrate his property, with certain formali- ties, to some god or goddess; after which it could not, under ordinary circumstances, be recovered, whether the sentence was revoked or not. Cicero had been capitally condemned through the instrumentality of Clodius, and obliged to fly from Rome.

388 It was a common expression among the Romans, for a person, "obtorto collo ad prætorem trahi," "to be dragged to the prætor with his neck wrenched;" and we meet with it repeatedly in the writings of Plautus. It would appear that it was customary for the lictors or officers of justice to seize criminals in a peculiar manner, perhaps with a rope, and with the exercise of great violence, whatever their rank.

389 According to the remark of Dalechamps, it appears to have been not unusual with the Roman magistrates, when resistance was offered to their order, to seize the party by the throat, as is here stated to have been done by Labeo.—B.

390 There has been considerable difficulty in ascertaining the names which should be given to the sons of Metellus, as the MSS. differ, and there appears to be no means of coming to any accurate decision, by a reference to other authorities. The essential circumstance, however, is, that two of the sons had obtained the honour of a triumph, and had acquired appropriate surnames.—B. Metellus Diadematus has been much confounded with his cousin, Metellus Dalmaticus. Diadematus was so called, from his wearing, for a long time, a bandage round his forehead, in consequence of an ulcer. He was consul B.C. 117.

391 By being dragged, and not proceeding willingly, in order to gain time for succour, and so save himself from being hurled from the Tarpeian rock.

392 Which allowed the laws to take their course, even against an individual of the first consequence in the state.—B.

393 In the class of those who were considered peculiarly fortunate; "hâc censurâ," literally, "in this assessment," in allusion to the classification of the citizens of Rome, according to the estimate of their property.—B.

394 In B.C. 45, when, being but about eighteen years of age, he had the presumption to ask his uncle for the office of "magister equitum;" upon which Julius Cæsar bestowed it on M. Lepidus, probably being of opinion that his nephew was not yet fit for the office.

395 In his triumvirate with Antony and Lepidus, he showed himself no less cruel than his colleague, Antony, notwithstanding the gloss which Pliny attempts to throw over his actions. Two thousand equites and three hundred senators are said to have been put to death during this proscription.

396 Augustus was detained at Dyrrhachium for some time before the battle of Philippi by illness, and had not recovered when the battle took place.

397 In the first engagement at Philippi, Brutus defeated the army of Augustus, while Cassius was defeated by Antony. Appian speaks also of his concealment in a marsh to the south of Philippi.

398 In his war against Sextus Pompeius, his fleet was twice shattered by shipwreck off the coast of Sicily, and he suffered several defeats by sea.

399 C. Proculeius, a member of the equestrian order, and a familiar friend of Augustus. It is of him that Horace speaks in the lines (II. Ode 2), "Vivet extento Proculeius ævo
Notus in fratres animi paterni."
He was one of the Romans to whom Augustus thought of giving his daughter Julia in marriage. The mode of his death is mentioned in B. xxxvi. c. 59.

400 This circumstance is stated more fully by Suetonius in his Life of Augustus; he tells, that "in crossing from Sicily to Italy to rejoin his forces, Augustus was unexpectedly attacked by Demochares and Apollophanes, two of Pompey's captains, and only escaped in a small vessel with the greatest difficulty."

401 L. Antonius having raised an army at Præneste, took possession of the town of Perusia, which was blockaded by Augustus, and Antonius was at last obliged to surrender. During this siege Augustus encountered several dangers, and was once nearly killed while sacrificing beneath the walls, by a band of gladiators, who came upon him unawares.

402 The victory was long doubtful, and it was only the sudden panic of Cleopatra, that finally ensured it to Augustus.

403 The exact nature of the accident here alluded to, is discussed by Hardouin, Lemaire, vol. iii. p. 169; he concludes, from the account of Suetonius and of Dion Cassius, that it was owing to the fall of a gallery, which extended between two towers.—B.

404 These are fully described by Suetonius, in his Life of Augustus, c. 80 and 81.

405 M. Claudius Marcellus, the son of Octavia, sister of Augustus. He was adopted by Augustus. Tacitus seems to hint that he was greatly beloved by the Roman people, and it is not improbable that Augustus may have become suspicious or jealous of him; his decease took place in his twentieth year.

406 To Mitylene. This refers to the jealousy between Marcellus and his brother-in-law, M. Vipsanius Agrippa. Pliny probably uses the term "pudenda," implying that Augustus showed neither firmness nor gratitude on this occasion; for anxious, at any cost, to prevent these differences, he sent Agrippa, against his will, as proconsul to Syria; immediately on which Agrippa left Rome, but stopped at Mitylene, and left the government of Syria to his legatus. Upon the death of Marcellus, Agrippa returned to Rome.

407 Dion Cassius mentions three conspiracies, the first by Fabius Cæpio and Muræna, a second, of which he does not name the authors, and a third by Cornelius Cinna.

408 Said in allusion to the suspicious deaths of his grandchildren Lucius and Caius, the children of his daughter Julia by Agrippa. They were probably removed by the criminal acts of Livia; but some historians have hinted that Augustus was privy to their destruction, the object of which was to remove all obstacles that lay in the way of Tiberius to the throne.

409 Implying that he was conscience-stricken at his share in their death, as well as struck with sorrow and remorse.

410 She was his only child; Scribonia was her mother. She was first married to her cousin Marcellus; on his death to L. Vipsanius Agrippa, and after his decease to Tiberius Nero, the son of Livia. Her profligacy was universally known, and Augustus did not scruple to enlarge upon it before the senate; but Pliny is the only writer who states that she contemplated an attempt on the life of his father; though Suetonius says that she became, at a late period of her reign, an object of interest to those who were disaffected. Julia was first banished to Pandataria, off the coast of Campania, and then to Rhegium, which she was never allowed to leave. Her death took place A.D. 14.

411 Tiberius Nero, afterwards emperor. Pliny here alludes to his retirement to Rhodes, where he remained seven years. Tacitus represents that his chief reason for leaving Rome was to escape the society of his wife Julia, who treated him with the utmost contempt, and whose licentious life was not unknown to him. During this retreat he devoted himself to the study of astrology. He left Rome without the consent of Augustus, who was equally unwilling to allow of his return.

412 Julia, one of the daughters of Julia and Agrippa, and the wife of L. Æmilius Paulus. She fully inherited the vices of her mother. For an adulterous intercourse with D. Silanus she was banished, by Augustus to Tremerus, off the coast of Apulia, where she survived twenty years, dependent on the bounty of the empress Livia. A child born after her dis- grace, was, by order of Augustus, exposed as spurious. She is supposed by some to be the Corinna of Ovid's amatory poems.

413 He probably alludes to the rising of some tribes in the provinces on the north-eastern coast of the Adriatic, in B.C. 35, who refused to pay their tribute. They were finally vanquished by Statilius Taurus, B.C. 33.

414 After the defeat of his general Varus, by Arminius, in Germany.

415 This pestilence is also mentioned by Dion Cassius; it took place A.U.C. 732.—B.

416 We have an account of the disastrous expedition of Varus in Florus, B. iv. c. 12.—B.

417 Suetonius speaks of calumnious pamphlets (libelli), that were circulated about, even in the senate-house, to his extreme disparagement.

418 A posthumous son of M. Vipsanius Agrippa by Julia, the daughter of Augustus, by whom he was adopted together with Tiberius. He was afterwards banished to Planaria, off the coast of Corsica, on account of his savage and intractable character, though guilty of no crime. Augustus is said to have privately visited him there, which, coming to the ears of Livia, increased her enmity against this youth, and he was murdered by her orders or those of Tiberius.

419 Tacitus, Ann. B. i. c. 3, says that he was banished by the artifices of Nero.—B.

420 After his death his solemn apotheosis took place in the Campus Martius. In some of the coins which were struck even during his life-time, he was called "Divus," or "the god."

421 For Tiberius Nero, the father of Tiberius Cæsar, took the side of M. Antonius in the Civil War.—B.

422 We have no mention of Pedius, or Phedius, as he is named in some of the MSS., in any of the ancient authors. A story of the same import is related of Solon and Tellus, by Herodotus, B. i. c. 30, and by Plutarch.—B.

423 A town of Arcadia. See B. iv. c. 10.

424 This is also related by Valerius Maximus, B. vii. c. 1.—B.

425 This is very similar to Virgil's beautiful description of the old man Coryeius, in the Georgics, B. iv. 1. 125, et seq.

426 We have some account of Euthymus in Pausanias, B. vi., and in Æian, Var. Hist. B. viii. c. 18.—B.

427 It has been conjectured by Poinsiret, that the word "Callimachus" does not refer to the well-known poet of that name, nor to any other individual, but that it was the title of the president of the Olympic games. The opinion is not without plausibility, but is scarcely sanctioned by sufficient authority.—B.

428 Pliny here alludes to the doctrine of astrology, which forms the especial subject of the next Chapter.—B.

429 These statements are not found in any of the works of Hesiod now extant; it is scarcely necessary to observe, that they are entirely without foundation, and contrary to all observation and experience.—B.

