OF SAVAGE BEASTS AND VERMIN.
[1577, Book III., Chapters 7 and 12; 1587, Book III., Chapters 4 and 6.]
It is none of the least blessings wherewith God hath endued this island
that it is void of noisome beasts, as lions, bears, tigers, pardes,
wolves, and such like, by means whereof our countrymen may travel in
safety, and our herds and flocks remain for the most part abroad in the
field without any herdman or keeper.
This is chiefly spoken of the south and south-west parts of the island.
For, whereas we that dwell on this side of the Tweed may safely boast of
our security in this behalf, yet cannot the Scots do the like in every
point within their kingdom, sith they have grievous wolves and cruel
foxes, beside some others of like disposition continually conversant among
them, to the general hindrance of their husbandmen, and no small damage
unto the inhabitants of those quarters. The happy and fortunate want of
these beasts in England is universally ascribed to the politic government
of King Edgar.[186]
* * * * *
Of foxes we have some, but no great store, and also badgers in our sandy
and light grounds, where woods, furze, broom, and plenty of shrubs are to
shroud them in when they be from their burrows, and thereunto warrens of
conies at hand to feed upon at will. Otherwise in clay, which we call the
cledgy mould, we seldom hear of any, because the moisture and the
toughness of the soil is such as will not suffer them to draw and make
their burrows deep. Certes, if I may freely say what I think, I suppose
that these two kinds (I mean foxes and badgers) are rather preserved by
gentlemen to hunt and have pastime withal at their own pleasures than
otherwise suffered to live as not able to be destroyed because of their
great numbers. For such is the scantity of them here in England, in
comparison of the plenty that is to be seen in other countries, and so
earnestly are the inhabitants bent to root them out, that, except it had
been to bear thus with the recreations of their superiors in this behalf,
it could not otherwise have been chosen but that they should have been
utterly destroyed by many years agone.
I might here intreat largely of other vermin, as the polecat, the miniver,
the weasel, stote, fulmart, squirrel, fitchew, and such like, which Cardan
includeth under the word _Mustela_: also of the otter, and likewise of the
beaver, whose hinder feet and tail only are supposed to be fish. Certes
the tail of this beast is like unto a thin whetstone, as the body unto a
monstrous rat: as the beast also itself is of such force in the teeth that
it will gnaw a hole through a thick plank, or shere through a double
billet in a night; it loveth also the stillest rivers, and it is given to
them by nature to go by flocks unto the woods at hand, where they gather
sticks wherewith to build their nests, wherein their bodies lie dry above
the water, although they so provide most commonly that their tails may
hang within the same. It is also reported that their said tails are a
delicate dish, and their stones of such medicinal force that (as
Vertomannus saith) four men smelling unto them each after other did bleed
at the nose through their attractive force, proceeding from a vehement
savour wherewith they are endued. There is greatest plenty of them in
Persia, chiefly about Balascham, from whence they and their dried cods are
brought into all quarters of the world, though not without some forgery by
such as provide them. And of all these here remembered, as the first sorts
are plentiful in every wood and hedgerow, so these latter, especially the
otter (for, to say the truth, we have not many beavers, but only in the
Teisie in Wales) is not wanting or to seek in many, but most, streams and
rivers of this isle; but it shall suffice in this sort to have named them,
as I do finally the martern, a beast of the chase, although for number I
worthily doubt whether that of our beavers or marterns may bethought to be
the less.
Other pernicious beasts we have not, except you repute the great plenty of
red and fallow deer whose colours are oft garled white and black, all
white or all black, and store of conies amongst the hurtful sort. Which
although that of themselves they are not offensive at all, yet their great
numbers are thought to be very prejudicial, and therefore justly reproved
of many, as are in like sort our huge flocks of sheep, whereon the
greatest part of our soil is employed almost in every place, and yet our
mutton, wool, and felles never the better cheap. The young males which our
fallow deer do bring forth are commonly named according to their several
ages: for the first year it is a fawn, the second a puckot, the third a
serell,[187] the fourth a soare, the fifth a buck of the first head, not
bearing the name of a buck till he be five years old: and from henceforth
his age is commonly known by his head or horns. Howbeit this notice of his
years is not so certain but that the best woodman may now and then be
deceived in that account: for in some grounds a buck of the first head
will be as well headed as another in a high rowtie soil will be in the
fourth. It is also much to be marvelled at that, whereas they do yearly
mew and cast their horns, yet in fighting they never break off where they
do grife or mew. Furthermore, in examining the condition of our red deer,
I find that the young male is called in the first year a calf, in the
second a broket, the third a spay, the fourth a staggon or stag, the fifth
a great stag, the sixth a hart, and so forth unto his death. And with him
in degree of venerie are accounted the hare, boar, and wolf. The fallow
deer, as bucks and does, are nourished in parks, and conies in warrens and
burrows. As for hares, they run at their own adventure, except some
gentleman or other (for his pleasure) do make an enclosure for them. Of
these also the stag is accounted for the most noble game, the fallow deer
is the next, then the roe, whereof we have indifferent store, and last of
all the hare, not the least in estimation, because the hunting of that
seely beast is mother to all the terms, blasts, and artificial devices
that hunters do use. All which (notwithstanding our custom) are pastimes
more meet for ladies and gentlewomen to exercise (whatsoever Franciscus
Patritius saith to the contrary in his _Institution of a Prince_) than for
men of courage to follow, whose hunting should practise their arms in
tasting of their manhood, and dealing with such beasts as eftsoons will
turn again and offer them the hardest, rather than their horses' feet
which many times may carry them with dishonour from the field.[188]
* * * * *
If I should go about to make any long discourse of venomous beasts or
worms bred in England, I should attempt more than occasion itself would
