callyd reward for cause that it is etyn on the erthe and not on the
skyn.”
[Sidenote: =Mayster of Game.= c. +xiv.+ fol. 62.]
“Goodnesse of greyhoundes cometh of ryght corage and of the good nature
of her fader and modir, and also men may wel helpe to make hem good in
the encharmyng of hem with other good greihoundes and feede hem wel in
the beest that he taketh.”
[Sidenote: Countrey Content. B. +i.+ p. 51.]
“In coursing,” says Markham, “you shall observe two things, bloud
and labour; bloud, which is a hartening and animating of your dogge
to delight in the pleasure, when he findes the reward of his paines
taking; for if a dog course continually, and never kill, the sport
will growe yrksome to him, and therefore, now and then, give him such
advantage that he may kill the hare—then labour, which is contrary to
killing; for in it you must give the hare all indifferent advantage,
both by lawe and otherwise, whereby she may stand long before the dogge
and make him shewe his uttermost strength before he be able to reach
her.”
[208]
[Sidenote: De Venat. c. +iv.+]
So Xenophon: ἔστι δὲ καὶ, ἄνευ τοῦ εὑρίσκειν τὸν λαγῶ, ἀγαθὸν, ἄγειν
τὰς κύνας εἰς τὰ τραχέα· καὶ γὰρ εὔποδες γίγνονται, καὶ τὰ σώματα
διαπονοῦσαι ἐν τόποις τοιούτοις ὠφελοῦνται.
[Sidenote: Natalis Comes de Venatione. L. +i.+]
Nec nulla hinc merces sequitur te digna laborum
In loca dura canes si duxeris, aspera montis
Per juga sylvestri populo vix pervia sæpe.
Scilicet hinc ungues solidæ, corpusque labori
Aptius est parvo, magnum quod pertulit ante!
[Sidenote: =Mayster of Game.= c. +xiii.+ fol. 59.]
“Whan thei be at sojourne, men shuld lede hem out every day a myle or
ij upon gravel, or upon right an hard pathe, bi a revere syde, bicause
that her feet may be harder.”
[209]
[Sidenote: De Venat. c. +vii.+]
Περὶ τῶν εἰς ἰχνείαν ἀσκουμένων κυνῶν—Spartan hounds, Castorians and
Foxites—with regard to which, Xenophon recommends that the hare should
be out of sight before they be allowed to follow her; lest, from being
too near their game, such as are high-couraged and swift of foot
might be injured by too much exertion in pursuit. It is unnecessary
to observe that the elder Athenian’s remarks are inapplicable to the
courser’s hound, who runs entirely by the eye; and the nearer he is
slipped to the hare, if he be only just entered, the better. A hare
will always beat a puppy in his noviciate, unaided by an old and
experienced hound.
[210] Μαινομένῃ ἔοικεν.
[Sidenote: Apollon. Rhod. L. +iv.+ vs. 1393.]
Λυσσαλέοις δ’ ἤπειτ’ ἴκελοι κυσὶν ἀΐσσοντες.
[211] He now gives in detail his instructions for entering greyhound
puppies to their appointed game, in opposition to those of Xenophon’s
seventh chapter; nor can the most experienced courser add to them
any thing worth knowing, nor the most ignorant complain of their
insufficiency.
[212] Πονούμενος ὁ λαγὼς ὑποκάμψας ἥξει. To the same point sings the
poet of Barga:
[Sidenote: P. Ang. Bargæi Cyneg. L. +v.+]
Quæque adeo multo jamdudum tarda labore
Genua trahat, primæve annis incauta juventæ
Continuò sese facili det cæde vorandam,
Namque animum, si spes olim frustrentur inanes,
Ipse suæ sibi virtutis malè conscius acrem
Abjicit, et dubiæ, desperat præmia palmæ.
[213] Οὐκ ἐπειδὴ τὰ κρέα ἄρα περὶ πολλοῦ ποιητέον ἀνδρὶ ἐς κάλλος
κυνηγετοῦντι. And yet we find that the hare’s flesh was in high
estimation with epicures of old; and a coursed hare is particularly
lauded by Martial among the luxuries of a country table,
[Sidenote: L. +iii.+ Epigram. 47.]
Leporemque læsum Gallici canis dente.
In our own country, the sportsman was as attentive to supply the hall
of banquet with its due portion of the delicate little animal, as the
kennel with its appointed halow.
[Sidenote: Booke of St. Alban’s.]
Thenne the loynes of the haare loke ye not forgete;
But brynge theym to the kechyn for the lordes mete—
says the dignified Prioress of Sopewell, in her metrical canons of
hunting.
See also “The Venery de Twety and of Mayster John Giffarde.” Fouilloux,
p. 69. Turberville, p. 174. and Gervase Markham, C. C. p. 33.
[214] Πονηρὸν μάθημα. It certainly is wrong to allow a greyhound to
gorge himself with his game, after he has been sufficiently instructed
in the art of killing; but no puppy should be hastily checked, when he
has caught his hare, even though, in the words of old Gervase, “he may
breake her.”
[215] Few coursers wait till the period specified before they enter
their dog-puppies: but it occasionally happens that dogs entered at
fifteen months old, if they are large and unset in their limbs, break
down under severe work, and are rendered subsequently useless; while
others, again, more neat and compact of shape, will run as well at
eighteen months as at any later period.
[Sidenote: =Mayster of Game.= c. +xiii.+ fol. 52.]
“Men shuld late renne no houndes,” says Duke Edmund, “of what
condicions that thei be of, ne nat hunte with hem in to the tyme that
thei were a +xii+ mounthis olde and passed, and also thei may hunt but
+ix+ yeer at the moost.”
[216] Φυλάττειν δὲ καὶ ἀπὸ ὀχείας.
[Sidenote: Lucret. L. +v.+ vs. 1016.]
Venus imminuit vires!
[Sidenote: Virgil. Georg. +iii.+ 209.]
——non ulla magis vires industria firmat,
Quàm Venerem et cæci stimulos avertere amoris.
[Sidenote: De Re Rust. L. +vii.+ c. +xii.+]
Columella, who admits the dog and bitch to copulate much earlier than
Arrian, is still aware of the mischievous consequences of the practice;
“si teneris conceditur,” says he, “carpit et corpus et vires, animosque
degenerat.”
[Sidenote: Vanierii Præd. Rust. L. +iv.+]
Blanda Venus canibus non permittenda tenellis.
[Sidenote: Pollux. L. +v.+ c. +vii.+]
As to the exact period at which the εὐνῆς ἔργα of Oppian (Hal. i. 532.)
should commence, and their probable duration, without risk of breeding
from animals too far advanced in years, there is some difference of
opinion. According to Pollux, ὥρα ἀρίστη κυνῶν πρὸς πλήρωσίν τε καὶ
γένεσιν, τῷ μὲν ἄῤῥενι τετάρτου ἔτους ἀρξαμένου, τελευταῖον τὸ ὄγδοον·
ἡ δὲ θήλεια τριετὶς, μέχρι ἑξαετίδος συνδυαζέσθω.
[Sidenote: Columella De Re Rust. L. +vii.+ c. +xii.+]
[Sidenote: Plin. Hist. Nat. L. +viii.+ c. 40.]
“Mares juveniliter usque in annos decem progenerant: post id tempus
ineundis fœminis non videntur habiles, quoniam seniorum pigra soboles
existit. Fœminæ concipiunt usque in annos novem, nec sunt utiles post
decimum,” according to Columella: while Pliny admits both dog and bitch
at a year old—“canum generibus annui partus, justa ad pariendum annua
ætas.”
[Sidenote: Hist. Quadrup. L. +i.+ De Cane.]
Conrad Gesner cites an ancient, nameless authority, to the following
effect: “Mares quarto anno gignere incipiant, (operâ scilicet hominum
admittentium tunc primùm robustioris generandæ sobolis gratiâ,) fœminæ
tertio usque in nonum.”
If a courser follow Virgil’s rule as to milch kine, in limiting the
age of his brood bitch for the purposes alluded to, he will find it
perfectly applicable:
[Sidenote: Georg. +iii.+ 60.]
Ætas Lucinam justosque pati hymenæos
Desinit ante decem, post quatuor incipit annos.
After the fourth year, no greyhound can be depended on for fair
running, and therefore may be well spared, to keep up the kennel stock,
when no longer useful in the field:
[Sidenote: Fracastorii Alcon.]
——ut generosa canum tibi copia nunquam
Desit.
[217]
[Sidenote: Countrey Contentments. B. +i.+ p. 47.]
[Sidenote: Virg. Georg. +iii.+ 96.]
Ἀπὸ τρίτου μὲν ἔτους ἐφίεσθαι—“You shall observe,” says Markham, “to
have your dogges and bitches of equal and indifferent ages, as about
three or foure years old at the most. But in case of need, your bitch
will endure a great deale longer than your dogge, and to breed with
a young dogge on an old bitch, may bring forth an excellent whelpe.”
“Frigidus in Venerem senior—.”
After describing a good-shaped bitch, Nemesian adds:
[Sidenote: Nemesian. Cyneg. vs. 114.]
Huic parilem submitte marem, sic omnia magnum,
Dum superant vires, dum læto flore juventus,
Corporis et venis primævi sanguis abundat.
Namque graves morbi subeunt, segnisque senectus:
Invalidamque dabunt non firmo robore prolem.
Sed diversa magis fœturæ convenit ætas.
Tu bis vicenis plenum jam mensibus acrem
In Venerem permitte marem: sit fœmina, binos
Quæ tulerit soles. Hæc optima cura jugandis.
Gratius would have a general parity of character in both male and
female,
[Sidenote: Cyneg. vs. 263.]
Junge pares ergo, et majorum pignore signa
Fœturam.
And Bargæus agrees with him that the similarity should extend to the
essential points of age, shape, and bodily powers:
[Sidenote: P. Angelii Bargæi Cyneg. L. +v.+]
——conjunge unà qui corpore, quique
Sint ætate pares, atque iisdem viribus, ut mox
Ipsa tuis votis similis fœtura sequatur.
[Sidenote: De Re Rust. L. +vii.+ c. 9.]
[Sidenote: C. C. Booke +i.+ and Countrey Farme, c. +xxii.+]
Columella is mistaken if he intends his observations on breeding in
general, (delivered in his chapter on swine-breeding), to apply to the
canine race. “In omni genere quadrupedum,” says he, “species maris
diligenter eligitur, quoniam frequenter patri similior est progenies
quàm matri.” Markham’s comparative view of the merits of the male and
female in breeding for the Celtic kennel will be found more practically
correct. See Countrey Contentments, B. +i.+ The dam should be selected
with the greatest attention to shape, pedigree, and character in the
field; nor should the same points be disregarded in the sire, but they
are not so important in the latter. The chances, however, of producing
a good litter are greater in the ratio of excellence (γενναιότης)
in both parents, their genealogical distinction, the blood of their
“proavorum atavi,” &c. for the reasons stated by the philosophic poet:—
[Sidenote: Lucretii L. +iv.+ vs. 1212.]
Fit quoque ut interdum similes existere avorum
Possint, et referant proavorum sæpè figuras,
Proptereà quia multa modis primordia multis
Mista suo celant in corpore sæpè parentes,
Quæ patribus patres tradunt à stirpe profecta, &c.
It is evident from what the elder Xenophon says on the accoutrements
of the dog, in the sixth chapter of his Cynegeticus, that the Grecian
sportsmen took some pains to preserve the purity of breed of certain
varieties of the dog. Sharp spikes were attached to the στελμονίαι or
body-clothes; ἐγκατεῤῥαμέναι δὲ ἐγκεντρίδες, ἵνα τὰ γένη φυλάττωσι, to
prevent promiscuous connexion.
The remarks of the text are defective on the subject of breeding,
leaving much to be supplied by experience and reference to other
authorities. Arrian, however, was too good a judge of the importance
of purity of blood in the greyhound kennel to attend to the mongrel
crosses recommended by other cynegetical writers, whose object seems to
have been to induce sportsmen to correct the faults or defects of one
species by crossing it with another in which the opposite excellencies
abounded. The ancients, before the time of Arrian at least, had no idea
of correcting the imperfections of individuals of the same species by
selecting from it other individuals in which the same defects were not
apparent, but rather “a redundancy of the desired excellency, coveted
in the imperfect animal.” Such is the plan of Gratius:
[Sidenote: Gratii Cyneg. 193.]
Idcirco variis miscebo gentibus usum.
Quondam inconsultis mater dabit Umbrica Gallis
Sensum agilem, traxêre animos de patre Gelonæ
Hyrcano, et vanæ tantum Calydonia linguæ
Exibit vitium patre emendata Molosso.
Scilicet ex omni florem virtute capessunt,
Et sequitur natura favens.
[Sidenote: De Re Rust. L. +ii.+ c. +ix.+]
[Sidenote: L. +xix.+ c. +i.+]
Varro, however, speaking of the breed of the shepherd’s dog, says
“magni interest ex semine esse canes _eodem_;” by which he means that
it should not be crossed with any hunting breed. But in the “Geoponica”
we are cautioned against allowing those of the same litter to have
sexual connexion with each other, φυλάττεσθαι μή ποτε οἱ ἐκ τῆς αὐτῆς
μητρὸς ὄντες κύνες τῇ πρὸς ἀλλήλους μίξει χρήσαιντο—a circumstance the
more remarkable, because breeding in and in (φωνᾶντα συνέτοισι) was
general in other animals, though not practised in the canine tribe:
[Sidenote: Ovid. Met. L. +x.+]
Coeuntque animalia nullo
Cætera delicto, nec habetur turpe juvencæ
Ferre patrem tergo, fit equo sua filia conjux.
Oppian’s tale to the contrary is not worthy of attention.
The Greek poet of the Chase goes a little farther than his Cynegetical
predecessors on the subject of breeding. His concubinage is
promiscuous, and he seems indifferent whether the varieties united be
both of a mild, or both of a savage disposition, or each different in
its type and character. The male and female are to be suited to each
other, and of superior excellence—
[Sidenote: Cyneg. +i.+ vs. 392.]
ἅρμενα τ’ ἀλλήλοισιν, ἐοικότα τ’ ἔξοχα φῦλα.
Then uniting the Arcadian with the Elean, the Cretan with the
Pannonian, the Carian with the Thracian, the Tuscan with the Spartan,
and the Sarmatian with the Iberian, he concludes with a preference of
pure blood:
ὥδε μὲν εὖ κεράσειας· ἀτὰρ πολὺ φέρτατα πάντων
φῦλα μένει μονόφυλα, τά τ’ ἔξοχα τεκμῄραντο
ἄνδρες ἐπακτῆρες.