430 The great age of Arganthonius is referred to by Lucian, in his treatise "De Macrobiis," "on Long-lived Men;" by Herodotus, B. i. c. 163; by Cicero, de Senect. sec. 19; and by Valerius Maximus, B. viii. c. 13; the three latter writers agree in making his age 120 years, and hence Pliny assigns to him the same age in the next page.—B. St. Augustine, De Civitate Dei, B. xv., quotes this passage of Pliny, and mentions the age of Arganthonius, as stated by him, to have been 152 years. For Tartessus, in Spain, see B. iii. c. 3, and B. iv. c. 36.

431 His story is told by Ovid, Met. B. x., where he is said to have become

432 Callimachus mentions a person of this name, who wrote a treatise on the art of making cheesecakes. There was also a physician so called, who flourished in the fifth century B.C. , and who is said by Galen to have been the first who wrote a treatise on the probe. Whether either of these individuals is the person here alluded to, is unknown.

433 We have the same statement as to the age of Epimenides, in Valerius Maximus, B. viii. s. 13; he also, in the same section, gives an account of the Epii, of Pictoreus, of Dandon, and of the king of the island of the Tyrians, all of which agree with the present statement, except that the person mentioned by Damastes is called Literius, and the last-named individual is styled the king of the island of the Lutmii.—B.

434 The king of the Tartessi, mentioned above.—B.

435 Pliny has already spoken of the vigorous old age of Masinissa, in the 12th Chapter of the present Book.—B.

436 We have an account of Gorgias in Cicero, de Seneet. sec. 9; in Valerius Maximus, B. viii. c. 13, and in Lucian.—B.

437 Valerius Maximus, ubi supra, reduces this to sixty-two years.—B.

438 We have the same statement respecting Peperna in Valerius Maximus, but he does not mention his age.—B.

439 The names of the succeeding censors were C. Claudius Pulcher, and T. Sempronius Gracchus.

440 V. Maximus gives the same account of the age of Corvinus, but he states the interval between his consulships to have been forty-seven years. According to the Fasti, in Dr. Smith's Dictionary of Antiquities, the interval was forty-eight years, from A.U.C. 406 to A.U.C. 455.—B.

441 The honour of the curule-chair—"sella curulis." It was attached to the offices of consul, prætor, and ædile; Corvinus had, therefore, been elected to one or other of these offices twenty-one times.—B.

442 Valerius Maximus gives the same account of Metellus. He also informs us that Metellus, although of an advanced age when created pontiff, held the office for twenty-two years; so also Cicero, de Senect. sec. 9.—B.

443 We have the same account of these females in Valerius Maximus. He adds, that Clodia survived all her children; Seneca, Epist. 77, also refers to the great age of Statilia.—B.

444 "Emboliaria," an actress in the "embolium," or interlude of the Roman stage; also called "acroama," by Cicero. It appears to have been a concert of musical instruments, perhaps accompanied by dancing.

445 Their consulship was A.U.C. 761.—B.

446 Their consulship was A.U.C. 671, which would leave an interval of ninety years between her first appearance and her appearance at the votive games.—B.

447 "Togatus saltare instituit." He acted in the "togatæ fabulæ," comedies representing Roman life, or the life of those who wore the toga, the civic costume of the Romans. The Greek comedies were called "palliatæ."

448 The secular games of Augustus are stated by Suetonius, in his Life of Augustus, c. 31, and by Dion Cassius, to have taken place A.U.C. 739.—B.

449 We have an account of Epigenes, by Hardouin, Lemaire, vol. i. pp. 86, 87, where he is designated Rhodius. He is referred to by Varro, Columella, and Seneca; Pliny mentions him in other parts of his work.—B.

450 Berosus has been referred to in the 37th Chapter of the present Book.—B.

451 For some account of Petosiris and Necepsos, see end of B. ii.

452 Literally, the fourth part; according to Hardouin's explanation, Lemaire, vol. iii. p. 186.—B.

453 Literally. . . . . ."repetitions." Dalechamps explains it as indicating, "that part of the heavens which is distant thirty parts; that is to say, two signs from the horoscope;" Lemaire, vol. iii. p. 187.—B.

454 Ajasson refers us to Jul. Firmicus for an explanation of the difference which may exist in the length of the lives of individuals as depending on their natal day; Lemaire, vol. iii. p. 186. It appears to have been one of the leading tenets of the astrologers, that the favourable influence of the ascending sign is diminished or counteracted by the rays of other planets, or of the sun, falling upon the sign in certain directions or at certain angles, and that the length of the life of the individual is shortened in proportion to this injurious effect.—B.

455 This term means, literally, "increasing by a regular scale," or, "ac- cording to a proportional series of numbers;" the multiples of 7 have been generally supposed to be the critical periods of human life, and, more especially, 63, or 9 times 7, which was accordingly termed "the grand climacteric."—B.

456 This census appears to have taken place A.D. 74, under the fifth consulship of Vespasian, and the third of Titus; according to Censorinus, it was the last of which we have any distinct account.—B.

457 "Vasaria;" it is said, by the commentators, to be a term of German origin, derived from a word which signified the bark of a tree. It does not appear, however, from what cause it was appropriated to the sense in which it is used by Pliny. The word is found in Cicero's oration against Piso, sec. 35; but is there applied to a totally different object.—B.

458 Now Brigella or Brescella. Parma still retains its ancient name, Placentia is now Piacenza, and Faventia the modern Faenza.

459 Probably the same as the Velia, mentioned by Phlegon Trallianus as famous for the longevity of its inhabitants.

460 "Marcus Mucius, M. Filius, Galeria, Felix." It has been doubted by the commentators, whether the word Galeria refers to the name of the mother of Mucius, or to the tribe to which he belonged. The latter is, perhaps, the more natural interpretation. Hardouin and Ajasson, however, adopt the opinion, that Galeria was the mother of Marcus; Lemaire, vol. iii. pp. 191,192. We meet with a precisely similar construction of words in Cicero, 9th Philip. sec. 7; "Ser. Sulpicius, Q. Filius, Lemonia Rufus."—B.

461 The son of Panthöus, and friend of Hector. He was famous for his wisdom and prudence in giving counsel. See Iliad, B. xviii. 1. 249–52.

462 The passage referred to is in the Iliad, B. xviii. 1. 249–51.—B.

463 Respecting Cælius [formerly called Cæcilius in most editions] Hardouin informs us that he was the accuser of Calpurnius, that he was prætor during the consulship of P. Lentulus Spinther and L. Metellus Nepos, and was oppressed by Clodius. Pliny refers to Cælius, and his accusation of Calpurnius, in a subsequent passage, B. xxvii. c. 2.—B. Licinius Calvus Macer was by some considered, as an orator, to rival even Cicero himself; and as a poet, is generally mentioned by the side of Catullus. He exhausted his constitution by his severe application, and died in his thirty-fifth or thirty-sixth year. He was remarkable for the extreme shortness of his stature. Cælius was a partisan of Pompey, and was eventually put to death at Thurii.

464 Consul A.U.C. 463; he is generally called Rufinus.—B.

465 This anecdote is mentioned by Cicero, De Nat. Deor. B. iii. c. 28, and by Valerius Maximus, B. i. c. 8.—B. He was tyrant of Pheræ and Tagus in Thessaly, and was finally assassinated.

466 He was consul A.U.C. 633; in consequence of the victories which he obtained over the Allobroges, he obtained the agnomen of "Allobrogicus."—B.

467 Valerius Maximus, B. viii. c. 13, refers to the great age of Xenophilus, but designates him "Pythagoræus;" he says that he obtained his information respecting him from Aristoxenus, the musician, which may have led to an inaccuracy on the part of Pliny. Poinsinet endeavours to reconcile the discrepancy, by the circumstance, that music formed a prominent part of the Pythagorean discipline.—B.

468 "Per sapientiam mori." Many conjectures have been formed respecting the meaning of this passage, which is obscure. Attempts have been made to amend the reading of the text, but; as it appears, without success; see the notes of Hardouin, Ajasson, and others, Lemaire, vol. iii. pp. 197, 8.—B. It is pretty clear, however, that Pliny here refers to what, in the next Chapter, he calls "sapientiæ ægritudo," the malady by the Greeks called "phrenesis," and by us "frenzy," which attacks the seat of wisdom, the understanding. Many pages have been written upon the meaning of this passage, obvious as it seems to be.

469 The same doctrine is advanced in B. xxviii., which treats of medicine, sec, c. 10.—B.

470 Among the ancients, all the manufactures and mechanical arts were carried on by slaves; they were, consequently, subjected to the same kinds of morbid causes which are found, in modern times, to be so detrimental to certain descriptions of workmen.—B.

471 Our own experience has taught us the truth of this observation in the case of the cholera; and the great plague of 1348, which is thought to have swept off one-third of mankind, is supposed to have travelled to Europe from the vicinity of the Ganges.

472 Dalechamps correctly remarks, that the laughter here referred to, is not the indication of mirth, but what has been termed the "risus Sardonicus," the "Sardonic laugh," produced by a convulsive action of the muscles of the face; Lemaire, vol. iii. p. 201.—B.

473 "Sapientitæ ægritudine." See Note 80 above.

