Category: History - Ancient
35. Birds which take their departure from us, and whither they go; the thrush, the blackbird, and the starling—birds which lose their feathers during their retirement—the turtle-dove and the ring-dove—the flight of starlings and swallows _ib._
35. Birds which take their departure from us, and whither they go; the thrush, the blackbird, and the starling—birds which lose their feathers during their retirement—the turtle...
6. BOOK VI.The Euxine[1] Sea, which in former times had the name of Axenus,[2] from the savage and inhospitable character of the nations living on its borders, by a peculiar whim of nature...
7. BOOK VII.[835Such then is the present state of the world, and of the countries, nations, more remarkable seas, islands, and cities which it contains.[836] The nature of the animated beings w...
8. BOOK VIII.Let us now pass on to the other animals, and first of all to the land animals. The elephant is the largest of them all, and in intelligence approaches the nearest to man. It und...
9. BOOK IX.We have now given an account of the animals which we call terrestrial, and which live as it were in a sort of society with man. Among the remaining ones, it is well known that t...
10. BOOK X.The history of the birds[2878] follows next, the very largest of which, and indeed almost approaching to the nature of quadrupeds, is the ostrich[2879] of Africa or[2880] Æthiop...
11. c. 18, informs us, that the first library, formed for the use ofthe 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 us...
12. 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 s...
13. c. 28, give a similar account of the district in which lions arefound.—B. Littré remarks, that this statement of Pliny is probably formed, as originally suggested by M. Maury, upon the fact, that the lions of Europe, as we learn from Herodot...
14. c. 44, speaks of the two species of lions, and describes them nearly as[1668] According to Cuvier, this is not the case; the lion passes its urine just as the other animals of the same family. Pliny again refers to the odour of the lion’s breath, i...
15. xliii. In the time of the Emperor Gordian, ten of these animals wereexhibited at Rome at once; a remarkable fact, when we bear in mind that so few have been imported into Europe for many centuries past. The giraffe is figured in the mosaic at Pr...
16. c. 32, accounts for the vulgar error, by stating that the hyæna hasa peculiar structure of the parts about the anus, which might, to an unpractised eye, give the idea, that it possesses the generative organs of both sexes. Ælian, Anim. Nat. B....
17. c. 2; according to the usual estimate, the sum here mentioned amounts18. c. 1, enlarge upon the valuable qualities of the ass for agricultural[1934] This property is mentioned by Herodotus, B. iv. c. 28, and by Aristotle, Hist. Anim. B. viii. c. 27, also De Gener. Anim. B. ii. c. 8, and by Strabo, B. vii. The ass is a...
19. c. 7 of the Ninth Book, Pliny mingles with many facts that really dobelong to the real dolphin, one trait which is quite foreign to it. ‘It is so swift,’ says he, ‘that were it not for the fact that its mouth is situate much beneath its muzzle,...
20. l. 112, is far from applicable to the dory, which is common enoughin the Mediterranean. If, indeed, the χαλκεὺς of the Greeks were the same as the “faber,” as, indeed, we have reason to suppose, it would be something in favour of the dory, as...
21. c. 8, that these crabs had shorter feet and thinner than those of the[2569] “Leones.” This name is not found in Aristotle’s account, but it is found in Athenæus, B. iii. c. 106; and in Ælian, Hist. Anim. B. xiv. c. 9. According to Diphilus, as qu...