[Sidenote: Natalis Comes de Venat. L. +i.+]
gens una tamen felicior unâ
Nascitur ex specie.
[Sidenote: Hist. Quad. L. +i.+ p. 259.]
Belin de Ballu in his “Animadversiones” has evidently mistaken Oppian’s
meaning in the latter part of this citation. The poet alludes to an
union of the qualities of individuals of the same variety of dog;
and not, as supposed by the French critic, to breeding _in and in_,
or proximity of blood, in the same family—a practice as degenerative
in the canine race, if persevered in for a length of time, as the
Stagirite has observed it to be in the human species. See Aristot.
de Rhetoricâ L. +ii.+ c. 17. Brodæus very properly explains μονόφυλα
by ἰδιόφυλα in his annotations. And Conrad Gesner, with his usual
accuracy, says: “Præstantissimi quidem canes in suo quique genere
μονόφυλοι sunt, id est, ex unius generis parentibus prognati: verùm
superflua venatorum cura miscere etiam diversa genera, quæ quidem
innumera sunt, adinvenit.”
[Sidenote: P. Angelii Bargæi Cyneg. L. +v.+]
Ipsa tamen generi sua cuique est maxima virtus.
Et quamvis variis proles genitoribus orta
Testeturque animos, et magnum robur avorum;
Inque uno interdum geminetur pectore duplex
Utilitas; tamen illa alieno protinùs usu
Degenerat, semperque magis producit inertem
Progeniem, et patriâ longè à virtute remotam.
[218]
[Sidenote: Aristotelis Hist. Animal. L. +vi.+ 20.]
Τὰ δὲ καταμήνια ταῖς κυσὶν ἑπτὰ ἡμέραις γίνεται· συμβαίνει δὲ ἅμα καὶ
ἔπαρσις αἰδοίου· ἐν δὲ τῷ χρονῷ τουτῷ οὐ προσίενται ὀχείαν, ἀλλ’ ἐν ταῖς
μετὰ ταύτας ἑπτὰ ἡμέραις· τὰς γὰρ πάσας δοκεῖ σκυζᾷν ἡμέρας τέτταρας
καὶ δέκα ὡς ἐπὶ τὸ πολύ.
[Sidenote: Gratii Cyneg. vs. 163.]
Dat Venus accessus, et blando fœdere jungit.
The son of Gryllus recommends (c. vii.) the same watchful delay to
insure fruitful intercourse: ἄγειν δὲ καταπαυομένας, ἵνα θᾶττον
ἐγκύμονες γίγνωνται, πρὸς κύνας ἀγαθούς. The term καταπαυομένας here
signifies “when their heat is beginning to remit a little,” and not, as
rendered by Blane, “in a quiet manner.”
[Sidenote: Fracastorii Alcon.]
Bis quinas tamen antè dies, accensus uterque
In venerem, venere abstineant; sic plena libido
Acrius exstimulat, viresque ad semina præbet.
Hinc major soboles, atque inde valentior exit.
[219] Ἀγαθὴ δὲ τῇ θηλεία ἡλικία, &c. Marvellous tales are on record
of periods much later than the seventh year, in which bitches have
given birth to numerous progenies; but Arrian has specified a limited
time within which a greyhound bitch may be considered as being at the
acme of her bodily powers, and likely to yield such a litter as will
not disappoint the expectations of the Veltrarius. To Mr. Pope we are
indebted, in his endeavour to reconcile with probability the age of the
Homeric Argus,—
[Sidenote: Odyssey, B. +xvii.+ vs. 394.]
The dog whom fate had granted to behold
His lord, when twenty tedious years had roll’d,—
[Sidenote: Ælian. Hist. Animal. L. +vii.+ c. 29.]
for the almost incredible case of a gravid bitch of the age of
twenty-two years. After which, we may well exclaim in the words of the
Greek naturalist, οὔκουν οὐδὲ Ἄργος ὁ κύων μυθοποίημα ἦν, ὦ θεῖε Ὅμηρε,
σὸν, οὐδὲ κόμπος ποιητικός!
[220] Xenophon merely says that the dog and bitch should be ἀγαθοὶ, and
the Faliscian adds that they be of tried spirit,
[Sidenote: Cyneget. vs. 266.]
Et primum expertos animi, quæ gratia prima est,
In venerem jungunt, &c.
[Sidenote: The Chace. B. +iv.+]
for every longing dame select
Some happy paramour; to him _alone_
In leagues connubial join. Consider well
His lineage; what his fathers did of old,
Chiefs of the pack, &c.
[221] Αἱ γὰρ ἐν τῷ ἐμφανεῖ ὁμιλίαι οὐ γόνιμοι. This ridiculous notion,
though doubtfully advanced in the manual, is supported by many of the
old Cynegetica.
[Sidenote: Gratii Cyneg. 279.]
Sed frustrà longus properat labor, abdita si non
Altas in latebras, unique inclusa marito
Fœmina, nec patitur veneris sub tempore mœchos
Illa, neque emeritæ servat fastigia laudis.
Primi complexus, dulcissima prima voluptas.
Hunc veneri dedit impatiens natura furorem.
[Sidenote: Cynograph. Curios. p. 54.]
The credulous author of the Cynographia Curiosa adds to the absurdity
of the notion by saying, “Si tum videantur canes, venationi inutiles
parient,” borrowing the same from the Cynosophium, where such an
opinion is said to be the result of long experience. See Cynosoph. c.
+ii.+
[222]
[Sidenote: Aristot. Hist. Animal. L. +vi.+]
κυΐσκεταί τε κύων ἐκ μιᾶς ὀχείας· δῆλον δὲ τοῦτο γίνεται μάλιστα ἐν
τοῖς κλέπτουσι τὰς ὀχειάς· ἅπαξ γὰρ ἐπιβάντες πληροῦσι, says the
Stagirite: and again he remarks, that the Spartan dog and bitch
are more inclined to copulate after exercise, a fact well known to
sportsmen: πονήσαντες γὰρ μᾶλλον δύνανται ὀχεύειν, ἢ ἀργοῦντες. (See
Scaliger’s note on the passage, L. +vi.+ c. +xx.+) This circumstance
is also noticed by Ælian and Julius Pollux. Indeed the author of
the Onomasticon, in a passage that has escaped the observation of
commentators, throws considerable light on the text, which is here
rather obscure. See L. +v.+ c. +vi.+ 51. of the Onomasticon.
[Sidenote: P. Angelii Bargæi Cyneg. L. +v.+]
Nec priùs optatam in venerem dimitte volentes,
Quàm rapido quassis cursu, quàm corpora multo
Sole fatigatis vehementior ingruat æstus.
Inde decem noctes, totidemque ex ordine luces
Abde domi, cursusque omnes prohibere memento.
[223]
[Sidenote: Gratii Cyneg. vs. 286.]
A greyhound bitch may be taken out coursing for ten days after having
been warded, but not longer—“Da requiem _gravidæ_, solitosque remitte
labores.” Walking exercise, however, should be continued till the
period of parturition arrive.
[Sidenote: Encyc. Méthod. Sur les Chasses, p. 140.]
“Il est prouvé qu’une lice couverte, qu’on laisse au chenil,
s’engraisse et s’appésantit en cessant de travailler, et qu’en cet
état elle fait ses chiens avec peine, et souvent même elle meurt dans
l’opération”—“on la fait promener de tems en tems dehors, par un valet
de chiens,” &c. &c.
The period of uterine gestation is in the Celtic greyhound the same as
in other varieties of the canine tribe:
[Sidenote: Nemesian. Cyneg. vs. 130.]
Mox cum se bina formârit lampade Phœbe
Ex quo passa marem genitalia viscera turgent,
Fœcundos aperit partus matura gravedo
Continuò, largâque vides strepere omnia prole!
[Sidenote: Hist. Quadrup. De Cane.]
Conrad Gesner remarks: “observavi in canibus nostris nonnullas catellas
gessisse uterum præcisè diebus 60, nonnullas uno insuper aut duobus.
Peregrina leporaria nostra excellens tulit uterum diebus 63.”
[224] Τὸν ἄῤῥενα μὴ ἐφίεναι ἐπὶ λαγών. This caution is unnecessary
for modern coursers, who rarely use the same hound in the field and
kennel, for coursing the hare, and supplying the pack with high-bred
successors. But if the same dog be employed for both purposes, the
interval specified for the restoration of his powers is not too long.
The Cynosophium, however, suggests a shorter period of 30 days, during
which nutritious food is to be administered, and then the stallion
hound may be again taken out for sport.
[225] Although the rule has its exceptions, (see Brodæus in Oppianum,
p. 42.) Aristotle’s observation, that animals in general ὁρμᾶ πρὸς τὸν
συνδυασμὸν in the vernal season, will be found correct.
[Sidenote: Virgil. Georg. +iii.+ 272.]
Vere magis, quià vere calor redit ossibus.
[Sidenote: Oppian. Halieut. L. +i.+ vs. 473.]
εἴαρι δὲ γλυκὺς οἶστρος ἀναγκαίης Ἀφροδίτης
καὶ γάμοι ἡβώωσι, καὶ ἀλλήλων φιλότητες
πᾶσιν ὅσοι γαῖάν τε φερέσβιον, αἵ τ’ ἀνὰ κόλπους
ἠέρος, οἵ τ’ ἀνὰ πόντον ἐριβρύχην δονέονται.
[Sidenote: De Venatione. c. +vii.+]
All the Cynegetica agree with Arrian as to the spring being the most
fit season for breeding and rearing puppies. Ἡ γὰρ ὥρα πρὸς τὰς
αὐξήσεις τῶν κυνῶν κρατίστη αὕτη, says Xenophon; and the same opinion
is repeated by the copyists of later date, with little addition.
Indeed, the reasons alleged in the text are the best that can be
adduced for preferring the spring to any other season:
[Sidenote: Oppian. Cyneg. L. +i.+ v. 375.]
εἰ δὲ νύ τοι κεράσαι φίλον ἔπλετο δῖα γένεθλα,
εἴαρι μὲν πρώτιστα λέχος πόρσυνε κύνεσσιν.
[Sidenote: La Vénerie. p. 9.]
[Sidenote: Countrey Contentments. B. +i.+ p. 26.]
The Cynosophium specifies January and February as the best breeding
months. “La droite saison,” says Fouilloux, “en laquelle doivent
naistre est en Mars, Avril, et May, que le temps est tempéré, et que
les chaleurs ne sont trop véhémentes.” He gives the same reasons as
our author for avoiding summer and autumn, and is, of course, followed
verbatim by Turberville. Markham would “put them together to ingender
and breed, eyther in January, February, or March, according as they
shall grow proud; for those are the three most principall monthes in
the yeare for hound, bitches, or bratches, to be limed in: not but that
they may conceive and bring forth as good whelps in other monthes; but
because there will be much losse of time in the entering of them.” He
farther enjoins that “the moone be eyther in the signe Aquarius or
Gemini; for it is held amongst the best huntsmen of this land, that
the whelpes that are ingendred under those two signes, wil never runne
mad, and for the most part the litter will have at least double so many
dogge whelpes as bitch whelpes.”
[226] Ἄλλως τε καὶ ἀπορίᾳ γάλακτος. The want of this essential
article of nutriment renders the winter objectionable for the rearing
of whelps; but its abundance in the spring gives to this season an
additional claim:
[Sidenote: Nemesian. Cyneg. vs. 158.]
passim nam lactis abundans
Tempus adest, albent plenis et ovilia mulctris.
[227]
[Sidenote: Geoponic. L. +xix.+ c. +ii.+]
[Sidenote: Encyc. Méthod. Les Chasses. p. 139.]
Ὅτι χειμὼν ἐπιλαμβάνει τὰ σκυλάκια. The greyhound puppy is remarkably
tender and susceptible of cold; indeed Fronto says that the whelp
of the pastoral dog requires to be fostered in warmth, δυσχείμερον
γάρ ἐστι τοῦτο τὸ ζῶον: and if an animal, necessarily of a hardy
constitution, be, when young, impatient of severe cold, we shall
readily acknowledge the importance of such a seasonable birth for the
delicate Celtic whelp, as will give him during his period of growth
two summers to one winter. “Il faut, autant qu’il est possible, faire
couvrir les lices à la fin de l’hiver ou au commencement du printems,
par la raison que les jeunes chiens, à qui les froids sont toujours
nuisibles, ont pour eux deux étés contre un hiver, et qu’en conséquence
ils s’élèvent plus aisément.”
[Sidenote: Geoponic. L. +xix.+ c. +i.+]
It is an essential part of kennel management to support brood bitches
with the most nutritious aliment. Varro (in Geoponicis) recommends
barley bread, in preference to wheaten, as more nutritious, with
mutton broth from bones, &c. poured over the bread, to be given before
whelping; and afterwards, barley meal with cow’s or goat’s milk, boiled
bones, and water to drink. The same instructions are delivered, almost
αὐτολεξεὶ, by Varro, de Re Rusticâ, L. +ii.+ c. +ix.+ In the latter
reference, the author expressly says the bitches are more nourished by
barley than wheaten bread, “magis eo aluntur, et lactis præbent majorem
facultatem.” But the experiments of the late Sir H. Davy on the quantum
of nutritious matter contained in the different varieties of bread
corn, and the test to which they have been put, in kennel feeding, by
practical sportsmen, induce us to believe that the “Scriptores de Re
Rusticâ” are mistaken on this point. The farina of wheat is the best
food for brood bitches, boiled with milk, or scalded with meat-broth.
Of the importance of keeping brood bitches on highly nutritious food,
the old huntsman, Pan, “Deus Arcadiæ,” was fully aware; for Diana found
him carving a lynx for their repast:
[Sidenote: Callimach. H. in Dian.]
——ἵκεο δ’ αὖλιν
Ἀρκαδικὴν ἐπὶ Πανός· ὁ δὲ κρέα λυγκὸς ἔταμνε
Μαιναλίης, ἵνα οἱ τοκάδες κύνες εἶδαρ ἔδοιεν.
[228]
[Sidenote: Aristotelis Hist. Animal. L. +vi.+ 286.]