474 Pliny probably took this notion from Celsus, who speaks of this as being a fatal symptom, B. ii. c. 6; "si manibus qui in febre, &c., in veste floccos legit, fimbriasque diducit. . . ."—B.

475 "Venarum percussa;" the ancients were not acquainted with the relation which exists between the arteries and the veins, or the appropriate functions of these parts.—B.

476 In Seneca, Contr. B. ii., we find the remark, "Suchgenius, at so early an age, bodes no long life." Apuleius, quoting from some Greek writer, says, "Odi puerulos præcoci sapientiâ." "I hate your bits of boys, with their precocious wisdom." We have a somewhat similar saying to the above passage from Seneca, "He is too wise," or "too clever to live long."

477 This remark has been confirmed by various writers, ancient and modern; it appears to depend upon an unnatural development of the cerebral and nervous system, which renders it more liable to disease, and less able to bear the impressions to which it is ordinarily exposed.—B.

478 This was probably Phthiriasis, or the "morbus pediculosus," which has been previously mentioned in this book with reference to Sulla, and of which, probably, Herod Agrippa died. Some authors state that Pherecydes put an end to his life by throwing himself from a rock at Delphi; others give other accounts of his death.

479 This circumstance is mentioned by Seneca, De Provid. c. 3.—B.

480 We have the same account of Antipater in Valerius Maximus, B. i. c. 8. He was the preceptor of Cato of Utica; Cicero makes honourable mention of him, De Oratore, B. iii. c. 50.—B.

481 We have an account of the death of Aviola, in Valerius Maximus, B. i. c. 8. This name occurs in the Consular Fasti, A.U.C. 806; but it could not be that of the person referred to by Valerius Maximus, as his work was published under the reign of Tiberius, who died A.U.C. 789. We have also an account of the death of Lamia in Valerius Maximus, as occurring under the same circumstances with that of Aviola.—B.

482 Poinsinet, vol. iii. pp. 251, 252, supposes, that Messala and Rufus are the names of two writers, and not, as usually supposed, of one only. The conjecture appears not improbable.—B.

483 Plutarch, "De Deo Socratis," gives us the same account of Hermotinus. Ajasson has remarked, not inaptly, that this story is very similar to the modern statements as to the effect of animal magnetism, Lemaire, iii. 207.—B. Apuleius, in his "Defence," has a passage which is remarkable as clearly bearing reference to the doctrines inculcated by the mesmerists of modern times; he says, "Quin et illud mecum reputo, posse animum humanum, præsertim puerilem et simplicem seu carminum avocamento, sine odorum delenimento, soporari et ad oblivionem præsentium externari; et paulisper remotâ corporis memoriâ, redigi et redire ad naturam suam quæ est immortalis scilicet et divina; atque ita veluti quodam sopore futura rerum præsagire."

484 We have no notice of any people, under this appellation, in Greece; Cantharus, however, occurs as the name of an individual, and possibly these may have been his descendants, or the members of his family.—B.

485 See B. v. c. 44.

486 We have an account of Aristeas in Herodotus, iv. 13, but somewhat different from that here given; Aristeas is also mentioned by Apollonius in his Hist. Mirab., and A. Gellius, B. ix. c. 4.—B. He was an epic poet, who flourished in the time of Crœsus and Cyrus. Herodotus mentions a story that he reappeared at Metapontum, in Italy, 340 years after his death. He is generally represented as a magician, whose soul could leave, and reenter his body at pleasure.

487 A poet and prophet of Crete. The story was, that being sent by his father to fetch a sheep, he went into a cave, and fell into a sleep, from which he did not awake for fifty-seven years. On awaking, he sought for the sheep, and was astonished on finding everything altered. On returning home, he found that his young brother had in the meantime become an aged man. His story is only equalled by the famous one of the Seven Sleepers of Da- mascus, who fell asleep in the time of the Decian persecution of the Christians, and slept in a cave till the thirtieth year of the reign of the Em- peror Theodosius, 196 years. It is not improbable that it is to this story about Epimenides, that we are indebted for the amusing story of Rip Van Winkle, by Washington Irving.

488 We have the life of Epimenides by Diogenes Laertius, who gives an account of this long-continued sleep. It is also mentioned by other writers, but there is some difference in their statements as to its length.—B.

489 According to the interpretation of Dalechamps, "spiritus et animæ interceptioni ac privationi," "the interception and privation of the breath and faculties;" Lemaire, vol. iii. p. 208.—B.

490 He probably alludes to what are known among us as hysteria, or hysterical affections.

491 We have an account of Heracüdes in Diogenes Laertius; he was a native of Pontus, and a pupil of Aristotle.—B.

492 This circumstance is not mentioned in either of the two works of Varro which have come down to us, "De Re Rusticâ," and "De Linguâ Latinâ."—B.

493 They were a body of commissioners appointed for the distribution of lands in Campania; Julius Cæsar, when consul, having caused a law to be passed, dividing that territory among such of the Roman citizens as should have three or more children.

494 We are not informed, whether these persons of the name of Corfidius, were in any way connected, nor, indeed, do we appear to have any certain knowledge of their history.—B. L. Corfidius, a Roman eques, is mentioned by Cicero, in his oration for Ligarius, B.C. 46, as one of the distinguished men who were then interceding with Cæsar on behalf of Ligarius; but after the oration was published, Cicero was informed that he had made a mistake in mentioning the name of Corfidius, as he had died before the speech was delivered. It does not appear certain that he was one of the parties here mentioned: but it is not improbable that he was the brother whose sudden death is mentioned below.

495 Among the ancients, servants used to be summoned by clapping the hands, as they are, in modern times, by ringing of bells.—B. The same practice still prevails in the east.

496 In the twenty-third Chapter of the present Book.—B.

497 Val. Maximus, B. ix. c. 12, and Diodorus Siculus, B. xiii. c. 14, gives the same account. It has been said, that, when he heard the news, he called for a draught of wine, and was choked with a grape-stone; this incident forms the subject of an epigram by Simonides, quoted by Hardouir, Lemaire, vol. iii. p. 210.—B.

498 There is reason to believe, that the prize was given rather to the rank, than to the poetry of Dionysius; see the remarks of Ajasson, Lemaire, vol. iii. pp. 210, 211.—B.

499 This anecdote is related by Livy, B. xxii. c. 7; by Valerius Maximus, B. ix. c. 12; and by Aulus Gellius, B. iii. c. 15; the two former, however, state, that it occurred after the battle of Thrasymenus,—B.

500 Cicero, De Fato, sec. 6, styles Diodorus, "valens dialecticus."—B.

501 According to Hardouin, these were Lucius, the prætor, and Caius, the father of the dictator; they were brothers, and the sons of C. Cæsar. —B.

502 Thirty-first of December; consequently his tenure of office was for a few hours only. Cicero indulged in several jokes upon his consulship, remarking that no one had died during it; and that the consul was extremely vigilant, for that he had never slept during his term of office.

503 This took place A.U.C. 708; Macrobius, in his Saturnalia, gives us an account of the jests passed by Cicero and others on the brief duration of his office.—B.

504 He is supposed to have been the same person who was consul A.U.C. 732.—B.

505 The Comitium was a place in the forum at Rome, where the "comitia curiata" were held, and certain offences tried and punished. It was here also that the tribunal, or "suggestum," was situate.

506 We are informed by Hardouin, that he held the office of Prætor A.U.C. 660.—B.

507 "A puero;" not necessarily a slave, as Littrè seems to think.

508 On Hardouin's authority, we learn that A. Pompeius was surnamed Bithynicus, and was prætor A.U.C. 680.–B.

509 The death of Thalna is given somewhat more in detail by Valerius Maximus, B. ix. c. 12; it took place A.U.C. 590.—B.

510 The ancients reckoned the hours from sun-rise; in summer, the second hour of the day would be six o'clock A.M., and in the winter, a quarter past eight.—B.

511 Bankers, and usurers more especially, had their shops in the Roman Forum.

512 "Cum vadimonium differri jubet."—B.

513 Augustus built a third Forum, because the old one and that of Julius Cæsar, were not found sufficient for the great increase of business. He adorned it with a temple of Mars, and the statues of the most distinguished Romans.

514 According to Hardouin, this ivory statue was in the eighth region of the city.—B.

515 "Specillum;" this instrument is mentioned by Celsus, B. vi. c. 6, 25, et alibi. There has been a considerable discussion among the commentators respecting the "specillum;" see Lemaire, vol. iii. pp. 213, 214. From the uses to which it was applied by Celsus, we can have little doubt upon the subject. Poinsinet and Ajasson employ the equivalent French term "eprouvette."—B.

516 "Mulsum" was the most universally esteemed of all the beverages used among the Romans. It seems to have been of two kinds: in the one case honey was mixed with wine, in the other with must. Massic or Falernian wine was preferred for the purpose, and new Attic honey. The proportions were four measures of wine to one of honey; and various perfumes and spices were added. See B. xxii, c. 4. It was especially valued as the most appropriate draught on an empty stomach.

517 The Cornelius Gallus here mentioned could not have been the poet of the same name, because, as we are informed, he died by his own hand. The death of the poet Gallus is alluded to by Ovid, Amores, B. iii. El. 9, 1. 64.—B. A similar fate is said, by Tertullian, to have overtaken Speusippus, the Platonic philosopher. The same was also said by some of the poet Pindar.

518 Val. Maximus, B. ix. c. 12, gives the same account of the death of Gallus and Haterius.—B.

519 Which was usually worn by the Romans at their entertainments.

520 Considering some of the above cases, Pliny must have had a curions notion of a happy death. Ovid would have agreed with him in one respect; for in his amatory poems, he expresses a wish that he may die of a surfeit of sensual enjoyment.

521 The great-grandfather of the Emperor Nero. We have a reference to his death by Seneca, De Benef. B. iii. c. 24, and a more full account of it by Suetonius, Life of Nero, c. 2.—B.

522 The charioteers at Rome were divided into four companies, or "factiones," each distinguished by a colour, representing the season of the year. These colours were green for the spring, red for the summer, azure for autumn, and white for the winter. Domitian afterwards increased them to six, adding the golden and the purple. The most ardent party spirit prevailed among them, and the interest in their success extended to all classes and both sexes.

523 In the thirty-sixth Chapter of this Book.—B.

524 It would appear, from Dalechamps and Hardouin, that this statement, respecting the period when the custom of burning the body after death was first adopted by the Romans, is incorrect, Lemaire, vol. iii. p. 219. There is much uncertainty as to its origin, and the source from which they borrowed it. We learn from Macrobius, that the practice was discontinued in his time, i. e. in the fourth century after Christ.—B.

525 We have the same remarks, respecting the antiquity of the custom of interring the body, the continued adoption of it by the Cornelian family, and the supposed notion of Sylla, in ordering his own body to be burnt, in Cicero, De Leg. B. ii. c. 22, from whom it is probable Pliny may have borrowed them.—B.

526 We have no English term that will preserve the distinction which Pliny makes between the two modes of disposing of the body after death. —B.

527 He views the state after death in the same light as Democritus and Epicurus, utterly denying the immortality of the soul; though it cannot be said that he looks upon life in the same cheerful, laissez-faire manner in which it was regarded by the latter of these philosophers.

528 Hardouin remarks, that the ancients made a distinction between the souls of the dead, and their spirits or shades, "umbræ." The former were supposed to remain on the earth, while the latter were removed either to Elysium or to Tartarus, according to the character or actions of the deceased.—B.

529 According to Varro, Democritus directs, that the body shall not be burnt after death, hut preserved in honey; on which Varro remarks, how greatly such a practice would tend to raise the price of that article.—B.

530 It has been conjectured, that Bacchus derived his name from the Greek word βάσκω, on account of his numerous journies into different parts of the world; it was during these that he conveyed to the various nations which he visited the arts of civilized life.—B.

531 We have a long discussion by Poinsinet, vol. iii. pp. 234, 235, on the derivation of the name of Ceres, in which he endeavours to explain the various attributes that were ascribed to her. The character in which she was generally regarded by the writers of antiquity, was the one here given to her by Pliny; in proof of which we may refer, among other authorities, to Virgil, Geor. B. i. 1. 147, and to Ovid, Metam. B. iii. 1. 341.—B.

532 The earliest method of reducing corn to the state proper for the food of man, was by pounding it in a mortar; afterwards, when it was ground between stones, they were moved by the hand, as is still the practice in many parts of the East. It was not until a comparatively late period that water was employed as the moving power for mills.—B.

533 It has been supposed by some commentators, that the character of legislator was bestowed upon Ceres, in consequence of the name by which she was designated, in the ancient northern languages, being incorrectly transferred to the Greek. Others have thought that it might be referred to the connection which may be supposed to exist between an advance in the arts of life generally and an improvement of the laws.—B.

534 We do not find the circumstance here referred to in the "Noctes Atticæ" of Aulus Gellius.—B.

535 It would appear that there were two individuals of this name, who were confounded with each other; Simonides, the celebrated poet, lived as late as the fifth century before Christ, so that it has been thought improbable that the Greek language could have existed without the four letters here mentioned, until so recent a period.—B.

536 The account of the original introduction of the alphabet into Greece, here given, is the one generally adopted in his time. Most readers will be aware, that the actual invention of letters, the share which the Egyptians and the Phœnicians had in it, the identification of Cadmus and still more of Mercury, with any of the heroes or legislators of antiquity, of whom we have any correct historical data, and the connection which the Greek alphabet had with those of other nations, are among the most curious questions of literary discussion, and are still far from being resolved with any degree of certainty.—B.

537 It seems to have been the general opinion, that the Greek language had, originally, sixteen or eighteen letters, the source of which was very uncertain, and of high antiquity; and to these, additional letters were, from time to time, appended by different individuals. Upon the whole, the claim of the Egyptians to the invention of letters, seems to rest upon, at least, a very plausible foundation.—B.

538 Epicharmus was born in the fifth century B.C. , in the island of Cos, hut removed, probably at an early age, to Sicily, where he passed a considerable portion of his life. His original profession was that of a physician, but he appears to have devoted his attention principally to general science and literature, and is more especially remarkable as the inventor of regular comedy. A few fragments only of his dramas remain, but the titles of no less than forty are preserved. From a line in the Prologue to the Menæchmi of Plautus, where it is said that the plot of the play, "non Atticissat verum Sicilicissat" "is not Attic, but Sicilian;" it has been conjectured, that Plautus took the plot of the piece from Epicharmus.

539 Phoroneus was the son of Inachus, and the second king of Argos; he began to reign about 1807 B.C.—B.

540 Epigenes has already been referred to in the fifty-fourth chapter of this Book.—B.

541 There has been much discussion respecting the interpretation of this passage. In the first place, the numbers in the text have extended from 720 and 490 to as many thousands, by the addition of the letter M., against the authority, however, of some MSS. In the next place, in older to curtail the enormous periods thus formed, the years have been supposed to be only lunar, or even diurnal periods. The opinion of Hardouin and Marcus is perhaps the better founded, who reject the proposed alteration, and consider these numbers to indicate, according to their natural signification, periods of years. The principal consideration that has been urged in favour of the alteration of the text is derived from two passages in Cicero's Treatise de Divin. B. i. c. 19, and B. ii. c. 46, where he refers to the very long periods which the Babylonians employed in their calculations, but which he justly regards as entirely without foundation, and even ridiculous. Pliny, however, professes to follow the opinion of Epigenes whom he styles "gravis auctor," and who, we may premise. would reject these improbable tales.—B. The reading, 720 thousands, is the one adopted by Sillig.

542 Pausanias, in his "Attica," calls the two brothers Agrolas and Hyperbius. Some commentators have supposed, that these names, as well as Doxius and Cælus, mentioned below, are merely symbolical, and that the personages are fictitious.—B.

543 The Gellius here mentioned had the prænomen of Cneius; he is not to be confounded with the more noted Aulus Gellius, by whom he is quoted in the Noct. Att. B. xiii. c. 29.—B.

544 There is a number of ancient legends attached to the name of Cecrops, yet we have but little authentic information respecting him. What appears to be the best established is, that he was born in the city of Sais, in Egypt, and that, about 1556 B.C. , he conducted a colony to Attica, where he built a fortress, on the Acropolis of Athens, and that his descendants continued, for some generations, to be kings of Attica.—B.

545 If this is the Cinyra previously mentioned in c. 49, he is more generally represented as the son of Apollo, or of Paphos, a priest of the Paphian Aphrodite or Venus. The true reading, however, is uncertain.

546 Hardouin informs us, that in all the MSS. which he has consulted, this person is named Agricola, while in the printed editions of Pliny he is styled Agriopa, or Ariopas. Poinsinet, vol. iii. pp. 250, 251, endeavours to explain this, by supposing, that the word "Agricola" was the one employed by Pliny, but was used by him as a generic, not as an appellative term. Some of the earlier editors, however, conceiving that no agricultural operations could be carried on, before the invention of the necessary implements had changed the name into Agriopa, derived from two Greek words, signifying "a man in the savage state, who is only capable of uttering inarticulate sounds." This method of solving the difficulty will probably appear fanciful and too refined, but it is the only one which has been proposed.—B.

547 The copper-mines of Temesa, supposed to have been in Cyprus, are mentioned by Homer. There was another place of that name in Bruttium, and another in India, both equally famous for their copper.

548 Danaus is said to have migrated from Egypt into Greece about 1485 B.C. He may have introduced wells into Greece, but they had, long before his time, been employed in Egypt and in other countries. The term "Dipsion," "thirsting," which it appears had been applied to the district of Argos, may seem to render it probable, that, before the arrival of Danaus, the inhabitants had not adopted any artificial means of supplying themselves with water.—B. But this country, we are told, is naturally well supplied with water.

549 Nothing is known respecting this individual; it does not appear that he is mentioned by any other of the ancients.—B.

550 There is so much fable mixed up with the account of the Cyclopes, that it is difficult to ascertain their real history. It seems probable, that there was a people of high antiquity, who were particularly skilful in the erection of stone edifices of various kinds, and more especially of those which served for the defence of cities. The remains of walls and other structures, which have obtained the name of Cyclopian, are found in various parts of Greece, Italy, and Sicily, and may be regarded as among the oldest works of man in existence, although they are probably of less antiquity than those of Egypt and of some parts of Asia.—B.