[Sidenote: Aldrovandi de Quad. Digit, Vivip. L. +iii.+]
The number of whelps in a litter varies much. The translator’s
experience affords instances of twelve at a birth, and of a solitary
puppy, from the same Celtic dam. Aristotle states the former number
to be the greatest in a canine litter; but Julius Cæsar Scaliger
(a celebrated dog-fancier) certifies, in his annotations on the
Stagirite’s Animal History, a litter of fourteen whelps, as within his
own knowledge: and this is again surpassed by the case of the canis
leporaria recorded by Aldrovandus, “Canis leporaria hic Bononiæ, unicâ
fœturâ, catulos septenos supra decem enixa est.”
[229]
[Sidenote: De Re Rust. L. +vii.+ c. 12.]
Μὴ ἐᾲν ἐκτρέφειν αὐτήν. Whether the bitch be again required for the
field or not, no humane courser will allow her to suckle more than
four or five whelps. If she be young, Columella advises that the first
litter should be taken from her: “primus effœtæ partus amovendus est,
quoniam tiruncula nec rectè nutrit; et educatio totius habitûs aufert
incrementum.” Nemesian also destroys the first litter, and the smallest
pups of subsequent litters:
[Sidenote: Cyneget. vs. 134.]
Sed quamvis avidus, primos contemnere partus
Malueris, mox non omnes nutrire minores.
Nam tibi si placitum populosos poscere fœtus,
Jam macie tenues, succique videbis inanes,
Pugnantesque diu, quisnam prior ubera lambat,
Distrahere invalidam lassato viscere matrem.
[Sidenote: De Re Rust. L. +ii.+ c. 9.]
[Sidenote: Geoponic. L. +xix.+ c. 2.]
“In nutricatu secundum partum,” says Varro, “si plures sunt, statim
eligere oportet quos habere velis, reliquos abjicere: quàm paucissimos
reliqueris, tam optimi in alendo fiunt propter copiam lactis.” Fronto
also agrees with him, and out of a litter of seven recommends only
three or four to be left with the mother; out of three, only two.
Many are the diagnostics, recorded in the ancient Cynegetica, to assist
the classic sportsman in selecting the most promising puppies:
[Sidenote: Gratii Cyneget. vs. 287.]
tum deinde monebo,
Ne matrem indocilis natorum turba fatiget,
Percensere notis, jamque inde excernere parvos.
Signa dabunt ipsæ, teneris vix artubus hæret
Ille tuos olim non defecturus honores:
Jamque illum impatiens æquæ vehementia sortis
Extulit, affectat maternâ regna sub alvo.
Ubera tota tenet, à tergo liber aperto,
Dum tepida indulget terris clementia mundi.
Verum ubi Caurino perstrinxit frigore vesper
Ira jacet, turbâque potens operitur inerti.
Illius è manibus vires sit cura futuras
Perpensare: leveis deducet pondere fratres:
Nec me pignoribus, nec te mea carmina fallent.
Nemesian demands our assent to a novel and somewhat cruel mode of
ascertaining the best puppies of a numerous litter, and states that it
is founded on actual experiment:
[Sidenote: Nemesian. Cyneget. vs. 144.]
quæ prodidit usus
Percipe, et intrepidus spectatis annue dictis.
Pondere nam catuli poteris perpendere vires,
Corporibusque leves gravibus prænoscere cursus.
Quin et flammato ducatur linea longè
Circuitu, signetque habilem vapor igneus orbem.
Impunè in medio possis consistere circo.
Hùc omnes catuli, hùc indiscreta feratur
Turba, dabit mater partus examine honestos,
Judicio natos servans, trepidoque perîclo.
Nam postquam conclusa videt sua germina flammis,
Continuo saltu transcendens fervida zonæ
Vincla, rapit rictu primum, portatque cubili;
Mox alium, mox deinde alium. Sic conscia mater
Segregat egregiam sobolem virtutis amore.
[Sidenote: Cynosoph. c. +iii.+]
[Sidenote: Hist. Quad. L. +i.+ p. 178. De Cane.]
The same diagnostics occur in the Cynosophium of Demetrius, and
the Alcon of Fracastorius. The former says, the dam φυσικῷ τινὶ
πόθῳ διακρίσει τὰ βελτίονα, καὶ ἐξάγει, and recommends the refuse
to be disposed of by sale or gift, after having been placed under
foster-parents. The heavier whelps should be placed, according to this
writer, under their own dam. But, of course, our diagnostic canons
must vary with each variety of dog. Gesner reconciles the conflicting
opinions of the Greek and Latin Cynegetica, on the selection of
puppies, in these words: “ego ita conciliârim, ut ad robur præferendi
sunt graviores; ad celeritatem, leviores.”
[Sidenote: Hist. Nat. L. +viii.+ c. 40.]
“Optimus in fœtu,” says Pliny, “qui novissimè cernere incipit, aut quem
fert primum in cubile fœta:” and he is supported by the Virgilian poet
of Barga—
[Sidenote: P. Angelii Bargæi Cyneg. L. +v.+]
Namque ea quem secum tulit in stramenta, toroque
Composuit primum, primoque affecit honore,
Ille alios omnes cursuque animisque superbis
Vincet ovans, simul ac loris exire solutis
Quiverit, et saltu transgressus inania campi
Intervalla cito diffugerit ocyus Euro.
He condemns the large and heavy pup as likely to be hereafter deficient
in speed:
[Sidenote: Ejusdem L. +v.+]
Continuò cujus subsidunt pondere membra
Atque artus major moles gravat, ille volucri
Insuetus cursu longè post ultima fratrum
Terga relinquetur, frustraque optabit adempta
Præmiaque, et multo perfusam sanguine prædam.
[Sidenote: Markham’s Countrey Contentments. B. +i.+ p. 48.]
“Touching greyhounds,” says the practical author of Countrey
Contentments, “when they are puppies or young whelpes, those which
are most raw-boned, leane, loose-made, sickle or crooked hought, and
generally unknit in every member, are ever likely to make the best
dogges, and most shapely: but such as in the first three or foure
monthes, are round, and close trust, fat, straight, and as it were full
sum’d and knit in every member, never prove good, swift, or comely.”
The courser, in selecting youngsters from a numerous litter, will not
be indifferent to
The marks of their renown’d progenitors—
Sure pledge of triumphs yet to come;
but will preserve all such “with joy,” while he casts “the dwindling
refuse to the merciless flood,” fearful of overloading “the indulgent
mother.”
[230]
[Sidenote: Noct. Attic. L. +xii.+ c. +i.+]
[Sidenote: The Governour. B. +i.+ c. +iv.+]
Τὸ γὰρ τῶν ἀγεννῶν γάλα οὐ ξύμφυλον ταῖς γενναίαις. It is difficult to
prove that the quality of the milk of varieties of the same species
of animal is absolutely different, and productive of effects, beyond
its physical nutriment, upon the innate powers and propensities of
the young animal supported by it: and yet such an opinion is too much
countenanced by naturalists to make us unhesitatingly condemn it as
destitute of all foundation. It was a favourite notion of ancient
physiologists, and many moral inferences were drawn from it by Galen
and others. “Non frustrà creditum est,” says A. Gellius, on the
authority of the philosopher Favorinus, “sicuti valeat ad fingendas
corporis atque animi similitudines vis et natura seminis, non secùs
ad eandem rem lactis quoque ingenia et proprietates valere; neque
in hominibus id solùm, sed in pecudibus quoque animadversum,” &c.
Wherefore Sir Thomas Elyot enjoins, when speaking of nutrication, “a
nourse shoulde be of no servile condicion, or vyce notable: for as some
auncient writers do suppose, oftentymes the chylde sucketh the vyce
of hys nouryse with the mylke of her pappe.” See Brathwait’s English
Gentleman, p. 94.
[Sidenote: Oppian. Cyneg. +i.+ 435.]
εἰ δὲ νύ τοι πινυτὴ σκυλακοτροφίη μεμέληται,
μή ποτ’ ἀμέλγεσθαι σκύλακας νεοθηλέϊ μαζῷ
αἰγῶν, ἢ προβάτων, μηδ’ οἰκιδίησι κύνεσσιν·
ἦ γάρ τοι νωθροί τε καὶ οὐτιδανοὶ βαρύθοιεν.
[Sidenote: Columel. de R. R. L. +vii.+ c. 12.]
Nec unquam eos quorum generosam volumus indolem conservare, patiemur
alienæ nutricis uberibus educari; quoniam semper et lac et spiritus
maternus longè magis ingenii atque incrementa corporis augent.
[231]
[Sidenote: De Venat. c. +vii.+]
Κράτιστον ἐᾷν ὑπὸ τῇ τεκούσῃ.—Arrian here copies his predecessor almost
verbatim; but in addition to the τὸ γάλα ἀγαθὸν καὶ τὸ πνεῦμα of the
former, the latter adds καὶ αἱ περιβολαὶ φίλαι. The classic reader will
remember the pathetic address of Andromache in the Troades,
[Sidenote: Euripidis Troad. vs. 766.]
ὦ νέον ὑπαγκάλισμα μητρὶ φίλτατον,
ὦ χρωτὸς ἡδὺ πνεῦμα!
[Sidenote: Platonis Menexenus.]
[Sidenote: Encyclopéd. Méthodique. Les Chasses. p. 140.]
[Sidenote: Booke of Hunting, &c. p. 22.]
It is true that a foster-mother may “cherish kind—an alien offspring,”
and “pleased” we may “behold her tenderness, and hospitable love,” but
instances are, I believe, most rare of greyhound puppies, suckled by
alien dams of mongrel blood, repaying the courser for the trouble of
rearing them. Πᾶν γὰρ τὸ τεκὸν τροφὴν ἔχει ἐπιτηδείαν ᾧ ἂν τέκῃ: and
it is in vain that we make the unnatural attempt, αἱ γὰρ θεραπεῖαι
αἱ ἀλλότριαι οὐκ εἰσὶν αὔξιμοι, according to both Xenophons; whereas
“les jeunes chiens, nourris par leur propre mère, seroient plus forts
et mieux portans que ceux qui sont nourris d’un lait étranger.” “When
a bitch hath whelpes,” says Turberville, “let a mastiffe bitch (une
matine, Fouilloux) give sucke to one halfe, and you shall find that
they will never be so good as those which the damme did bring up.”
[Sidenote: Oppian. Cyneg. +iii.+ 107.]
ἦ ῥα τόσον τέκεών τε, καὶ ἀρτιγόνοιο γενέθλης
φίλτρον ἐνὶ κραδίῃ στάξεν θεός·
τόσσον ῥα φύσις κρατερώτατον ἄλλων.
[232] Χρὴ γάλακτι ἀνατρέφειν αὐτά. See Ch. +viii.+ where he also
speaks of milk food; and Xenophon. de Venat. c. +vii.+ 4. The latter
recommends milk for the first year: καὶ οἷς μέλλει τὸν ἅπαντα χρόνον
βιώσεσθαι, ἄλλο δὲ μηδέν—αἱ γὰρ βαρεῖαι πλησμοναὶ τῶν σκυλακίων
διαστρέφουσι σκέλη, σώμασι νόσους ἐμποιοῦσι, καὶ τὰ ἐντὸς ἄδικα
γίγνεται.
[Sidenote: Gratii Cyneg. vs. 304.]
tum denique fœtû
Cum desunt, operis fregitque industria matres,
Transeat in catulos omnis tutela relictos.
Lacte novam pubem, facilique tuebere mazâ.
Nec luxus alios avidæque impendia vitæ
Noscant.
[Sidenote: Columella De Re Rust. L. +vii.+ c. 2.]
Columella also, and the Carthaginian poet, administer milk to the young
fry, and Pollux with his copyist Paullini adds thereto the blood of the
game to which the hounds are to be afterwards entered; “Quod si effœta
lacte deficitur, caprinum maximè conveniet præberi catulis, dum fiant
mensium quatuor:”
[Sidenote: Nemesian. Cyneg. vs. 161.]
Interdumque cibo cererem cum lacte ministra,
Fortibus ut succis teneras complere medullas
Possint, et validas jam tunc promittere vires.
[Sidenote: Cynograph. Curiosa. p. 33.]
“Probè autem despiciendum,” says the credulous physician of Eisenach,
on the authority of Julius Pollux, “cui generi singulos applicare
velis, ut eorum animalium, quæ venationi sunt destinata, sanguinem cum
offis statim post ablactationem subministres,” &c.
[Sidenote: =Mayster of Game.= c. +xii.+ fol. 51.]
“Thei hav grete nede of hur dame,” according to Duke Edmund, “in to
the tyme that thei be ij monethis olde, and than thei shuld be fedde
with gootis mylke or with kowes mylk and cromes of brede ymade smale
and put there inne; and specially in the morowe and at nyght by cause
that y^{e}. nyght is more cold than the day and also men shuld geve hem
crommes in fflesh brothe and in this wise men may norfshe hem tyl thei
be of half yeere olde.”
[Sidenote: Blondus de Canibus, &c.]
Largus victus solet esse maximo damno.
[Sidenote: Oppian. Halieut. L. +i.+ 719.]
It very rarely happens that the κύων ἀρτιτόκος is deficient in milk for
six or eight weeks after the birth of her progeny;
[Sidenote: Lucretii L. +v.+ 805.]
fœmina quæque
Cum peperit dulci repletur lacte, quod omnis
Impetus in mammas convertitur ille alimenti:
but if the puppies do not thrive on the nutriment they derive
from their dam, it is probably deficient in quantity, and should
be dispensed with altogether as soon as they will lap cow’s milk
sufficient for their support.
[Sidenote: P. Angelii Bargæi Cyneg. L. +v.+]
Tum tu adeò (nam tempus erit) jam parce parenti,
Exhaustis parce uberibus. Sed mollia nondum
Subducenda tamen natis alimenta, sed haustu
Pascendi lactis, cujus mulctralia pingues
Implerunt vaccæ, et redeuntes rure capellæ.
[Sidenote: Booke of Hunting, p. 22.]
Turberville says, “the longer they tast of their dammes teat, the more
they shall take of her complexion and nature.” And when weaned, “it
is best,” he remarks, “to bring them up abroad with milke, bread, and
all sorts of pottages, and you shall understand that to bring them up
in villages of the country, is much better than to bring them up in a
butcherie:” “aux villages, et non aux boucheries,” Fouilloux p. 9.
[Sidenote: Lord Bacon’s Nat. History. Cent. +iv.+]
How close is the analogy “touching the acceleration of growth and
stature,” in the human and canine subject! In breeding for the kennel,
Lord Bacon’s observations may be turned to some account. “Excess of
nourishment,” says he, “is hurtful; for it maketh the child corpulent,
and growing in breadth rather than in height.” “The nature of it may
not be too dry, and therefore children in dairy countries do wax more
tall, than where they feed more upon bread and flesh;” “over-dry
nourishment in childhood putteth back stature.” Upon which principle
Albertus Magnus orders liquid food for the dog, because his temperament
is dry.