551 We have sufficient evidence of the early period at which the art of weaving was practised in Egypt, from the figures to be found on their monuments, and from the specimens of their manufactures, some of very delicate texture, which have been found in the most ancient of their tombs. It was doubted, at one time, whether these fine stuffs were formed from the fibres of flax or of cotton, or, in other words, whether they were cambric or muslin; but it is now generally admitted that they are made of flax. We have frequent mention of the products of the loom in the Pentateuch; we may select the 13th chapter of Leviticus, where linen and woollen stuffs are especially mentioned, and distinguished from each other.—B.

552 It is very difficult, probably impossible, in the present day, to determine to which of the nations of antiquity we are indebted for the invention of the art of dyeing. We have notices of coloured stuffs in various parts of the Pentateuch, and there is reason to suppose, that the art was practised, at a very early period, by the Egyptians, the Phœnicians, and the Indians. They had even arrived at the knowledge of partial dyeing, or what is technically termed "printing," as applied to cotton or linen.—B.

553 According to Justin, B. ii. c. 6, the Athenians introduced the use of wool among their countrymen; but it has been supposed that they learned it from the Egyptians.—B.

554 Arachne is said to have been a native of Hypæpæ, near Colophon, in Asia Minor, and has been celebrated for her skill in embroidery by Ovid, Metam. B. vi. As we have sufficient evidence that linen was manufactured by the Egyptians at a very early period, we may presume that this account of Arachne is either fabulous, or that, in some way or other, she was instrumental in the introduction of linen into Greece.—B.

555 Nothing is known of this individual, nor have we any further information respecting the discovery ascribed to him.—B.

556 Homer, Il. B. vii. 1. 221, and Ovid, Fasti, B. iii. 1. 824, speak of Tychius, as particularly skilful in making shoes, and other articles of leather.—B.

557 It is difficult to determine, how far we are to regard the names here mentioned as belonging to real or only to fictitious personages, nor is it easy for us to ascertain what should be regarded as the actual invention of medicine. A certain kind of medical, or rather surgical practice, must have existed in the rudest state of society and in the earliest ages, which was improved and refined by the gradual experience and increased civilization of each successive generation.—B.

558 In this, as in so many others of the arts, the original invention has been given to the Egyptians, while the introduction of it into Greece is ascribed to Cadmus. The word œs, which is generally translated "brass," as well as the Greek word χαλκὸς, was applied by the ancients, either to copper, or what is properly bronze, i. e. a mixture of copper and tin. Brass, the compound of copper and zinc, does not appear to have been known to them. With respect to the claim of the Scythians to the discovery of the use of copper, it has been justly remarked, that it is natural to suppose it to have been first known in those countries, where the ore of the metal is found in large quantities, which is the case in the region that was anciently named Scythia.—B.

559 According to Pausanias, the art of forging iron was discovered by Glaucus of Chios. Strabo ascribes it to the Idæan Dactyli, and the art of manufacturing utensils of bronze and iron to the Telchines; the former were inhabitants of Crete, the latter of Rhodes.—B.

560 According to Hyginus, silver was first discovered in Scythia by Indus, and introduced into Attica by Erichthonius. Æacus is said by Cassiodorus to have been the discoverer of gold.—B.

561 Pangæus is generally described as a mountain on the confines of Macedonia and Thrace; but Marcus says that it was a mountain of Abyssinia, near the source of the Nile, and he adduces various passages from the ancients to prove that the Egyptians had an extensive traffic there in gold at a very early period; Ajasson, vol. vi. pp. 191, 192.—B.

562 Thoas was the king of the Tauric Chersonnesus and Panchaia was a district of Arabia Felix; it does not appear what connection Thoas could have with Panchaia.—B.

563 We have no account of any individual bearing this name, and it has been proposed by Hardouin to substitute for it "Midas Phrygius," who is said, both by Hyginus and by Cassiodorus, to have been the discoverer of lead.—B.

564 From the accounts of Pliny, B. iv. c. 36, as well as of Strabo, and the other ancient geographers, it appears, that he here alludes to the Scilly Isles, including, probably, the western extremity of Cornwall. We are informed by Herodotus, B. iii. c. 115, that tin was brought from them, and they were hence named the "tin islands," from the Greek word for tin, κασσἱτερος.—B.

565 On this subject we may refer to Note 72.—B.

566 Pliny, in B. xxxv. c. 45, informs us, that Choræbus invented the art of making pottery, and that it was first exercised, as a trade, by Chalcosthenes. He says, that a certain district of Athens obtained the name of "Ceramicos," from his manufactory of earthen-ware, derived from κέραμος, "potter's clay."—B.

567 The inventions here ascribed to Dædalus, are, by many of the ancients, given to his nephew; see Isidorus, Hyginus, Diodorus Siculus, and Ovid, Metam. B. viii. 1. 234, et seq.—B.

568 "Ichthyocolla," perhaps more properly, "Fish-glue."

569 Pausanias ascribes also to Theodorus the invention of forging iron and copper. According to Vitruvius, the square was invented by Pythagoras.—B.

570 The same statement is made by Strabo, and other writers of antiquity, and is confirmed by the Arundelian Marbles.—B.

571 See B. xiii. c. 42.

572 Marcus informs us, that, according to the Arundelian Marbles, Erichthonius, the fourth king of Athens, was the inventor of chariots.—B. See p. 229.

573 Hardouin remarks, that Pliny, in the beginning of this Chapter, ascribes the invention of commerce to Bacchus; we may suppose, that the commerce there referred to, was the conveyance of goods by land, while that of the Carthaginians was traffic by sea.—B.

574 Eumolpus was a native of Thrace; but being expelled from his native country, he invaded Attica, and, after various contests with Erichthonius, obtained the office of high-priest of Ceres, which was continued to his descendants.—B.

575 We learn from the writings of Moses, that the planting of the vine, and the conversion of the juice of the grape into wine, was practised by Noah immediately after the Flood. The mixing of water with wine would seem to be a very obvious and natural mode of procuring a pleasant and refreshing beverage.—B.

576 From the writings of Moses, we learn that the use of oil and of honey was known to the inhabitants of Palestine and Egypt, at a very early period.—B.

577 "Buzyges" is a Greek term, signifying "one who yokes oxen;" according to Hardouin, the real name of the person here referred to was Epimenides.—B.

578 For an account of Triptolemus, the reader may consult Hyginus, and Pausanias, B. vii. Achaica.—B. Also the Fasti of Ovid, B. iv. 1. 507, et seq.

579 Phalaris is supposed to have been contemporary with Servius Tullius, who reigned from 577 to 533 B.C.—B.

580 Meaning a citizen who obtained the sovereignty by violence and usurpation.

581 This is supposed to have taken place 1000 years before Christ, when the Lacedæmonians conquered the Helots. But Moses had given the Jews a code of laws, respecting the treatment of slaves, between 400 and 500 years before that event, and we have various intimations of the existence of slavery, in his writings, long before his time. It appears, indeed, that in the different countries of the East, and in Africa, slavery has existed from time immemorial.—B.

582 This is confirmed by Ælian, Var. Hist. B. iii. c. 38.—B.

583 According to the same fabulous account of the early Grecian history, they were twin brothers, kings of the Argives; after much contention, Acrisius succeeded in expelling Prcetus from Argos; they are said to have lived 1400 years B.C. Athamas was a king of Thebes, and the contemporary of Acrisius.—B.

584 According to Hardouin, the Lacedæmonians had the helmet, the sword, and the spear, of a peculiar form, different from that used by the other natives of Greece.—B.

585 This account of the invention of the bow and arrow seems to have been derived from the high character which the Scythians and Persians had acquired for their dexterity in the use of those weapons.—B.

586 The "amentum" was a leather thong tied to the middle of the javelin, to assist in throwing it, though it is unknown how it added to the effect. It has been suggested that it was by imparting rotation, and consequent steadiness.

587 Ætolus was said to have been the son of Endymion, of Elis, who, having accidentally killed one of his countrymen, left his native place, and settled in the part of Greece named after him, Ætolia.—B.

588 See B. xxviii. c. 6. This was the Roman "veru," or "verutum," so called from its resemblance to a spit. Its shaft was three feet and a half long, and its point five inches. The "Velites" did not form part of the Roman legion, but fought in scattered parties wherever they were required.

589 The "pilum" was short and thick; its shaft, often made of cornel, was partly square, and five feet and a half long. The head was nine inches long. It was used either to throw or thrust with, and, in spite of what Pliny says, was peculiar to the Romans.

590 Julius Firmicus ascribes the invention of the apparatus used in hunting to the Cretans; and Gratius, Cyneg. 1. 108, that of the hunting spear, with its iron spike, to Dercylus, of Amyclæ.—B.

591 Vitruvius informs us, that the catapulta and the balista were instruments formed upon the same principle, the former being adapted for the discharge of arrows, and the latter, masses of stone. Cæsar, however, in his account of the siege of Massilia, Bell. Civ. B. ii. c. 8, speaks of stones being thrown by the catapulta. Ælian, Hist. Var. B. vi. c. 12, says, that it was invented by Dionysius, the first king of Syracuse.—B.

592 Strabo ascribes the invention of the sling to the Ætolians; he informs us, that the inhabitants of the Balearic Isles, so famous for their dexterity in the use of this instrument, originally obtained it from the Phrygians.—B.

593 According to Hyginus, Tyrrhenus, the son of Hercules, invented the trumpet; Clemens, of Alexandria, and Athenæus, ascribe the invention to the Tyrrhenians.—B. Virgil speaks, B. viii. 1. 526, of the "clangor of the Tyrrhenian trumpet."

594 The "tortoise." He probably means a military machine, moved on wheels and roofed over, used in besieging cities, and under which the soldiers worked in undermining the walls. It was usually covered with raw hides or other materials, which could not easily be set on fire. The same name was also applied to the covering formed by a compact body of soldiers, who placed their shields over their heads, and linked them together, to secure themselves against the darts of the enemy. The latter kind of "testudo" was sometimes formed, by way of an exercise, in the games of the Circus.

595 This has been supposed to have been the real origin of the Trojan horse, on which Virgil has built one of his most interesting episodes; the horse, as described by Virgil, was, however, in every respect, different from the battering ram.—B.

596 In consequence of some false charges brought against him, Bellerophon was sent to combat with a monster called the Chimæra, in the expectation that he would perish in the attempt; but Minerva, pitying his situation, provided him with a winged horse, named Pegasus, by means of which he accomplished his perilous task in safety.—B.

597 Pelethronius is said to have been a king of the Lapithæ, a people of Thessaly, who were celebrated for their skill in the management of the horse.—B.

598 According to Cicero, De Nat. Deor. B. iii. c. 23, Minerva was the first who used a chariot with four horses. Hardouin supposes that the Erichthonius here mentioned was not the king of Athens, but the son of Dardanus, the king of Troas; he does not state the ground of his opinion, and Ælian, Hist. Var. B. iii. c. 38, expressly speaks of him as an Athenian. Virgil, Geor. B. iii. 11. 113, 114, speaks of Erichthonius as the inventor of the chariot with four horses; he is supposed to have lived about 1450 B. C . As Hardouin justly remarks, we have an account, in the writings of Moses, of chariots being used by the Egyptians long before this period. It is not, however, stated what was the number of horses used for these chariots.—B.

599 "Tesseræ," in the original, which is also the name of the dice used in various games. But the connection in which the word is here placed makes it more probable that it refers to some military operation; Virgil employs it in this sense, Æneid, B. vii. 1. 637, as also Livy, B. vii. c. 35. There is, however, a tradition that Palamedes invented the games in which dice are used, during the siege of Troy.—B.

600 The words are "auguria ex avibus," while the art which is said to have been taught by Tiresias, is termed "extispicio avium." The first of these consists in foretelling future events, by observing the flight, the chirping, or the feeding of birds, the latter by the inspection of their entrails. But it appears that this distinction is not always observed; see Cicero, De Divin. B. i. c. 47. The observation of the auguries was committed to a body or college of priests, regarded as of the highest authority in the Roman state. The "Haruspices," whose office it was to inspect the entrails of sacrificed animals, and from their appearance to foretell future events, were considered as an inferior order.—B.

601 Amphiaraüs was reputed to be the son of Apollo, and was famous for his knowledge of futurity; he was one of the Argonauts, and joined in the expedition of the Epigoni against Thebes, in which he perished. Divine honours were paid to him after his death, and a temple erected to his memory, which was resorted to as an oracle.—B.

602 Amphictyon established the celebrated council named after him, and which consisted of delegates from the principal cities of Greece, who assembled at stated periods to decide upon all public questions. He is supposed to have lived about 1500 B.C.—B.

603 It is very difficult, perhaps impossible, to separate the actual history of Atlas from the mythological and fabulous tales mixed up with it. We may, however, conclude that he was a king of Libya, or of some part of the north of Africa; that he was an observer of the heavenly bodies, and one of the first who gave any connected account of them. Under the term "astrology," Pliny probably intended to comprehend both the supposed science, now designated by that name, and likewise astronomy, or the physical laws of the heavenly bodies.—B.

604 Pliny has previously stated, B. ii. c. 6, that the sphere was invented by Atlas, and that Anaximander discovered the obliquity of the ecliptic, by which he is said "to have opened the doors of knowledge."—B.

605 The simplest and most common musical instrument used by the Greeks, was the "tibia," or pipe.—B.

606 According to Hardouin, the Phrygians invented the pipes employed by hired mourners at funerals, or, more probably, were the first to adopt the use of the pipes at that ceremony.—B.

607 Which was played on the side, like the German flute of the present day.

608 It was not uncommon for two "tibiæ," or pipes, to be played upon by one performer at the same time, one being held in each hand.

609 Apuleius, Flor. B. i. c. 4, characterizes the different kinds of music, termed "moduli" by Pliny, as follows: the Æolian, as simple, the Asiatic varied, the Lydian plaintive, the Phrygian solemn, and the Doric warlike.—B.

610 According to the mythological traditions, Mercury, when a child, found the shell of a tortoise on the banks of the Nile, and made it into a lyre, by stretching three strings across; he presented it to Apollo, and he gave it to Orpheus, who added two strings to it; after the death of Orpheus, his lyre was placed among the stars, and forms the constellation still known by that name.—B.

611 He was a native of Miletus, and contemporary with Philip, the father of Alexander the Great. The fact of Timotheus having accompanied Alexander in his expedition to Asia, which forms the basis of Dryden's immortal Ode, is not supported by any historical authority.—B.

612 Pausanias (Corinth) informs us, that he was the son of Vulcan, and invented the tibia, but he does not mention his vocal powers.—B.

613 According to Hardouin, the first of these, the "saltatio armata," or "armed dance," was performed on foot, and with wooden armour; the second, the Pyrrhic dance, was performed on horseback, and consisted in the dextrous management of the animals. Pyrrhus, from whom the dance received its name, was the son of Achilles.—B.

614 The honour of the invention has been given to Phemonoë, a priestess of the oracle of Delphi.—B.

615 Apuleius, Flor. B. ii. c. 15, says that Pherecydes was the first to dis- regard the fetters of verse, and to write in desultory language. Pliny, however, in B. v. c. 31, has ascribed the invention of prose to Cadmus. Hardouin endeavours to reconcile this inconsistency, by supposing that Cadmus was the first prose writer of history, and that Pherecydes first applied prose to philosophical subjects. But Cicero, De Orat. B. ii. c. 12, speaks of Pherecydes as a writer of simple annals.—B.

616 There are several persons of this name among the kings and heroes of the semi-fabulous periods; but the one here mentioned is said to have been the son of Phoroneus, and to have lived about 1400 B.C. These games were celebrated in honour of Pan; the combatants were naked, and had the body anointed with oil; the Lupercalia of the Romans, in many respects, resembled the games of Lycaon. We are informed by Livy, B. i. c. 5, that the Lupercalia were introduced into Italy by Evander, the Arcadian.—B. Ovid, in the Fasti, B. i., states to the same effect.

617 Iolcos was a city of Thessaly, from which place the Argonauts embarked on their expedition to Colchis; Acastus was one of them; the funereal games which he instituted were in honour of his father, Pelias.—B.

618 See B. iv. c. 10.

619 The Isthmian games were originally instituted by Sisyphus, king of Corinth; after having been interrupted for some time, they were reestablished by Theseus, who celebrated them in honour of Neptune.—B.

620 These were the celebrated Olympic games; Diodorus Siculus, B. iv. c. 3, Pausanias, and other ancient writers, as well as Pliny, ascribe their origin to Hercules; Pausanias, however, says, that some supposed them to have been instituted by Jupiter.—B.

621 "Pila lusoria." There have been many conjectures respecting the person to whom this invention is attributed, as well as respecting the nature of the game itself; in either case it appears that we have nothing but mere conjecture to direct our opinion.—B. Among the Romans, the games with the "pila, or ball," were those played with the "pila trigonalis," so called, probably, from the players standing in a triangle: the "follis" was a large ball inflated, and used for football. "Paganica" was a similar ball, but harder, being stuffed with feathers, and used by rustics. "Harpastum" was a small ball, used by the Greeks, and was scrambled for on reaching the ground.

622 The MSS. differ as to the name of the person to whom the invention of painting is ascribed; but, in those which are considered the most worthy of credit, he is called Gyges Ludius. Marcus endeavours to prove, that the term "Ludius" refers to the country of Lud or Ludim, to the south of Egypt; and he points out some analogies between the name Gyges, and some words which are found in ancient inscriptions, or which are still in use among the Nubians and Abyssinians. Pliny, B. xxxv. c. 5, attri- butes the invention of painting to the Egyptians, and says, that "it was practised by them long before it was known in Greece."—B.

623 The term Euchir, εὔχειρ, which is literally "dextrous or handy," would rather seem to be a prefix to a name, than a proper name itself. With respect to Polygnotus, and the share which he had in the invention of painting, the reader may examine what Pliny says in a subsequent part of his work, B. xxxv. c. 35.—B.