[Sidenote: Countrey Contentments. B. +i.+ p. 27.]
It is seldom that the practical courser will differ from the advice of
old Gervase Markham; but when he says, “if the house you keep be of
great receite, and many servants, you shall let your cooke bring up
your whelpes, and your dairy-maide your second best, and the rest you
shall put forth amongst your friends or tenants, according unto the
love you possesse in the country,” I am inclined to invert the merits
of the respective claimants on the litter, placing la cuisinière at the
bottom of the list.
[Sidenote: Somerville. The Chace. B. +iv.+]
————unto thy choicest friends
Commit thy valued prize: the rustic dames
Shall at thy kennel wait, and in their laps
Receive thy growing hopes, with many a kiss
Caress, and dignify their little charge
With some great title, and resounding name
Of high import.
[233]
[Sidenote: Columella de Re Rust. L. +vii.+ c. 12.]
See Xenophon de Venat. c. +vii.+ 5. All the names left us by Xenophon,
Arrian, and Columella, are dissyllabical. Nominibus autem non
longissimis appellandi sunt, quo celeriùs quisque vocatus exaudiat; nec
tamen brevioribus, quàm quæ duabus syllabis enuntientur. Oppian names
his puppies, while young and tractable, νηπιάχοι:
[Sidenote: Cyneg. +i.+ 443.]
αὐτὰρ νηπιάχοισιν ἐπ’ οὐνόματα σκυλάκεσσι
βαιὰ τίθει, θοὰ πάντα, θοὴν ἵνα βάξιν ἀκούῃ.
By which Gesner supposes the names should be “oxytona.” Natalis Comes
agrees with his predecessors:
[Sidenote: De Venat. L. +i.+]
ponantur nomina cuique
Certa cani, teneatque ad summum syllaba bina:
Protinùs ut noscat voces, et verba vocantum.
The indefatigable German naturalist has alphabetically arranged all the
classic names of the Greek and Roman kennels that have descended to us.
We find in his canine vocabulary, those of Xenophon, Ovid, Columella,
and others of ancient days; and some from Blondus (of which Gesner
disapproves) of more modern use. Hyginus has a copious list of canine
appellatives in his 181st fable, entitled “Diana.” And one of the most
chaste poets of the fifteenth century supplies the kennel with
[Sidenote: Hercules Stroza.]
bona naribus Heuresiïchne,
Theragus, Ocypete, Thoissa, Melæna, Cylindus,
Chætodesque hirtus setis, domitorque ferarum
Theridamas, veloxque Lagois, et ocyor illa
Protodomus, longoque legens compendia passu
Macrobates, Leuconque rapaci et cum Harpage Theron.
[234] Εἰ δὲ μή πω ἐθέλοις σκυλακεῦσαι. Schneider is of opinion that
Arrian is here cautioning the courser against running a bitch, whom
it has been deemed prudent to put aside from taking the dog, and
whose milk-vessels are distended towards the close of the period of
gestation, as if she were actually pregnant. This interpretation is
ingenious, and may be tenable; but as I find no such caution in any
ancient author, and have never seen any mischief accrue from running a
bitch at the time alluded to, (though her speed is certainly impaired
by the constitutional plethora of the period;) and, moreover, as it
magnifies a very unimportant circumstance in the physical condition of
the bitch, and is, on the whole, rather a far-fetched interpretation, I
have followed Blancard and Zeune in the more usual acceptation of the
verb σκυλακεύειν, i. e. catulos nutrire. No man in his senses would
think of coursing a brood bitch while in the state described in the
text.
[235] Καὶ παρίστανται ἤδη ἐς δρόμον. These words commence the 32nd
Chapter in all the editions which I have examined; and though Schneider
suggests their adaptation to the close of the present Chapter, he
does not venture to change their position. Inasmuch, however, as the
division into chapters is probably arbitrary, and the words in question
are more appropriate here than at the commencement of the ensuing
Chapter, they are here introduced.
[236] Κύων θήλεια μὲν ὠκυτέρα ἄῥῤενος. I have already remarked that
Arrian and Xenophon invariably use the feminine gender when speaking
of the dogs of the chase: and so also the Grecian poets, (as the κυσὶν
ταχείαις of Euripides, and σκυλάκεσσι θοαῖς of Oppian,) and in some
cases the Latin, (as the “canes montivag_æ_” of Lucretius, “venatic_a_
canis” of Ennius, and “mult_â_ cane” of Horace); as if bitches were
more quick-scented, “more fleet of foot, or sure of fang.” Minerva, in
the Ajax Flagellifer, compares Ulysses searching for the mad Ajax, to
a Spartan bitch; though the verse would have admitted the masculine
instead of the feminine gender, and the former would certainly have
been more appropriate to the sex of the person represented. The gender
is changed by the poet in a marked way:
[Sidenote: Sophoclis Ajax Flagell. vs. 2.]
καὶ νῦν ἐπὶ σκηναῖς σε ναυτικαῖς ὁρῶ
Αἴαντος, ἔνθα τάξιν ἐσχάτην ἔχει,
πάλαι κυνηγετοῦντα, καὶ μετρούμενον
ἴχνη τὰ κείνου νεοχάραχθ’, ὅπως ἴδῃς
εἴτ’ ἔνδον, εἴτ’ οὐκ ἔνδον· εὖ δέ σ’ ἐκφέρει
κυνὸς Λακαίνης ὥς τις εὔρινος βάσις.
[Sidenote: Markham’s Countrey Contentments. B. +i.+ p. 47.]
This opinion, therefore, of the superiority of the bitch over the
dog seems to have prevailed in the kennels of antiquity; and such, I
believe, is still entertained by sportsmen. “It is an old received
opinion,” observes the author of Countrey Contentments, “amongst
many men of the leashe, that the greyhound bitch will ever beate the
greyhound dogge, by reason of her more nimblenesse, quicknesse, and
agillity; and it is sometimes seene that a perfect good bitch indeed,
hath much advantage of an ordinary dogge: but if the good dogge meet
with the good bitch, there is then no comparison, but the dogge will be
her master, inasmuch as he exceedeth her both in lengthe and strengthe,
the two maine helpes in coursing; for her nimblenesse is then no helpe,
sith a good dogge in the turne will loose as little ground as any
bitch whatsoever.” See also The Countrey Farme, c. +xxii.+ by Markham,
ed. 1616. The earliest edition, of 1600, does not contain Markham’s
additional remarks on coursing, but merely Surflet’s version of “Maison
Rustique.”
[237]
[Sidenote: The Countrey Farme, c. +xxii.+]
Ἄῤῥην δὲ θηλείας διαπονεῖσθαι ἀμείνων. Aristotle remarks, in the
Spartan tribe of dogs, that the bitches are longer-lived than the dogs,
in consequence of the latter working harder than the former, διὰ τὸ
πονεῖν τοὺς ἀῤῥένας μᾶλλον. “Wheresoever,” says Markham, “the course
shall stand forth long, the good dogge will _beat out_ the good bitch
and make her give over.”
[238] Αἱ θήλειαι μὲν ἀγαπητὸν, κ. τ. λ. I am not aware of any
difference having been observed by coursers, in the duration of the
comparative speed of the dog and bitch. It is not inability to run that
disqualifies a greyhound (generally in his third year from the period
of entrance) for appearance on the coursing field, but a propensity,
acquired by experience, to skulk and run false:
[Sidenote: Sir W. Scott.]
Experience sage the lack of speed supplies,
And in the gap he seeks—his victim dies.
[Sidenote: Merry Wives of Windsor. Act +i.+]
We can rarely, if ever, say of any greyhound, after he has run two
seasons, what _Shallow_ says of _Page’s_ fallow greyhound, who “was
out-run on Cotsale:”—“He is a _good_ dog, and a _fair_ dog; can there
be more said? he is _good_, and _fair_.” So soon does the fleetest dog
begin to make up by cunning what he wants in willingness to work.
[239] Ἄῤῥενες δὲ καὶ ἐς δέκατον διαφυλάττουσιν. Our author is here at
issue with Juliana Berners, who says of the greyhound in his ninth year,
[Sidenote: Book of St. Alban’s. 1496.]
And whan he is comyn to that yere,
Have hym to the tannere;
For the beste hounde that ever bytche had,
At nynthe yere he is full badde.
Indeed, it is incredible, however great may have been his youthful
vigour, that any dog should retain his full speed till the tenth year;
a period at which all the bodily powers begin to feel the gradual
approach of infirmity, at which many dogs die apparently of natural
decay, and all are incapacitated for strenuous exertion. “Canes
Laconici,” says Pliny, “vivunt annis denis, fœminæ duodenis, cætera
genera quindecim annos, aliquando viginti.” Instances of the latter
protracted period are very rare. I never knew a greyhound to reach the
memorable age of the Homeric Argus—
[Sidenote: Odyss. +xvii.+ 326.]
Ἄργον δ’ αὖ κατὰ μοῖρ’ ἔλαβεν μέλανος θανάτοιο,
αὐτίκ’ ἰδόντ’ Ὀδυσῆα ἐεικοστῷ ἐνιαυτῷ.
[Sidenote: The Chace. B. +iv.+]
Short is their span; few at the date arrive
Of ancient Argus, in old Homer’s song
So highly honour’d; kind, sagacious brute!
See Ælian de Nat. Animal. Buffon Hist. Natur. and Lord Bacon Hist. Vitæ
et Mortis.
[240] Μέγα μοι δοκεῖ τὸ κτῆμα ἄῤῥην κύων τῇ ἀληθείᾳ γενναῖος. Such in
the annals of British coursing was Topham’s Snowball, and such Bate
Dudley’s Millar!
[Sidenote: Natalis Comes de Venatione. L. +i.+]
Tu quos ad studium venandi legeris, et quos
Dixeris hinc comites cursûs, cædisque ferarum,
Quære mares: maribus major vis est animusque,
Et melius tolerare valent certamina longa.
[241] Καὶ οὐκ ἄνευ θεῶν τοῦ εὐμενείας, κ. τ. λ. With Schneider’s
sanction, I have united the 33rd Chapter of the first and second
editions of the Greek text with the 32nd of the German editor, from
which chapter the former seems to have been most unnecessarily
separated by Holstein, or whoever first divided the Cynegeticus into
sections, affixing to each a table of contents.
In accordance with Arrian’s notion, the fabulous greyhound of the
suspicious Cephalus is conceived, in the imagination of the poet, to
have been bestowed on the virtuous Procris by the Goddess of the Chase,
with the high character of pre-eminent speed:
[Sidenote: Ovid. Metam. L. +vii.+ 754.]
quem cum sua traderet illi
Cynthia, ‘currendo superabit,’ dixerat, ‘omnes.’
[242]
[Sidenote: Attic. L. +i.+ c. +xix.+]
Ἀρτέμιδι Ἀγροτέρᾳ. This title of the sylvan goddess is variously
derived by etymologists. Scheffer (Ælian. V. H. L. +ii.+ c. 25.)
would have her ladyship so called from Agræ in Attica—χωρίον Ἄγραι
καλούμενον, the scene of her first essay in hunting on arriving
from Delos. Διαβᾶσι δὲ τὸν Εἱλισσὸν, says Pausanias, χωρίον Ἄγραι
καλούμενον, καὶ ναὸς Ἀγροτέρας ἐστὶν Ἀρτέμιδος, κ. τ. λ. But Perizonius
objects to Scheffer’s derivation, and also to that ἀπὸ τῆς ἄγρας, _à
venatione_, considering Ἀγροτέρα rather to signify _rustica, in agris
agens_. If ἄγρα, _venatio_, be the root of the title, to the same may
probably be referred the titular epithet by which Apollo is connected
with the chase, by Pausanias in Atticis, (L. +i.+ c. +xli.+) Ἀγραίος:
unless the Attic Agræ would here afford a more ready solution. But the
true derivation of Ἀγροτέρα is to be sought in ἀγρός. See Etymologicon
Magnum.
From whatever source derived, it is sufficient for our purpose that the
epithet is commonly applied to her in the character of “Dea Venatrix,”
(Ovid. Met. L. +ii.+ 454.)—“Dea sylvarum,” (Ovid. Met. L. +iii.+
163.)—“sævis inimica virgo—belluis,” (Hor. Od. +xii.+ l. +i.+ 22.)—as
presiding over woods, and delighting in hunting. It is so used in the
Thesmophoriazusæ of Aristophanes,
τάν τ’ ἐν ὄρεσι δρυογόνοι-
σι κόραν ἀείσατ’ Ἄρ-
τεμιν Ἀγροτέραν:
and in the Rape of Helen of Coluthus,
[Sidenote: Coluthi Rapt. Helenæ. vs. 32.]
οὐδὲ κασιγνήτη Λητωϊὰς Ἀπόλλωνος
Ἄρτεμις ἠτίμησε, καὶ ἀγροτέρη περ ἐοῦσα.
[Sidenote: Oneirocrit. L. +ii.+ c. +xxxv.+]
To coursers it must be a mighty consolation to know that, by virtue of
this distinction, the goddess is ominous of good when seen by them as a
night-phantom; at least so says the dream-interpreter of Ephesus, the
fortune-telling Artemidorus—κυνηγοῖς μάλιστα συμφέρει διὰ τὴν Ἀγροτέραν.
The Odyssey affords the graphic outline from whence Apelles is supposed
to have worked off his finished picture of the Goddess of the Chase as
an active toxophilite:
[Sidenote: Homeri Odyss. L. +vi.+ 102.]
Ἄρτεμις εἶσι κατ’ οὔρεος ἰοχέαιρα,
ἢ κατὰ Τηΰγετον περιμήκετον, ἢ Ἐρύμανθον,
τερπομένη κάπροισι καὶ ὠκείῃς ἐλάφοισι·
τῇ δέ θ’ ἅμα Νύμφαι, κοῦραι Διὸς Αἰγιόχοιο,
Ἀγρονόμοι παίζουσι· κ. τ. λ.