624 The vessel in which Danaüs came into Greece, may, probably, have been of a much superior construction, or much larger than those previously seen in that country; but it is generally supposed, that Cecrops, Cadmus, and the other Egyptian and Phœnician colonists, had come by sea to Greece, long before the arrival of Danaüs. In the ancient Egyptian monuments there are representations of different kinds of vessels of considerable size, which would imply a knowledge of the art of navigation at a very remote period. The same is proved by the traditionary annals of the Egyptians.—B.

625 The word here used, "ratis," would appear to be applied to any species of slightly built vessel, of whatever form. The term raft is not altogether appropriate, but we have no English word which exactly corresponds to it.—B.

626 According to the generally received account, Erythras migrated from Persia to Tyrrhina, an island in the Red Sea. See B. vi. c. 28 and 32.—B.

627 It has been conjectured, that the ancient Britons borrowed the peculiar form of their vessels from the Phœnicians, who were known to have frequented the south-west coasts of our island. Small vessels, not unlike those here described by Pliny, were used very lately, by the fishermen in the Bristol channel.—B. They are still used by the Welsh fishermen, and are made of oil-cloth or leather stretched on a frame. They are called by the Welch cwrwgle, whence our word "coracle."

628 By the term "longa navis," here used, Pliny probably designates a vessel which was propelled by a number of rowers, ranged side by side, in contradistinction to the small skiffs which were moved along, either by a sail or a single pair of oars, and were more of a rounded form.—B.

629 Ctesias has already been referred to, in c. 2 of the present Book.—B.

630 One of her most remarkable exploits was her expedition against India, of which we have an account in Diodorus Siculus, B. ii.; he says that she fitted out a fleet of between 2000 and 3000 vessels.—B.

631 From the account of Damastes, given by Hardouin, he was a native of Sigæum, whose works appear to have been held in considerable estimation by the ancients.—B.

632 There were at least three ancient cities of the name Erythræ, but the one most noted was situate on the coast of the Ægean Sea, opposite to the Isle of Chios.—B.

633 The passage in Thucydides here referred to, is in B. i. c. 13.—B.

634 There appears to be much uncertainty respecting the statements made in the concluding part of this paragraph, in consequence of the variation of the MSS.—B.

635 The position of the rowers, in the vessels of the ancients, and, more especially, the mode in which the ranks, or "ordines," were disposed with respect to each other, has been a subject of much discussion. From the incidental remarks in the classical writers, and from the representations which still remain, particularly those on Trajan's Column, and on certain coins, it would appear that they were disposed in stages, one above the other, and provided with oars of different lengths, in proportion to their distance from the water. But, although we may conceive that this was the case with two or three rows, it is impossible that a greater number could have been disposed in this manner.—B.

636 It is not easy to determine what was the construction and form of the four kinds of vessels here mentioned, which he designates respectively by the terms "lembus," "cymba," "celes," and "cercurus." The "lem- bus" is mentioned by Livy, B. xxiv. c. 40, as a vessel with two benches of oars, "biremis;" and in B. xl. c. 4, he describes it as a small vessel used for towing large ships. The "cymba" has been supposed to have been a still smaller vessel, answering to our idea of a common boat; the "celes," we may suppose, was named from "celer," being especially adapted for quick motion, and the "cercurus" from κερκὸς, "a tail," from its long narrow form, or from its having a tail-like appendage attached to it.—B.

637 Hardouin conjectures, that the cities of Copæ and Platæ derived their names, respectively, from the inventions here ascribed to them, κωπὴ and πλατὴ.—B.

638 Pausanias ascribes this invention to Dædalus; Diodorus, B. v. c. 1, to Æolus, who gave his name to the Æolian islands.—B.

639 "Hippagus."—B.

640 "Tecta longa;" Cæsar, Bell. Civ. B. i. c. 56, says that the Massilians fitted out long ships, of which eleven were "tectæ."—B.

641 Ships of war had their prows armed with brazen beaks, to which sharp spears were attached; these were used in their naval engagements as instruments of attack, and, when the vessels were captured, were considered the trophies of victory. The tribunal, in the Roman Forum, from which the orators harangued the people, obtained its name of "Rostra," from its being ornamented with the beaks of captured ships.—B.

642 The "harpago" and the "manus ferrea" are mentioned by Cæsar, Bell. Civ. B. i. c. 57, and by Livy, B. xxx. c. 10; Quintus Curtius also speaks of them, but considers them as only different names for the same instrument, B. iv. c. 2, 12.—B.

643 Tiphys was the pilot of the vessel of the Argonauts; he died before the expedition reached Colchis.—B.

644 Hardouin remarks upon this passage, that Pliny probably means to speak of the persons who first killed oxen or other animals for what may be styled profane purposes; as they had long before this been employed for sacrifice.—B.

645 Herodotus, B. v. c. 59, says that the Phœnician letters were very similar to the Ionian; and we are informed by Hardouin, that Scaliger, in his Dissertation upon an ancient inscription on a column discovered in the Via Appia, and removed to the Farnese Gardens, has proved that the Ionians borrowed their letters from the Phœnicians.—B.

646 Herodotus confirms this opinion by a reference to an ancient tripod at Thebes, written in what he terms Cadmæn letters, having a strong resemblance to those used by the Ionians.—B.

647 Tacitus, Ann. B. ix. c. 14, says, "The Latin letters have the same form as the most ancient Greek ones."—B.

648 There is scarcely a letter of this inscription which has not been controverted, and no two editions hardly agree.—B.

649 Probably the earliest existing reference to the practice of shaving is in Genesis, xli. 14, where Joseph is said to have shaved and changed his raiment, when brought from prison into the presence of Pharaoh; in this case, we may presume that it was the head, and perhaps not the beard, which was shaven.—B.

650 The ancients had two methods of arranging the beard; in one it was cut close to the skin, in the other it was trimmed by means of a comb, and left of a certain length. These two methods are alluded to by Plautus, Capt. ii. 2, 16:—B. "Now the old fellow is in the barber's shop; at this very instant is the other handling the razor—But whether to say that he is going to shave him close, or to trim him through the comb, I know not."

651 Varro, De Re Rus. B. ii., states this fact in almost the same words. He remarks, in continuation, that the old statues prove that there were formerly no barbers, by the length of their beard and hair.—B.

652 "Africanus sequens;" he was the son of Paulus Æmilius, the conqueror of Perseus, and the adopted son of Scipio Africanus. In consequence of his conquest of Carthage, he was named Africanus the Younger. His custom of shaving is alluded to by Aulus Gellius, B. iii. c. 4. From the remarks of these writers, we may conclude that the Romans were not generally in the habit of shaving until after the age of forty.—B.

653 "Cultus." Suetonius gives a different account of the method in which Augustus managed his beard. After remarking upon his carelessness as to his personal appearance, he says, that Augustus sometimes cropped, "tonderet," and sometimes shaved, "raderet," his beard. Dion. Cassius mentions the period when Augustus began to shave, the consulship of L. Marcius Censorinus and C. Calvicius Sabinus, A.U.C. 714; he was then in his twenty-fourth year.—B.

654 In B. ii. c. 78; where Pliny says, that the first clock was made at Lacedæmon, by Anaximander; he was the contemporary of Servius Tullius, who commenced his reign 577 B.C.—B.

655 "Accensus;" he was one of the public servants of the magistrates, and was so called from his office of summoning the people to the public meetings (acciere).—B.

656 See also B. xxxiii. c. 6. This was a place in Rome appropriated to the Greek ambassadors; it is mentioned by Cicero, in a letter to his brother, Quintus, B. ii. c. 1.—B. It stood on the right side of the Comitium, being allotted to the Greeks from the allied states, for the purpose of hearing the debates in the comitia curiata.

657 This column is supposed to have stood near the end of the Forum, on the Capitoline Hill. It was C. Mænius (in whose honour it was erected) who defeated the Antiates, and adorned the Forum with the "rostra," or beaks of their ships, from which the "rostrum," or orator's stage, took its name. His statue was placed on the column. He was consul in B.C. 338. See B. xxxiv. c. 11.

658 Hardouin supposes that this event took place in the consulship of Papirius Cursor, A.U.C. 461, B.C. 292. According to the commonly received Chronology, Pyrrhus came into Italy, B.C. 280, twelve years after the consulship of Papirius Cursor.—B.

659 According to Censorinus, in his treatise, De Die Natali, it was difficult to decide which was the most ancient dial in Rome; some writers agreeing with Pliny, that it was the one in the Temple of Quirinus, others that in the Capitol, and others the one in the Temple of Diana, on the Aventine.—B.

660 Marcus conjectures, that this account of the dial was contained in the work of Varro, De Rebus Humanis, referred to by Aulus Gellius, B. iii. c. 2, but not now extant.—B.

661 Owing to the circumstance of the dial having been adapted to the latitude of Catina, now Catania, about four degrees south of Rome—B.

662 Vitruvius describes this instrument. Marcus, Ajasson, vol. vi. pp. 218, 219, gives us an account of two kinds of elepsydræ, or water-clocks, which were constructed by the Greeks.—B. See also the account of clocks in Beckmann's History of Inventions, vol. i.