The rival copy of Virgil (Æneid. L. +i.+ 502.) will occur to the
reader’s recollection; and I need not again exhibit (see c. +xxii.+
note 2.) the elaborate and highly-embellished portrait of the
Carthaginian poet, (Nemesian. Cyneg. vs. 86.) Effigies in marble of the
Goddess of Hunting are to be seen in almost every collection; alone,
with her usual symbols of venation, or accompanied by dogs of chase, or
deer—or both, as in an alto-relievo at Wilton House. Temples and altars
of Diana Agrotera are mentioned by Pausanias in Atticis c. +xix.+ and
c. +xli.+, in eliacis +i.+ c. +xv.+, in Achaicis c. +xxvi.+
For the honour of Diana, in the character of Agrotera, the shows
of wild beasts in the Roman Circus and Amphitheatre were generally
designed: so Claudian,
[Sidenote: Claudian. De Consul. Mall. Theod. vs. 292.]
Tu juga Taygeti, frondosaque Mænala, Clio,
I Triviæ supplex; non aspernata rogantem
Amphitheatrali faveat Latonia pompæ!... &c.
and for their support in splendid variety, the whole world was
ransacked for its rarest and most savage animals:
quodcunque tremendum est
Dentibus, aut insigne jubis, aut nobile cornu,
Aut rigidum setis capitur decus omne timorque
Sylvarum, &c.
[Sidenote: Lucian. Deor. Dial. Juno et Latona.]
No deity amongst the heathens was more terrible than the masculine
daughter of Latona, (ἀῤῥενικὴ πέρα τοῦ μέτρου, καὶ ὄρειος, in Juno’s
taunting language,) and none less patient of affront—
[Sidenote: Milton’s Comus, vs. 445.]
gods and men
Fear’d her stern frown, and she was queen o’ th’ woods.
The reader will call to recollection the death of the unfortunate son
of Autonoë, τὸν Ἀκταίωνος ἄθλιον μόρον, (Euripid. Bacchæ,) and the
desolation of the well-cultivated vineyard of Œneus (Homer. Iliad. L.
+ix.+) at the hand of Dian,
[Sidenote: Iliad. L. +ix.+ 533.]
καὶ γὰρ τοῖσι κακὸν χρυσόθρονος Ἄρτεμις ὦρσε
χωσαμένη.
[Sidenote: Callimach. H. in Dian. 260.]
It is supposed that the beautiful poetry of Callimachus, in which the
anger and favour of the goddess are so feelingly described, (Hymn,
in Dian.,) was imitated from the Psalms of David, which the poet,
peradventure, had seen at the court of King Ptolemy. See the effects
of her wrath, vs. 124. σχέτλιοι οἷς τύνη χαλεπὴν, κ. τ. λ.; with which
are contrasted the good luck and happiness of those to whom she is
propitious, vs. 129. οὓς δέ κεν εὐμειδής τε καὶ ἵλαος, κ. τ. λ. The
conclusion follows, of course, that no man in his right senses should
think of slighting the powerful dispenser of so much good and evil—μή
τις ἀτιμήσῃ τὴν Ἄρτεμιν.
The reader will find an amusing description of the worshipful Dian in
the sulks at the marked insult of Œneus,
[Sidenote: Ovid. Metam. L. +viii.+ 277.]
(solas sine thure relictas
Præteritæ cessasse ferunt Latoïdos aras)—
in Lucian, περὶ Θυσίων: καί μοι δοκεῖ ὁρᾷν αὐτὴν ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ
τότε μόνην, says the infidel satirist, τῶν ἄλλων θεῶν ἐν Οἰνέως
πεπορευμένων, δεινὰ ποιοῦσαν, καὶ σχετλιάζουσαν οἵας ἑορτῆς
ἀπολειφθήσεται.
[243]
[Sidenote: Plaut. Aul. +iii.+ 6. 43.]
Ἀνατιθέναι ἀπαρχὰς τῶν ἁλισκομένων τῇ Θεῷ, καὶ ἀποκαθαίρειν, κ. τ.
λ.—as amended by Schneider. “Ac ne degustabant quidem novas fruges,
aut vina,” says Pliny (+xviii.+ 2.) “antequam sacerdotes primitias
libassent.” And our venerable courser would have his disciples
observe with strictness the same religious ceremonies of dedication,
purification, &c. The ancients always purified themselves before
sacrificing—“Ego, nisi quid me vis, eo lavatum, ut sacrificem:” and
Hector tells his mother he is afraid to pour forth even a libation to
Jupiter with unwashed hands,
[Sidenote: Iliad. L. +vi.+ 266.]
χερσὶ δ’ ἀνίπτοισιν Διῒ λείβειν αἴθοπα οἶνον
ἅζομαι.
[244] The τοὺς κύνας καὶ τοὺς κυνηγέτας of our author answers to the
“tota juventus” of Gratius, hereafter cited; and his ὡς νόμος, to the
“lustralis de more sacri” of the Faliscian.
[245]
[Sidenote: Vénerie Normande. _La S. Hubert._]
M. Le Verrier de la Conterie derives the fête of the French Chasseurs
called _La S. Hubert_ from this Celtic festival of Diana. As the latter
supplanted with her images the unseen divinity of earlier adoration,
she in her turn yielded the tutelage of the chase to St. Martin, St.
Germain, and St. Hubert. Arrian wrote in the second century, and in the
sixth we find Diana still predominant:—“Le père Dom Martin nous assure
que vers la fin du sixième siècle, les Gaulois célébroient les mystères
de cette divinité avec des chants excessifs, et toutes les débauches
que peuvent produire l’amour et le vin, sur une montagne des Ardennes
qui est dans le Luxembourg, où ils avoient une idole de Diane fort
grande et fort célèbre,” &c.
M. Fleuri (Hist. Ecclesiast. Tom. +viii.+ l. +xxxv.+ n. 22.) relates
the destruction of Diana’s image, and the erection of the monastery
and church of St. Martin on its site. But neither St. Martin, nor St.
Germain, (“évêque d’Auxerre, et chasseur de grande réputation,”) were
able to preserve their ascendancy against the superior claims of St.
Hubert, (“évêque de Liège, plus fin et plus rusé dans l’art de la
chasse,”) who subsequently received the first-fruits of the chase,
ἀπαρχὰς τῶν ἁλισκομένων, and a tenth part of the game, as an annual
consecration, ἐνιαύσια, from the posterity of the Celts.
[Sidenote: Historie of Scotland. Mainus.]
The worship of Diana Venatrix extended from Celtica to the British
Isles, which at an early period were peopled by a Celtic race, (see
note 12. at the end of the present chapter). “Amongst other the goddes
also,” says Holinshed, “whiche the Scottishmen had in most reverence,
Diana was chiefe, whom they accompted as their peculiar patronesse, for
that she was taken to be the goddesse of hunting, wherein consisted
their chiefest exercise, pastime, and delite.” And at the same period,
we find these Scoto-Celts in possession of greyhounds and hounds of
chase of the highest repute, during the reign of Dorvadille.
[246] Θησαυρὸς signifies, primarily, “_theca_, ubi res pretiosa
deponitur;” and secondarily, “ipsa res condita.” See Martinii Lexicon
Philologicum.
[247]
[Sidenote: Pinkerton on Coins. Vol. +i.+ p. 89. and Ainsworth.]
Ἐπὶ μὲν λαγῷ ἁλόντι δύο ὀβολὼ ἐμβάλλουσιν. The game of the modern
courser was valued by the Celtic sportsmen, for Dian’s treasury, at
about 2½_d._ of British currency. The obolus was a small Greek coin
of silver, weighing about 11 grains, in ancient money worth 1½_d._ It
was the sixth part of the drachma, which nearly answered to the Roman
denarius. The double obolus, or diobolion, exactly hit the value of the
hare in the Celtic scale of appreciation.
[248]
[Sidenote: L. +xii.+ c. +ii.+]
[Sidenote: Ælian. de Naturâ Animal. L. +xiii.+ c. +xi.+]
[Sidenote: De Venat. c. +v.+]
Ἐπὶ δὲ ἀλώπεκι δραχμὴν—Anglicè, _ninepence for a fox_. The silver
drachma was equal to six oboli, consequently this crafty and
destructive felon was estimated at thrice the value of the hare.
The reasons of the text for the extra payment must be perfectly
satisfactory to the patrons of the leash—ὅτι ἐπίβουλον τὸ χρῆμα, καὶ
τοὺς λαγὼς διαφθείρει, κ. τ. λ. “Fraudulentum animal,” says Isidorus,
“insidiisque decipiens:” and Ælian, αἱροῦνται δὲ οἱ λαγῲ ὑπὸ ἀλωπέκων
ἐνίοτε, οὐκ ἧττον δρόμῳ, ἀλλὰ καὶ μᾶλλον τέχνῃ· σοφὸν γὰρ ἀπατᾷν
ἀλώπηξ, καὶ δόλους οἶδεν. Xenophon, too, remarks that foxes are wont
to kill not only hares, but leverets, αὐτοὺς καὶ τὰ τέκνα: and is
supported by the Cilician poet of the chase, who says of the fox—
[Sidenote: Oppian. Cyneg. L. +iii.+ 459.]
δὴ τότε καὶ θήρῃ πικρὴν ἐπὶ μῆτιν ὑφαίνει
οἰωνούς τε δόλοισιν ἑλεῖν καὶ τέκνα λαγωῶν.
[Sidenote: =Mayster of Game.= c. +viii.+ fol. 43.]
“Foxes done grete harme,” says Duke Edmund, “in wareyns of conynges
and of hares, the whiche thei ete, and take hem so gynnously and withe
grete malice, and not withe rennyng.”
[249]
[Sidenote: =Mayster of Game.= c. +v.+ fol. 30.]
Ἐπὶ δὲ δορκάδι τέσσαρας δραχμάς. The tetradrachm of silver was worth
four drachmas, or three shillings sterling—a high valuation of the
roe-deer, an animal of chase, rather scarce in the British Isles, but
at all times, I believe, abundant in France. De Langley calls the roe
“a good litel beest, and goodly for to hunte to.”
[250]
[Sidenote: L. +vii.+]
[Sidenote: Martial. Epigr. L. +xii.+ Ep. 68.]
[Sidenote: Antiquit. Roman. Tom. +i.+ 662.]
Ὁπόταν γενέθλια ἥκη τῆς Ἀρτέμιδος. The gods of antiquity had their
natal days as well as men. “Dies nobis natalitii sunt,” says Arnobius,
“et potentias cœlites dies autumant habere natales.” The anniversary
of Diana’s birth-day (see Ad. Turnebi Adversar. L. +viii.+ c. +xxvi.+)
was celebrated on the 13th of August—“Augustis redit Idibus Diana.”
“Feriis suis, emeritos canes, quietosque à venatione, et immunes habere
credebatur, et ipsa etiam feriari,” in the words of Pitiscus.
[Sidenote: Statii Sylv. L. +iii.+ l. 57.]
Ipsa coronat
Emeritos Diana canes, et spicula tergit,
Et tutas sinit ire feras.
Pausanias in Achaicis c. +xviii.+ describes a splendid celebration of
the sylvan rites of Diana Laphria by the people of Patræ, in costliness
and magnificence far surpassing these Celtic ceremonies, but in
character somewhat similar. The festival of Patræ was also annual, as
in Celtica.
[251] Ἱερεῖον.
[Sidenote: Ovid. Metam. L. +xv.+ 130.]
Victima labe carens, et præstantissima forma,
(Nam placuisse nocet,) vittis præsignis et auro
Sistitur ante aras.
The ancient sacrifice consisted of three principal things—libation,
incense, and victim; of which the latter was most important—varying
according to the character of the deity to whom it was offered, and
that of the persons offering. Perfection of form, as described by Ovid,
was essential to acceptance at the altar.
[252] Οἱ μὲν ὄϊν, οἱ δὲ αἶγα. So in Horace’s invitation to Phyllis to
attend his banquet on Mæcenas’s natal day,
[Sidenote: Carminum L. +iv.+ c. +xi.+]
ara castis
Vincta verbenis avet immolato
Spargier agno.
The kid of the Celtic hunters is mentioned in the celebration of
Diana’s rites by Gratius; see note 10.
[253] Τῶν ἱερείων ἀπαρξάμενοι τῇ Ἀγροτέρᾳ. The first-fruits of the
spoil were offered up to Diana Venatrix, (see c. +xxxii.+ n. 8.,) as
well as the purchased sacrificial victims. We are told by Plutarch that
it was customary to consecrate the horns of the stag to the goddess,
and to affix them to her temple; a quiver, too, with bow and arrows,
and a canis venaticus, were commonly added.
[Sidenote: Claudian. De Consul. Honor. L. +iv.+ 159.]
Tibi sæpè, Diana,
Mænalios arcus, venatricesque pharetras
Suspendit, puerile decus.
See Symmach. Epist. L. +v.+ Ep. 68. and Pitisci Lexicon Antiquitatum.
[254] Εὐωχοῦνται αὐτοί τε καὶ οἱ κύνες.
[Sidenote: Gratii Cyneget. 483.]
Idcircò aeriis molimur compita lucis
Spicatasque faces (sacrum) ad nemora alta Dianæ
Sistimus, et solito catuli velantur honore;
Ipsaque per flores medio in discrimine luci
Stravêre arma, sacris et pace vacantia festâ.
Tum cadus, et viridi fumantia liba feretro
Præveniunt, tenerâque extrudens cornua fronte
Hœdus, et ad ramos etiamnum hærentia poma,
Lustralis de more sacri, quo tota juventus
Lustraturque Deæ, proque anno reddit honorem.
Ergo impetrato respondet multa favore
Ad partes quâ poscis opem, seu vincere silvas,
Seu tibi fatorum labes exire minasque
Cura prior, tua magna fides tutelaque Virgo.
[Sidenote: De Nugis Curialium L. +i.+ c. +iv.+]
To the hunting jubilations of our early annals (when Dian’s revels were
scarce exploded) John of Salisbury alludes in his Policraticus: “Si
vero clariore prædâ, cervo fortè vel apro, venantium labor effulserit,
fit plausus intolerabilis, exultant venatores, caput prædæ et solemnia
quædam spolia triumphantibus præferuntur, regem Cappadocum captum
credas. Sic cornicines et tibicines videas victoriæ gloriam declarare.”
[255] Τὰς κύνας δὲ καὶ στεφανοῦσιν. The custom of crowning, or
decorating with roses and garlands of ribbon, greyhounds which have
distinguished themselves in the coursing field, continues, I believe,
at the present day. Such were the rewards bestowed on the fleet horses
of the hippodrome:
[Sidenote: Theocriti Idyl. +xvi.+]
τιμὰς δὲ καὶ ὠκέες ἔλλαχον ἵπποι
οἱ σφίσιν ἐξ ἱερῶν στεφανήφοροι ἦνθον ἀγώνων.
[Sidenote: Strabon. Geograph. L. +xiv.+]
See the medal of Diana Pergæa from Montfaucon Antiq. Expliq. Tom. +i.+
p. 44. The goddess holds a spear, or hunting-pole, in her left hand,
and a fillet or crown in her right hand, elevated over the head of a
canis venaticus, who is wishfully looking up, as if in expectation of
the reward of merit. This medal is copied by the learned Father from
Beger, and derives its inscription from Perga in Pamphylia, nigh to
which city, I find in Strabo, stood on an elevated site the temple of
ΑΡΤΕΜΙΣ ΠΕΡΓΑΙΑ, whose rites were there annually celebrated.
[256]
[Sidenote: Illustrations of Shakspeare, and of Ancient Manners, &c.
Vol. +i.+ p. 392.]
Vestiges of the Celtic ceremonies of Agrotera seem to have been extant,
under a peculiar modification, in London, within a period not very
remote. That Dian’s worship was not confined to continental Europe, but
extended, as already noticed in note 1. (_sub fine_) of this chapter,
to the insular Britons, is an historical fact, confirmed, according to
the learned and ingenious Mr. Douce, by the remains of such animals
as were used in her sacrifices, and also by her own images found on
rebuilding St. Paul’s Cathedral—on the site of which, Dr. Woodward very
plausibly inferred, a Roman temple of the pagan goddess once stood.
“It cannot be controverted,” continues the first-cited able antiquary,
“that Diana was reverenced in this country long after the introduction
of Christianity, when we find from the testimony of Richard Sporling,
a monk of Westminster in 1450, and a diligent collector of ancient
materials, that during the persecution of Diocletian the inhabitants of
London sacrificed to Diana, whilst those of Thorney, now Westminster,
were offering incense to Apollo. Sir W. Dugdale records that a
commutation grant was made in the reign of Edward I. by Sir William Le
Baud, to the dean and canons of St. Paul, of a doe in winter on the
day of the Saint’s conversion, and of a fat buck in summer on that of
his commemoration, to be offered at the high altar, and distributed
among the canons. To this ceremony Erasmus has alluded in his book _De
Ratione Concionandi_, when he describes the custom which the Londoners
had of going in procession to St. Paul’s Cathedral with a deer’s head
fixed upon a spear, accompanied with men blowing hunting-horns. Mr.
Strype, likewise, in his Ecclesiastical Memorials, Vol. +iii.+ p. 378.
has preserved a notice of the custom as practised in Queen Mary’s
time, with this addition, that the priest of every parish in the city,
arrayed in his cope, and the bishop of London in his mitre, assisted
on the occasion. Camden had likewise seen it when a boy, and had heard
that the canons of the Cathedral attended in their sacred vestments,
wearing garlands of flowers on their heads.”
[257] We cannot but admire the fine feelings of piety, and conscious
dependence on an over-ruling Providence, which pervade the closing
chapters of the Cynegeticus.
[Sidenote: Lucretii L. +i.+ 62.]
[Sidenote: Hist. Natur. L. +ii.+ c. +vii.+]
Many splendid passages might be selected from the classical writings
of Greece and Rome, demonstrative of the fact that, however darkened
by mythological allusions, the most enlightened heathens supported a
conviction of the affairs of this lower world being under the guidance
of a Supreme Intelligence, and of man himself being utterly weak and
destitute when unsupported by the aid and influence of Heaven. This
feeling is strongly manifested in the works of Homer, Hesiod, Pindar,
Orpheus, Phocylides, and a host of others among the Greeks: and
notwithstanding the mischievous attempt of the philosophy of Epicurus
to eradicate from the Roman mind all sense of dependency on Heaven,
(as if the Divine Essence, in relation to human conduct, “nec benè
promeritis capitur, nec tangitur irâ,”) the works of Virgil, Horace,
and Claudian afford splendid examples of the important truth that the
natural aspirations of poetry tend to the honour of the Gods, and that
when rightfully employed, the genius of man is ever directed to the
advancement of religion and morality. It is unnecessary to refer to the
innumerable passages illustrative of the creed of ancient philosophers,
contained in their works; let it suffice that Pliny, in speaking of
the unity of the Deity, gives the reason why men commonly spoke of
more than one God: “Fragilis et laboriosa mortalitas in partes ista
digessit, infirmitatis suæ memor; ut portionibus quisque coleret, quo
maximè indigeret,” &c. The catalogue of subordinate deities, enumerated
by our author as directing the affairs, destinies, and pursuits of
mankind, merged with him in the belief of one Supreme Intelligence,
of which these subaltern deities were the several attributes and
manifestations, in the government of the universe and its constituent
parts. According to Hermesianax,
Πλούτων, Περσεφόνη, Δημήτηρ, Κύπρις, Ἔρωτες,
Τρίτωνες, Νηρεὺς, Τηθὺς, καὶ Κυανοχαίτης,
Ἑρμῆς τ’, Ἥφαιστός τε κλυτὸς, Πὰν, Ζεύς τε, καὶ Ἥρη,
Ἄρτεμις, ἠδ’ Ἑκάεργος Ἀπόλλων, εἷς θεός ἐστι:
an opinion which was general with the superior philosophers of Greece
and Rome, in opposition to the polytheistic notions of their inferiors,
who, while worshipping the “portiones” of Pliny, violated most grossly
the unity of the Εἷς Θεὸς of philosophy;—the understandings of the
former being too strong (as Sir W. Jones has remarked in the argument
of his Hymn to Surya) to admit the popular belief, but their influence
too weak to reform it, and establish in its place, in the public mind
at large, the supreme unity of the Deity—
[Sidenote: Hor. Carm. L. +iii.+ od. +iv.+]
Qui terram inertem, qui mare temperat
Ventorum, et urbes, regnaque tristia,
Divosque, mortalesque turmas
Imperio regit unus æquo.
For further notice of this subject, the reader is referred to Maximus
Tyrius, Dissert. 17., a Greek philosopher of the second century,
contemporary, I believe, with Arrian.
[258]
[Sidenote: Homer. Odyss. L. +iii.+ 48.]
Οὐδὲν ἄνευ θεῶν γιγνόμενον ἀνθρώποις ἐς ἀγαθὸν ἀποτελευτᾷ. To this we
may cite many parallel passages: πάντες δὲ θεῶν χατέουσ’ ἄνθρωποι, says
the son of Nestor to the divine attendant of Telemachus. Hesiod begins
and ends his poem of the Works and Days with inculcating piety towards
the Gods; the only way to please whom and to be happy, he says, is to
be religious and strictly moral—
[Sidenote: Opera et Dies vs. 706. Vide Dies vs. 826.]
εὖ δ’ ὄπιν ἀθανάτων μακάρων πεφυλαγμένος εἶναι.
Nor are the passages, recommendatory of due reverence of the Gods, less
numerous in the lyric and tragic poets of Greece, than in her heroic
poets:
[Sidenote: Pindar Pyth. L. +i.+ 79.]
ἐκ θεῶν γὰρ μαχαναὶ πᾶ-
σαι βροτέαις ἀρεταῖς
καὶ σοφοὶ καὶ χερσὶ βια-
ταὶ περίγλωσσοί τ’ ἔφυν.
See also the sublime supplication of Hecuba in the Troades of
Euripides, vs. 884.
The hymn of Cleanthes,
οὐδέ τι γίγνεται ἔργον ἐπὶ χθονὶ σοῦ δίχα, δαῖμον,
οὔτε κατ’ αἰθέριον θεῖον πόλον, οὐτ’ ἐνὶ πόντῳ, κ. τ. λ.
is considered the forgery of a later age. Not so, however, the
beautiful truths of the Greek poet of the Halieutics:
[Sidenote: Oppian. Halieutic. L. +ii.+ 4.]
τί γὰρ μερόπεσσιν ἀνυστὸν
νόσφι θεῶν; οὐδ’ ὅσσον ὑπ’ ἐκ ποδὸς ἴχνος ἀεῖραι,
οὐδ’ ὅσον ἀμπετάσαι βλεφάρων περιφαέα κύκλα.
ἀλλ’ αὐτοὶ κρατέουσι καὶ ἰθύνουσιν ἕκαστα,
τηλόθεν ἐγγὺς ἐόντες, ἀναγκαίη δ’ ἀτίνακτος
πείθεσθαι, κ. τ. λ.
[259]
[Sidenote: L. +i.+ vs. 359. and vs. 1186.]
[Sidenote: Pope’s Odyss. B. +ii.+ 471.]
Ὅσοι ναυτίλλονται, ἀπὸ θεῶν ἄρχονται. The sea-deities were numerous,
and of various gradations. Spence arranges them in six classes. See
Milton’s invocation of Sabrina, in his Comus, vs. 867. for the names of
many of these _Dii Marini_. Arrian mentions only Neptune, his Queen,
and the Nereids—lords of the mediterranean or inland seas: superior to
whom were Oceanus, “Pater rerum,” and Tethys. Moreover, it appears from
Apollonius Rhodius, that Apollo, for particular reasons, (αὐτὸς γὰρ
ἐπαίτιος ἔπλευ ἀέθλων, says Jason, addressing πατρώϊον Ἀπόλλωνα,) was
worshipped, under the name of Ἐμβασίος, by the Argonauts at the time of
their embarkation, and under that of Ἐκβασίος at disembarking. See also
Homer. Odyss. +ii.+ 430. where Telemachus pours forth “the holy goblet
to the powers divine,” but principally invokes, for a specific reason,
“the blue-eyed progeny of Jove.”
[260] Ἀνασωθέντες χαριστήρια θύουσιν,
[Sidenote: Virg. Georg. L. +i.+ 436.]
Votaque servati solvent in littore nautæ, &c.
and again, Æneid. +xii.+ 766.
Servati ex undis ubi figere dona solebant
Laurenti divo, et votas suspendere vestes.
Several votive monuments are engraven in Père Montfaucon’s Antiq.
Expliq. Tom. +ii.+ with inscriptions, SALVOS IRE, SALVOS REDIRE, &c.:
and Pitiscus (Lexic. Antiq. Rom. V. +ii.+ p. 164.) has others, NEPTUNO
REDUC. SACRUM, &c.
See the indications of the _Dii Marini_ appearing in dreams to
sea-faring people, in Artemidorus, L. +ii.+ 38.
[261] Ὅσοι τὴν γῆν ἐργάζονται. Every art and science had, in classic
mythology, its divine guardian, from whom it first emanated, and by
whose liberal condescension mankind were instructed in the rudiments of
their several callings:
[Sidenote: Oppian. Hal. L. +ii.+ 15.]
κεῖνοι καὶ τέχνας πολυκερδέας ἀνθρώποισιν
δῶκαν ἔχειν, καὶ πᾶσαν ἐπιφροσόνην ἐνεήκαν.
ἄλλος δ’ ἀλλοίοισιν ἐπώνυμος ἔπλετο δαίμων
ἔργοις, οἷσιν ἕκαστος ἐπίσκοπον ᾔρατο τιμήν.
The tutelar deities of husbandmen were Ceres, Proserpine, and Bacchus.
Hence, in the beginning of the first Georgic, amongst the “agrestum
præsentia numina,” Virgil invokes conjointly “Liber et alma Ceres;” and
Pindar designates Bacchus,
[Sidenote: Isthm. L. +vii.+ 3.]
χαλκοκρότου πάρεδρον
Δαμάτερος.
[Sidenote: Artemidor. Oneirocrit. L. +ii.+ c. 39.]
Δημήτηρ δὲ καὶ Κόρη, καὶ ὁ λεγόμενος Ἴακχος, says the Ephesian
visionary, γεωργοῖς καὶ τοῖς κτήσασθαι γῆν προῃρημένοις ἀγαθαί. The
department of rural economy under the tutelage of Ceres is succinctly
stated by Oppian in the second book of his Halieutics:
[Sidenote: Oppian. Hal. L. +ii.+ 19.]
Δηὼ μὲν ζεύγλης τε βοῶν, ἀρότοιο τε γαίης
πυρῶν τ’ εὐκάρποιο φέρει γέρας ἀμήτοιο.
The connexion of Proserpine with husbandry is not so clear; but as
Nicomedia, our author’s native city, was sacred both to the mother and
daughter, and he held the office of priest in the temple of the latter,
we may suppose him fully acquainted with all her tutelary distinctions,
of which the patronage of agriculture seems to have been one.
[Sidenote: Artemidor. Oneirocrit. L. +ii.+ c. 37.]
[Sidenote: Georgic. L. +i.+ 21.]
Bacchus’s presidency was principally confined, in his character of
_Vitisator_, to the culture of vineyards: Διόνυσος τοῖς γεωργοῖς
συμφέρει τοῖς τὸν ξυλικὸν καρπὸν γεωργοῦσι, μάλιστα ἀμπέλους. To
the three deities of Arrian here mentioned, Virgil subjoins others,
“studium quibus arva tueri,” whom the philosophic courser allows to
extend their fostering care to venation—at least some of them, as Pan,
the Nymphs, &c.
[262]
[Sidenote: c. +xxxvi.+]
[Sidenote: Oneirocrit. L. +ii.+ c. 35.]
[Sidenote: Ejusdem c. 37.]
Οἱ δὲ ἀμφὶ τὰς τέχνας πονούμενοι. The different bodies or colleges
of artificers had their particular tutelary deities. Pausanias in
Arcadicis mentions a temple of Minerva Machinatrix: ἔστι δὲ Ἀθηνᾶς
ἱερὸν ἐπίκλησιν Μαχανίτιδος, ὅτι βουλευμάτων ἐστὶν ἡ θεὸς παντοίων
καὶ ἐπιτεχνημάτων εὑρέτις. The connexion of Minerva and Vulcan with
handicrafts is noted by Artemidorus: Ἀθηνᾶ χειροτέχναις ἀγαθὴ διὰ
τὴν προσηγορίαν, Ἐργάνη καλεῖται γάρ——Ἥφαιστος ... χειρώναξι ἀγαθὸς
πᾶσι:—and by Oppian:
[Sidenote: Halieut. L. +ii.+ 21.]
δοῦρα δὲ τεκτῄνασθαι, ἀναστῆσαί τε μέλαθρα,
φάρεά τ’ ἀσκῆσαι μήλων εὐανθέϊ καρπῷ
Παλλὰς ἐπιχθονίους ἐδιδάξατο.
——Ἡφαίστῳ δὲ μέλει ῥαιστήριος ἱδρώς.
[Sidenote: Lucian. Deor. Dial. Juno et Latona.]