663 See end of B. iii.

664 He was a contemporary of the Gracchi, and was author of a History of Rome, down to B.C. 145 at least; supposed to have been very voluminous and full in its details of the legendary history of the Roman nation. Livy probably borrowed extensively from it.

665 See end of B. ii.

666 A hearer of Ateius Capito, and celebrated as a jurist under Tiberius and later emperors. From him a school of legists, called the Sabiniani, took their rise. He wrote some works on the Civil Law. Pliny quotes him, as we have seen, in c. 4, to show the possibility of gestation being to the thirteenth month.

667 Daughter of the elder Agrippina and Germanicus, and the mother of Nero. Her memoirs of her life are quoted by Tacitus, but we have no remains of them.

668 The great Roman orator and philosopher.

669 A distinguished orator, poet, and historian of the Augustan age. He was an active partisan of Cæsar, and the patron of Horace and Virgil, whose property he saved from confiscation. He wrote a history of the civil war in seventeen books, but none of his works have come down to us. His tragedies are highly spoken of by Virgil and Horace.

670 See end of B. ii.

671 Nothing whatever seems to be known relative to this author, who is mentioned in c. 53 of this Book. See the Note to that passage.

672 See end of B. ii.

673 The author of the Æneid and the Georgics, the friend of Augustus, Pollio, and Mæcenas, one of the most virtuous men of ancient time, and the greatest probably of the Latin poets.

674 See end of B. vi.

675 Cremutius Cordus, a Roman historian, who was impeached before Tiberius, by two of his clients, for having praised Brutus, and styled Cassius "the last of the Romans," his real offence being the freedom with which, in his work, he had spoken against Sejanus. He starved himself to death, and the senate ordered his works to be burnt. Some copies, however, were preserved by his daughter, Marcia, and his friends.

676 C. Mæcenas Melissus, a native of Spoletum. He was of free birth, but exposed in his infancy, and presented to be reared by Mæcenas. He was afterwards manumitted, and obtained the favour of Augustus, who employed him to arrange the library in the portico of Octavia. At an advanced age he commenced the composition of a collection of jokes and bon-mots. He also wrote plays of a novel character, which he styled "Trabeatæ."

677 See end of B. ii.

678 A. Cornelius Celsus, the celebrated writer on medicine. Little is known of his age or origin, or even his profession. It is supposed, however, that he lived in the time of Augustus and Tiberius. His treatises on Medicine and Surgery are still used as hand—Books for the medical student, and his style is much admired for its purity.

679 Or Valerius Maximus. He is supposed to have lived in the time of Tiberius, and wrote nine books on memorable deeds and sayings, which still survive, and are replete with curious information.

680 Trogus Pompeius, the Roman Historian, on whose work Justin founded his history. His grandfather, who was of the Gaulish tribe of the Vocontii, received the citizenship of Rome during the war against Sertorius; and his father was a private secretary of Julius Cæsar. Except as set forth in the pages of Justin, no portion of his history, except a few scattered fragments, exists. The quotations from him in Pliny, are thought to have been all taken from a treatise of his, "De Animalibus," mentioned by Charisius, and not from his historical works.

681 See end of B. vi.

682 The friend and correspondent of Cicero, descended from one of the most ancient equestrian families of Rome. His surname was, probably, given to him from his long residence at Athens, and his intimate acquaintance with the Greek language and literature. Though, generally, of a virtuous character, he neglected no means of making money, and was, consequently, a man of great opulence. He wrote a book of Annals, or rather an Epitome of Roman History, which, like the rest of his works, has perished,

683 He lived in the time of Augustus and Tiberius, and is mentioned by the Eusebian Chronicle, as becoming blind in his seventy-third year, during the reign of Vespasian, and attaining the age of eighty-five. He wrote a work on the Life of Sallust another on the Censurers of Virgil, and commentaries on the speeches of Cicero, of which alone a few portions are still extant, and are of considerable value in a historical as well as a grammatical point of view.

684 Probably Papirius Fabianus. See end of B. ii.

685 See end of B. iii.

686 See end of B. v.

687 Nothing whatever is known relative to this author.

688 See end of B. ii.

689 He is said to have written an epic poem, called Arimaspeia, full of marvellous stories respecting the Arimaspi and the golden regions. See c. 2 of the present Book, and Note 98 in p. 211, where some further particulars relative to him will be found.

690 See end of B. v.

691 He was a native of Nicæa, in Bithynia, and the author of some works, characterized as being full of incredible stories. Cyril, however, says, that he was born at Cittium, and Gellius styles him a writer of no small authority. He is generally looked upon as belonging to the class of writers called Paradoxographi.

692 See end of B. iv.

693 Or Agatharchus, a Greek grammarian of Cnidos. He was, as we learn from Strabo, attached to the Peripatetic school of philosophy, and wrote several historical and geographical works. He was living in the reign of Ptolemy Philometer, who died B.C. 146. His works, which were very numerous, are enumerated by Photius.

694 See end of B. iii.

695 See end of B. ii.

696 See end of B. iii.

697 Strabo, in B. ii. speaks of a Periplus of Europe, written by a person of this name. There was also a physician called Apollonides, a native of Cos, who practised at the court of Artaxerxes Longimanus, where he was eventually put to death.

698 A Greek historian of the reign of Ptolemy Euergetes, and said by different authors to have been a native of Athens, Naucratis in Egypt, and Sicyon. He wrote a work on history, of considerable value, though his credit as an historian has been violently attacked by Polybius.

699 Of Cyrene, an author of uncertain date. He wrote a work on the philosophers.

700 See end of B. v.

701 See end of B. ii.

702 Nothing is known of this writer.

703 For Eudoxus of Cnidos, see end of B. ii: and for Eudoxus of Cyzicus, see end of B. vi.

704 See end of B. ii.

705 See end of B. vi.

706 Of Samos, a descendant of Alcibiades, who flourished in the time of Ptolemy Philadelphus. When a boy, he gained a pugilistic victory at Olympia. He eventually became tyrant of Samos; but nothing further is known of his career. From what Pliny says, in c. 40. of B. iii., he is supposed to have been living in the year B.C. 281. He was the author of a history of Greece, and other historical works, of which, however, we possess no remains.

707 See end of B. ii.

708 Of Cos, the father of the medical art, and in many respects the most celebrated physician of ancient or modern times. It is supposed that he flouished in the fifth century before Christ. A great number of medical works, still extant, have been attributed to him: but there were many other physicians who either had, or assumed, this name.

709 Of Prusa, in Bithynia. He is mentioned in c. 37 of this Book. See Note 44 in p. 183.

710 Of Ascra, in Bœotia, the earliest of the Greek poets, with the exception of Homer. His surviving works, are his "Works and Days," and the "Theogony."

711 Of Teos, in Asia Minor, famous for his amatory and lyric poems; he died at the age of eighty-five. Pliny mentions the supposed mode of his death. in c. 5, of the present Book.

712 See end of B. ii.

713 See end of B. iv.

714 See end of B. iv.

715 See end of B. iv.

716 See end of B. ii.

717 A priest of Belus, at Babylonia, and a historian of the time of Alexander the Great. He wrote a History of Babylonia, of which some fragments are preserved by the ecclesiastical writers.

718 See end of B. ii.

719 See end of B. ii.

720 See end of B. iii.

721 See end of B. iv.

722 See end of B. iv.

723 See end of B. ii.

724 An Athenian, who wrote a history of Greece and Sicily in twenty-six or twenty-seven books, coming down to B.C. 298, from which time Psaon of Platæa continued it.

725 Of Lampsacus, a Peripatetic philosopher, and tutor of Ptolemy Philadelphus. He succeeded Theophrastus, B.C. 288, as head of that school. He devoted himself to the study of natural science, and appears to have held a pantheistic system of philosophy. By Cudworth, Leibnitz, and others, he has been charged with atheism. The "Euremata" of Ephorus, here mentioned, was a book which treated of inventions.

726 See end of B. iv.

727 Of Tragilus, in Thrace, a disciple and contemporary of Isocrates. His book, here mentioned, treated on the subjects chosen by the Greek tragic writers, and the manner in which they had dealt with them.

728 Of Cyrene, the friend or disciple of Callimachus. He flourished under Ptolemy Philadelphus, about B.C. 249. He wrote works on places in Asia, on Rivers, and on Islands; but none of his compositions have survived.

729 A native of Magnesia, who wrote on rhetoric and history, probably in the early part of the third century B.C. Strabo speaks but slightingly of him; and Cicero and Dionysius of Halicarnassus agree in looking upon him as a downright blockhead. Upon the other hand, Varro rather admires his style. The history of Alexander the Great was his favourite theme; and he is represented by Aulus Gellius as dealing rather largely in the marvellous.

730 Mentioned by Athenæus as having written a history of Eubœa.

731 See end of B. iii.; and see c. 31 of the present Book, and Note 6 in p. 175.

732 Nothing whatever appears to be known of this writer.

733 See end of B. iv.

734 See end of B. iii.

735 See end of B. iv.

736 See end of B. ii.

The Natural History. Pliny the Elder. John Bostock, M.D., F.R.S. H.T. Riley, Esq., B.A. London. Taylor and Francis, Red Lion Court, Fleet Street. 1855.

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