Juno tells Latona that Vulcan’s skill as an artificer, is a
counterpoise to his claudicant deformity: ἀλλ’ οὗτος μὲν ὁ χωλὸς, ὅμως
χρήσιμός γε ἐστὶ, τεχνίτης ὢν ἄριστος, κ. τ. λ.
[263] Οἱ ἀμφὶ παίδευσιν. Instructors—those engaged in education—the
μουσοπόλων ἔργων ἐπίσκοποι of the Cilician poet.
[264] Μούσαις. The Muses were thought to preside over the different
departments of science, poetry, vocal and instrumental music, and the
fine arts generally.
[Sidenote: Hesiod. D. G. 94.]
ἐκ γὰρ Μουσάων καὶ ἐκηβόλου Ἀπόλλωνος
ἀνδρὲς ἀοιδοὶ ἔασιν ἐπὶ χθόνα καὶ κιθαρισταί.
[265] Ἀπόλλωνι Μουσηγέτῃ. When the gods attended the nuptials of Peleus
and Thetis on Mount Pelion, Apollo led “the tuneful choir” in the
character of Musagetes:
[Sidenote: Coluthi Rapt. Helen. vs. 23.]
ἐκ δὲ μελισσήεντος ἀπεσσυμένων Ἑλικῶνος
Μουσάων λιγύφωνον ἄγων χορὸν ἦλθεν Ἀπόλλων.
Representations of Apollo in the character of Musagetes or Lyristes,
from the Justinian gallery, are given by Père Montfaucon in the first
volume of his Antiquities; by Spence, in his Polymetis, Pl. +xiii.+ f.
+i.+ +ii.+; and by Visconti, in the Clementine Museum, Vol. +i.+
[Sidenote: Ausonii Musarum Inventa. Idyll. +xx.+]
Mentis Apollineæ vis has movet undique Musas.
In medio residens amplectitur omnia Phœbus.
[Sidenote: Artemidori Oneirocrit. L. +ii.+ c. 35.]
Ἀπόλλων μουσικοῖς ἀγαθὸς, says the Ephesian, λόγων γὰρ εὑρετὴς ὁ θεὸς
καὶ μουσικῆς πάσης. In which character the Roman poets of the Augustan
age have decked him out to the life. See Ovid’s
[Sidenote: Metam. L. +xi.+ 165.]
Ille caput flavum lauro Parnasside vinctus—
Verrit humum Tyrio saturatâ murice pallâ, &c.
[266] Μνήμοσυνῃ. This goddess is celebrated by Hesiod, in his Theogony,
as the mother of the Muses:
[Sidenote: D. G. vs. 915.]
ἐκ ἧς αἱ Μοῦσαι χρυσάμπυκες ἐξεγένοντο
ἐννέα, τῇσιν ἅδον θαλίαι, καὶ τέρψις ἀοιδῆς.
So Akenside, in The Pleasures of Imagination:
[Sidenote: Book +iii.+]
Ye beauteous offspring of Olympian Jove
And Memory divine, Pierian maids.
That this mythology is judicious, has been remarked by Plutarch in his
rules for the education of children; since nothing so much cherishes
learning as memory. There is a statue of Mnemosyne in the Clementine
Museum of Visconti, Vol. +i.+
[267] Ἑρμῇ. Mercury is here introduced in one of his most creditable
capacities, as the author of letters, and the god of orators and
eloquence:
[Sidenote: Francis’s Horace. B. +i.+ Od. +x.+]
The god of wit, from Atlas sprung,
Who by persuasive power of tongue
And graceful exercise refined
The savage race of human kind!
[Sidenote: Artemidori Oneirocrit. L. +ii.+ c. 37.]
Ἑρμῆς ἀγαθὸς τοῖς ἐπὶ λόγους ὁρμωμένοις, καὶ ἀθληταῖς, καὶ
παιδοτρίβαις, κ. τ. λ.
[268] Οἱ δὲ ἀμφὶ τὰ ἐρωτικὰ Ἀφροδίτῃ. In the Rape of Helen, Venus is
called Ἁρμονίης βασίλεια, (v. 26.) θαλάμων βασίλεια, (v. 137.) and
γάμων βασίλεια, (v. 306.) queen of marriage. And to the same purport is
the description of Nemesian:
[Sidenote: Bucol. Eclog. L. +ii.+ 57.]
cui cura jugales
Concubitus hominum totis connectere sêclis.
[Sidenote: Artemidori Oneirocrit. L. +ii.+ c. 37.]
μάλιστα δὲ ἀγαθὴ περὶ γάμους καὶ κοινωνίας, καὶ περὶ τέκνων γονὰς,
says the dream-interpreter, of the goddess of love, συνδέσμων γὰρ καὶ
ἐπιγόνων ἐστὶν αἰτία. The reader will remember her angry speech (tangit
et ira Deos) in the prologue of the Hippolytus,
τοὺς μὲν σέβοντας τἀμὰ πρεσβεύω κράτη,
σφάλλω δ’ ὅσοι φρονοῦσιν εἰς ἡμᾶς μέγα, κ. τ. λ.
and her vengeful and infuriate character, as drawn by Apollonius
Rhodius in reference to the Lemnians:
[Sidenote: Argonaut. L. +i.+ 615.]
οὕνεκά μιν γεράων ἐπιδηρὸν ἄτισσαν.
and amplified by Valerius Flaccus, L. +ii.+ vs. 29.
[269] Ἔρωτι. Venus confesses that she has little power without the aid
of her favourite son Cupid:
[Sidenote: Æneid. L. +i.+ 668.]
Nate, meæ vires, mea magna potentia, &c.
Ad te confugio, et supplex tua numina posco.
She is accompanied by him and Ἵμερος (whom the Grecian mythologists
seem to have distinguished from Ἔρως) in the Theogony of Hesiod.
[Sidenote: D. G. vs. 201.]
τῇ δ’ Ἔρος ὡμάρτησε, καὶ Ἵμερος ἕσπετο καλός.
The Odes of Anacreon afford many graphic sketches of the mischievous
little god:
[Sidenote: Od. +iii.+ vs. 17.]
φέροντα τόξον,
πτέρυγάς τε καὶ φαρέτρην.
[270] Πειθοῖ. Suada or Suadela—the goddess of persuasion—_nuptiarum
conciliatrix_. In the temple of Jupiter at Olympia, as described by
Pausanias, Cupid is seen receiving Venus rising out of the sea, and the
goddess Πειθὼ placing a crown on her head: and so in the Rape of Helen,
she is the bearer of the bridal chaplet:
[Sidenote: Coluthi R. H. vs. 28.]
καὶ στέφος ἀσκήσασα γαμήλιον ἤλυθε Πειθὼ,
τοξευτῆρος Ἔρωτος ἐλαφρίζουσα φαρέτρην.
[Sidenote: Epod. L. +i.+ Od. +vi.+]
[Sidenote: Oneirocrit. L. +ii.+ c. 37.]
Horace unites Suadela and Venus in the attractions of “the
well-bemoney’d swain”—“benè-nummatum decorat Suadela Venusque.” And
Artemidorus says her appearance is ominous of good to all persons, and
on all occasions; Πειθὼ δὲ καὶ Χάριτες, καὶ Ὧραι, καὶ Νύμφαι πρὸς πάντα
καὶ πᾶσιν εἰσὶν ἀγαθαί.
[271] Χάρισιν. The Graces of Heathen mythology were ladies of great
influence: simplicity of manners, gracefulness of deportment, gaiety of
disposition, liberality, eloquence, and wisdom, were all derived from
them:
[Sidenote: Pindar. Olymp. L. +xiv.+ 6.]
σὺν γὰρ ὑμῖν τὰ τερπνὰ καὶ τὰ γλυκέα
γίνεται πάντα βροτοῖς·
εἰ σοφὸς, εἰ καλὸς, εἴ τις ἀγλαὸς
ἀνήρ.
[Sidenote: Hesiodi D. G. vs. 64.]
In the Theogony they “keep their court with the God of Love,” and
revel in banquets; and in Horace’s supplicatory Ode to Venus, they are
associated with the “Regina Cnidi Paphique,” Cupid, the Nymphs, Hebe,
and Mercury:
[Sidenote: Carm. L. +i.+ Od. 31. vs. 5.]
Fervidus tecum puer, et solutis
Gratiæ zonis, properentque Nymphæ,
Et parùm comis sine te Juventas,
Mercuriusque.
[272]
[Sidenote: De Venat. c. +vi.+]
[Sidenote: Ἱερακοσόφιον. p. 21.]
Τοὺς ἐπὶ θήρᾳ ἐσπουδακότας οὐ χρὴ ἀμελεῖν τῆς Ἀρτέμιδος τῆς Ἀγροτέρας.
Xenophon was equally strict in his religious observances towards the
rural deities, bidding the sportsman, before he slip a single hound,
to vow a participation of the game to Apollo and Diana Agrotera. See
Pitisci Lexicon Antiquit. Roman. and Apul. Met. +vi.+ p. 175. The
falconer of Demetrius, in later days, offered his morning adoration
to the God of heaven before sun-rise, and then flew his hawk at the
quarry: τὸν θεὸν ἐπικαλεσάμενος τῇ θήρᾳ εὐμενῶς συλλήψοιτο, κ. τ. λ.
Following his Classic prototypes, Adrian de Castello makes the cardinal
hunter supplicate the Sylvan goddess:
[Sidenote: Adriani Venatio apud poetas tres Aldi.]
Volans Ascanius levi veredo
Precatus Triviæ perenne numen,
Invadit jaculo, diuque librans
Jecit eminùs, &c.
as a necessary preliminary to the slaughter of a stag, bayed by the
hounds.
[273]
[Sidenote: Xenophon. De Venat. c. +i.+]
[Sidenote: See the Museo Chiaramonti of Visconti and Guattani. T.
+xviii.+]
Ἀπόλλωνος. Apollo shared with Diana the institution of hunting:
Ἀπόλλωνος καὶ Ἀρτεμίδος ἄγραι καὶ κύνες. Whence, with his twin-sister,
he is seen on antique relievos with dogs and other emblems of the
chase. In his character of Venator, Apollo is described by Maximus
Tyrius as a youth armed with a bow, his naked side appearing beneath a
chlamys, and his feet raised in the act of running:
[Sidenote: Virgil. Æneid. L. +iv.+ 143.]
Qualis ubi hibernam Lyciam Xanthique fluenta
Deserit, ac Delum maternam invisit Apollo,
Instauratque choros, mixtique altaria circum
Cretesque Dryopesque fremunt pictique Agathyrsi;
Ipse jugis Cynthi graditur, mollique fluentem
Fronde premit crinem fingens, atque implicat auro;
Tela sonant humeris.
[Sidenote: Statii Achil. L. +i.+ 167.]
[Sidenote: Lucian. Deor. Dial. Juno et Latona.]
[Sidenote: Tibull. L. +iii.+ El. +iv.+ 34.]
The reader is of course familiar with the Apollo of the Belvedere—the
Venator of Statuaries—“Venator Apollo:” but perhaps not so well
acquainted with the Wilton effigy of him, exhibiting in a small compass
all the symbols which characterise his presidency over poetry, music,
divination, or more probably medicine, and the chase—(προσποιεῖται μὲν
πάντα εἰδέναι, καὶ τοξεύειν, καὶ κιθαρίζειν, καὶ ἰατρὸς εἶναι, καὶ
μαντεύεσθαι)—in three of which attributes he is cited by our author
in the present Chapter. The attitude of the god is easy and graceful;
he appears to lean against one of the horns of his lyre, placed on
a tripod, around which a serpent twines. Over his right shoulder is
seen his quiver, and his head is decorated with a laurel crown—“castâ
redimitus tempora lauro:” the chlamys of the Venator is thrown off,
exposing the belt beneath, and the former with its gem is placed on
some fit receptacle beside the right leg.
[274]
[Sidenote: De Augment. Scient. L. +ii.+]
[Sidenote: Virg. Eclog. L. +ii.+ 33.]
Πανός. “Officium Panis nullâ alia re,” says Lord Bacon, “tam ad vivum
proponi atque explicari potuerit, quàm quòd Deus Venatorum est,” &c.
He was the god of the shepherds as well as hunters, the leader of
the Nymphs as Apollo was of the Muses, the patron of rural life, and
president of the mountains. Happy the man, exclaims the poet of the
Georgics in his eulogy of country life, who numbers the rustic deities,
and Pan amongst the rest, in the catalogue of his acquaintance:
[Sidenote: Virg. Georg. L. +ii.+ 494.]
deos qui novit agrestes,
Panaque, Sylvanumque senem, Nymphasque sorores!
The most graphic description of the goatish god I have any where seen
is in the 13th book of Silius Italicus:
pendenti similis Pan semper, et uno
Vix ulla inscribens terræ vestigia cornu, &c. &c.
[Sidenote: Deorum Concilium.]
But as this has been cited at length by Spence in his Polymetis, a
book of easy reference, I decline introducing it here—wishing, as
much as possible, to present my readers with passages omitted by this
celebrated scholar. Let Lucian’s more brief delineation be substituted:
ὁ μὲν κέρατα ἔχων, καὶ ὅσον ἐξ ἡμισείας ἐς τὸ κάτω αἰγὶ ἐοικὼς, καὶ
γένειον βαθὺ καθειμένος, ὀλίγον τράγου διαφέρων ἐστίν.
[275] Νυμφῶν. Beger’s list of these ladies does not much exceed
one hundred in number, although it is said that Diana had above a
thousand in her retinue. We may suppose those principally interested
in Cynegetical pursuits to have been the _Oreades_, nymphs of the
mountains; the νύμφαι Ὀρεστιάδες of Homer (Iliad. +vi.+ 421.) the
Ὀρείπλαγκτοι of Aristophanes (Thesmophoriazusæ); the _Napææ_, nymphs
of the meadows, (of whom Virgil, “faciles venerare Napæas,”) and the
_Dryades_ and _Hamadryades_, nymphs of the woods, the φιλορνίθων
Δρυάδων χορὸς of Oppian (Cyneg. +i.+ vs. 78.) see claudian. de laudib.
stilic. l. +iii.+ for a description of the “acies formosa Dianæ,” and
the Epicedium of Hercules Stroza; in which latter the names of many of
these inferior Sylvan deities, “turbæ nemoralis,” are registered in
chaste hexameters, addressed to the Duchess of Ferrara. Sometimes the
Naiads also accompanied the land-nymphs in their hunting pranks:
[Sidenote: Valer. Flacci Argon. L. +iii.+ 530.]
pulchro venantes agmine Nymphas,
Undarum, nemorumque decus, &c.
[Sidenote: Tempest, Act +v.+ sc. +i.+]
Elves of hills, brooks, standing lakes, and groves.
[276]
[Sidenote: De bello Gallico L. +v.+ c. 17.]
[Sidenote: Lexicon Antiq. V. +ii.+ 186.]
Ἑρμοῦ Ἐνοδίου καὶ Ἡγεμονίου. “Deum maximè Mercurium colunt,” says Cæsar
of the Gauls or Celts: “hujus sunt plurima simulacra; hunc omnium
inventorem artium ferunt; _hunc viarum atque itinerum ducem_; hunc ad
quæstus pecuniæ mercaturasque habere vim maximam arbitrantur.” Being
the god of every species of gain, and the dog being sacred to him,
we have additional reasons for the injunction of the text. He was
called Ἐνόδιος or “vialis” according to Pitiscus, “qui viarum præses,
in biviis, et compitis ponebatur ad semitas monstrandas:” in which
capacity his statues are, what are commonly called Terminal,—that
seemingly imperfect, ugly, awkward-looking shape, to which a worthless
Roman nobleman, Rubellius Plancus, is assimilated by the satirist of
Aquinum;
[Sidenote: Juvenal. Sat. +viii.+ 52.]
at tu
Nil nisi Cecropides, truncoque simillimus Hermæ.
Nullo quippe alio vincis discrimine, quàm quòd
Illi marmoreum caput est, tua vivit imago.
A Greek medal is extant of Arrian’s native city, of the reign
of Antoninus Pius, bearing the impress of the god Terminus. See
Nummophylacium Reginæ Christinæ, Tab. +lvii.+
The old herdsman of Theocritus, with the title εἰνόδιος, affords the
reason of its use:
[Sidenote: Idyll. +xxv.+ 3.]
ἔκ τοι ξεῖνε πρόφρων μυθήσομαι ὅσσ’ ἐρεείνεις,
Ἑρμέω ἁζόμενος δεινὴν ὄπιν εἰνοδίοιο.
τὸν γὰρ φασὶ μέγιστον ἐπουρανίων κεχολῶσθαι,
εἴ κεν ὁδοῦ ζαχρεῖον ἀνῄνηταί τις ὁδίτην.
See Eustathius ad Homeri Odyss. +xvi.+ and Ouzelius ad M. Minuc. Felic.
Octavium, p. 109.
In his character of guide or conductor, (Ἡγεμόνιος,) amongst many
others, the wily god volunteers his services to Cario, in the Plutus of
Aristophanes:
[Sidenote: Act. +v.+ sc. +i.+]
ΕΡ. ἀλλ’ ἡγεμόνιον. ΚΑ. ἀλλ’ ὁ θεὸς ἤδη βλέπει.
ὥσθ’ ἡγεμόνος οὐδὲν δεησόμεσθ’ ἔτι.
Though the messenger of the gods, and supremely Διὸς ἄγγελος, he seems
to have been a willing itinerant on earth (ὁδοιπόρος) in the cause of
humanity. See Iliad +xxiv.+
Guard of our life, and partner of our way!
[277] Ὅσοι ἄλλοι ὄρειοι θεοί. Almost every mountain had its tutelar
deity; but Arrian probably here means the rural deities hitherto
unnamed, as Sylvanus, Silenus, Priapus, Aristæus, the Fauns, Satyrs,
Pales, Flora, Feronia, and a host of others. On a due observance of the
rites of these gods and goddesses, and demi-deities of “hill and dale,
forest and mead,” (to whom might be traced, perhaps, the fairy system
of more modern days,) and more particularly on an observance of those
of Diana Agrotera, was an abundant supply of game, and avoidance of the
ordinary casualties of the chase, entirely dependent:
[Sidenote: Senecæ Hippolyt. Prol. vs. 73.]
Tua si gratus numina cultor
Tulit in saltus; retia vinctas
Tenuere feras; nulli laqueum
Rupêre pedes; fertur plaustro
Præda gementi: tum rostra canes
Sanguine multo rubicunda gerunt;
Repetitque casas rustica longo
Turba triumpho.
[278]
[Sidenote: c. +xxxiii.+]
Καὶ γὰρ καὶ οἱ κύνες βλάπτονται, κ. τ. λ. All that Arrian here
anticipates as a consequence of neglect of the rural deities, Savary
of Caen, in bitterness of heart, invokes on the ill-fated heads of
_the brethren of the leash_; whom he designates as enamoured of the
savage pugnacity of the bull-dog greyhound—with which alone, the
wolf-greyhound of his country, this poet was acquainted. Great as may
have been his love of the harrier’s chase, and great his admiration
of its followers, whom he calls Dian’s legitimate worshippers, I
cannot conceive him conversant with the genuine pastime of his Celtic
ancestry, nor with the κύων τῇ ἀληθείᾳ γενναῖος of Arrian, when he
wrote the following virulent anathema:
[Sidenote: Album Dianæ Leporicidæ. L. +v.+]
Talia legitimos non infortunia tangant
Cultores, Diana, tuos: inhonora Laconis
Sed quoscunque juvat feritas truculenta Molossi,
Sola quibus cædes, si qua est in cæde voluptas,
Illorum paribus turbentur gaudia causis.
Mulcta suppliciis cor insatiabile prædæ.
Plecte viros, extingue canes, rabiemque ferocem
Instilla, dominus catulis odiosus et ipsis,
Exæquet falsum veris Actæona pœnis.
Et qui participes (pigeat licet ista precari)
Disrumpantur equi, domini plectantur in illis!
[279]
[Sidenote: Ælian. de Naturâ Animal. L. +xi.+ c. 9.]
Ælian tells us there is a temple of Diana in an isle of the Red Sea
called Icarus, abounding with goats, roe-deer, and hares, which
a sportsman may catch, if the goddess be duly petitioned; but if
not, he is not only unsuccessful in his sport, but punished for the
transgression—ἐὰν δὲ μὴ αἰτήσῃ, οὔτε αἱρεῖ, καὶ δίδωσι δίκας, ἃς ἄλλοι
λεγούσιν.
[280] Ὅμηρος ἐν τῇ ποιήσει. Arrian alludes to the contest for the prize
of archery, at the games celebrated by Achilles on the occasion of
the funeral of his friend Patroclus. I give Pope’s translation of the
passage:
[Sidenote: Iliad B. +xxiii.+ vs. 1020.]
To the tall top a milk-white dove they tie,
The trembling mark at which their arrows fly.
“Whose weapon strikes yon fluttering bird, shall bear
These two-edged axes, terrible in war;
The single he, whose shaft divides the cord.”
He said: experienced Merion took the word;
And skilful Teucer: in the helm they threw
Their lots inscribed, and forth the latter flew.
Swift from the string the sounding arrow flies;
But flies unblest! No grateful sacrifice,
No firstling lambs, unheedful! didst thou vow
To Phœbus, patron of the shaft and bow.
For this, thy well-aim’d arrow, turn’d aside,
Err’d from the dove, yet cut the cord that tied:
Adown the mainmast fell the parted string,
And the free bird to heav’n displays her wing:
Seas, shores, and skies with loud applause resound,
And Merion eager meditates the wound:
He takes the bow, directs the shaft above,
And following with his eye the soaring dove,
Implores the god to speed it through the skies,
With vows of firstling lambs, and grateful sacrifice.
The dove, in airy circles as she wheels
Amid the clouds, the piercing arrow feels:
Quite through and through the point its passage found,
And at his feet fell bloody to the ground.
[281] Ἐπειδὴ μὴ ἐπηύξατο τῷ Ἀπόλλωνι. The God of Archers and Archery.
The poet and the courser would both teach us the same lesson—that
without addressing supplication to heaven, we cannot succeed in our
undertakings. Merion does not conquer because he is the better archer,
but because he is the better man.
[282] Τοὺς ἐκγόνους δὲ τῶν ἐπὶ Θήβας σὺν Πολυνείκῃ. The Homeric line
cited by Arrian from the speech of Sthenelus, in the fourth book of the
Iliad, alludes to the victors of the second Theban war, wherein the
sons of the seven captains subdued the city, before which their fathers
had perished:
[Sidenote: Pope’s Iliad. B. +iv.+ 460.]
With fewer troops we storm’d the Theban wall,
And happier saw the sev’n-fold city fall.
In impious acts the guilty fathers died;
The sons subdued, for heav’n was on their side.
Capaneus, the sire of Sthenelus, was thunder-struck, while blaspheming
Jupiter—
[Sidenote: Statii Thebaid. L. +x.+ 927.]
Talia dicentem toto Jove fulmen adactum
Corripuit.
[283] Πολυδάμαντι οὐκ ἐῶντι. From Pope’s translation I extract a part
of the speech of Polydamas, with the omen referred to:
[Sidenote: B. +xii.+ 253.]
Seek not this day the Grecian ships to gain;
For sure to warn us Jove his omen sent,
And thus my mind explains its clear event:
The victor eagle whose sinister flight
Retards our host, and fills our hearts with fright,
Dismiss’d his conquest in the middle skies,
Allow’d to seize, but not retain the prize, &c.
Pope’s version of Hector’s reply to this speech of Polydamas, is
one of the most splendid specimens of his talent to be found in the
poem—as the whole incident is perhaps the finest of Flaxman’s beautiful
illustrations of the immortal bard.
[284]
[Sidenote: Pyth. +ii.+ vs. 161. and 173.]
[Sidenote: Act. Apost. c. +ix.+]
Οὐκ ἀγαθὸν ἀπειθεῖν τῷ θείῳ. Homer himself draws many similar
inferences in the progress of his interesting tales both of the Iliad
and the Odyssey—χαλεπόν τοι ἐρισθενέος Κρονίωνος—παισὶν ἐριζέμεναι—and
again, θεόθεν δ’ οὐκ ἐστ’ ἀλέασθαι: and Pindar abounds with like
injunctions of humble submission to the divine will—χρὴ δὲ πρὸς—θεὸν
οὐκ ἐρίζειν, κ. τ. λ.—ποτὶ κέντρον δέ τοι—λακτιζέμεν, τελέθει—ὀλισθηρὸς
οἶμος. See also vs. 89. ejusd. Carm. The reader cannot but recollect
the memorable counterpart to these words, (with reverence be they
cited!) in the Apostolic history of the conversion of St. Paul—σκληρόν
σοι πρὸς κέντρα λακτίζειν.
How beautiful the metaphor that runs through the following lines of the
poet of Cilicia!
[Sidenote: Oppian. Hal. L. +ii.+ 12.]
ἀλλ’ αἰεὶ μάκαρες πανυπέρτατοι ἡνία πάντη
κλίνουσ’, ᾗ κ’ ἐθέλωσιν· ὁ δ’ ἕσπεται, ὅς κε σαόφρων,
πρὶν χαλεπῇ μάστιγι καὶ οὐκ ἐθέλων ἐλάηται.
See the sensible remarks of Xenophon on the words ΣΥΝ ΘΕΩ ΠΡΑΤΤΕΙΝ, at
the conclusion of his treatise De Offic. Magistr. Equit. c. +ix.+
[285]
[Sidenote: De Legibus.]
Ἄρχεσθαί τε ἀπὸ θεῶν. “A Diis immortalibus,” says Cicero, “sunt
nobis agendi capienda primordia:” and Julius Pollux, to whom I have
frequently referred in the early part of these annotations, concludes
his address to Commodus, at the commencement of his Onomasticon, with
the same sentiment—ποιήσομαι δὲ τὴν ἀρχὴν, ἀφ’ ὧν μάλιστα προσήκει τοὺς
εὐσεβεῖς, ἀπὸ τῶν θεῶν.
[286]
[Sidenote: De Expeditione Alexandri L. +vi.+ c. +xxviii.+]
Χαριστήρια θύειν εὖ πράξαντα. So in his Anabasis, Arrian writes, θύσαι
Ἀλέξανδρον ἐν Καρμανίᾳ χαριστήρια τῆς κατ’ Ἰνδῶν νίκης, κ. τ. λ.
These free-will offerings may be considered in the light of grateful
acknowledgments to the gods for blessings received. They were paid by
soldiers after victory, by husbandmen after harvest, and by sportsmen
after success in the field.
[287]
[Sidenote: Æneid. L. +vi.+ 244.]
Σπένδειν. Wine was generally used in these libations, but not always;
for there were νηφάλια ἱερὰ—sober sacrifices, wherein no wine was
poured forth. Generally, however, wine was employed, as we learn from
Virgil’s “frontique invergit vina sacerdos.”
[288]
[Sidenote: Schol. ad Aristoph. Thesm. Act. +i.+]
Εὐφημεῖν—“favere linguâ, bona verba dicere.” This expression does
not seem to mean that the persons present at a sacrifice were to
observe profound silence, but rather to abstain only from words
of evil omen. Mr. Cowper has preserved its sense correctly in his
translation of εὐφημῆσαι, Iliad +ix.+ 171. “That every tongue abstain
from speech—Portentous.” Ogilby, Dacier, and Pope, all mistake the
signification of εὐφημεῖν. “Præcones clamantes,” says Festus, “populum
sacrificiis favere jubebant. Favere est bona fari.” But Bourdin ad
Aristoph. Thesmophor. εὐφημεῖν σημαίνει σιγᾷν καὶ σιωπᾷν δι’ εὐφημίας.
[289] Στεφανοῦν. The sacrificial victims were adorned with garlands
and crowns on their horns and necks. The altars were decorated with
sacred herbs, and the priests themselves wore crowns upon their heads,
composed of the leaves of the tree sacred to the deity to whom they
paid their devotions. See Tertullian de Idololatriâ.
[290]
[Sidenote: Arrian. de Exped. Alex. L. +iv.+ c. +xi.+]
Ὑμνεῖν. Hunting-carols, it may be, were chanted to Dian and her sylvan
train, by the Celts and other sportsmen of old. It was customary
to sing hymns in honour of the Gods, and dance around the altar of
sacrifice, on occasion of celebrating the more important religious
rites; when the songs, in general, commemorated the exploits of the
worshipped, enumerated their virtues, and the benefits conferred
upon the worshippers, expressing, at the same time, a wish for
their continuance. Ὕμνοι μὲν ἐς τοὺς θεοὺς ποιοῦνται, ἔπαινοι δὲ ἐς
ἀνθρώπους, says Callisthenes, in his splendid speech on the line of
distinction to be drawn between divine and human honours.
[291]
[Sidenote: Lexicon Antiq. Roman.]