readily offer, sith we have very few worms, but no beasts at all, that are
thought by their natural qualities to be either venomous or hurtful. First
of all, therefore, we have the adder (in our old Saxon tongue called an
atter), which some men do not rashly take to be the viper. Certes, if it
be so, then is not the viper author of the death of her[189] parents, as
some histories affirm, and thereto Encelius, a late writer, in his _De re
Metallica_, lib. 3, cap. 38, where he maketh mention of a she adder which
he saw in Sala, whose womb (as he saith) was eaten out after a like
fashion, her young ones lying by her in the sunshine, as if they had been
earthworms. Nevertheless, as he nameth them _viperas_, so he calleth the
male _echis_, and the female _echidna_, concluding in the end that _echis_
is the same serpent which his countrymen to this day call _ein atter_, as
I have also noted before out of a Saxon dictionary. For my part I am
persuaded that the slaughter of their parents is either not true at all,
or not always (although I doubt not but that nature hath right well
provided to inhibit their superfluous increase by some means or other),
and so much the rather am I led hereunto for that I gather by Nicander
that of all venomous worms the viper only bringeth out her young alive,
and therefore is called in Latin _vipera quasivivipara_, but of her own
death he doth not (to my remembrance) say anything. It is testified also
by other in other words, and to the like sense, that "_Echis id est vipera
sola ex serpentibus non ava sed animalia parit_." And it may well be, for
I remember that I have read in Philostratus, _De vita Appollonii_, how he
saw a viper licking her young. I did see an adder once myself that lay (as
I thought) sleeping on a molehill, out of whose mouth came eleven young
adders of twelve or thirteen inches in length apiece, which played to and
fro in the grass one with another, till some of them espied me. So soon
therefore as they saw my face they ran again into the mouth of their dam,
whom I killed, and then found each of them shrouded in a distinct cell or
pannicle in her belly, much like unto a soft white jelly, which maketh me
to be of the opinion that our adder is the viper indeed. The colour of
their skin is for the most part like rusty iron or iron grey, but such as
be very old resemble a ruddy blue; and as once in the year (to wit, in
April or about the beginning of May) they cast their old skins (whereby as
it is thought their age reneweth), so their stinging bringeth death
without present remedy be at hand, the wounded never ceasing to swell,
neither the venom to work till the skin of the one break, and the other
ascend upward to the heart, where it finisheth the natural effect, except
the juice of dragons (in Latin called _dracunculus minor_) be speedily
ministered and drunk in strong ale, or else some other medicine taken of
like force that may countervail and overcome the venom of the same. The
length of them is most commonly two feet, and somewhat more, but seldom
doth it extend into two feet six inches, except it be in some rare and
monstrous one, whereas our snakes are much longer, and seen sometimes to
surmount a yard, or three feet, although their poison be nothing so
grievous and deadly as the others. Our adders lie in winter under stones,
as Aristotle also saith of the viper (lib. 8, cap. 15), and in holes of
the earth, rotten stubs of trees, and amongst the dead leaves; but in the
heat of the summer they come abroad, and lie either round in heaps or at
length upon some hillock, or elsewhere in the grass. They are found only
in our woodland countries and highest grounds, where sometimes (though
seldom) a speckled stone called _echites_, in Dutch _ein atter stein_, is
gotten out of their dried carcases, which divers report to be good against
their poison.[190] As for our snakes, which in Latin are properly named
_angues_, they commonly are seen in moors, fens, loam walls, and low
bottoms.
As we have great store of toads where adders commonly are found, so do
frogs abound where snakes do keep their residence. We have also the
slow-worm, which is black and greyish of colour, and somewhat shorter than
an adder. I was at the killing once of one of them, and thereby perceived
that she was not so called of any want of nimble motion, but rather of the
contrary. Nevertheless we have a blind-worm, to be found under logs, in
woods and timber that hath lain long in a place, which some also do call
(and upon better ground) by the name of slow-worms, and they are known
easily by their more or less variety of striped colours, drawn long-ways
from their heads, their whole bodies little exceeding a foot in length,
and yet is their venom deadly. This also is not to be omitted; and now and
then in our fenny countries other kinds of serpents are found of greater
quantity than either our adder or our snake, but, as these are not
ordinary and oft to be seen, so I mean not to intreat of them among our
common annoyances. Neither have we the scorpion, a plague of God sent not
long since into Italy, and whose poison (as Apollodorus saith) is white,
neither the tarantula or Neapolitan spider, whose poison bringeth death,
except music be at hand. Wherefore I suppose our country to be the more
happy (I mean in part) for that it is void of these two grievous
annoyances wherewith other nations are plagued.
We have also efts both of the land and water, and likewise the noisome
swifts, whereof to say any more it would be but loss of time, sith they
are all well known, and no region to my knowledge found to be void of many
of them. As for flies (sith it shall not be amiss a little to touch them
also), we have none that can do hurt or hindrance naturally unto any: for
whether they be cut-waisted or whole-bodied, they are void of poison and
all venomous inclination. The cut or girt waisted (for so I English the
word _insecta_) are the hornets, wasps, bees, and such like, whereof we
have great store, and of which an opinion is conceived that the first do
breed of the corruption of dead horses, the second of pears and apples
corrupted, and the last of kine and oxen: which may be true, especially
the first and latter in some parts of the beast, and not their whole
substances, as also in the second, sith we have never wasps but when our
fruit beginneth to wax ripe. Indeed Virgil and others speak of a
generation of bees by killing or smothering a bruised bullock or calf and
laying his bowels or his flesh wrapped up in his hide in a close house for
a certain season; but how true it is, hitherto I have not tried. Yet sure
I am of this, that no one living creature corrupteth without the
production of another, as we may see by ourselves, whose flesh doth alter
into lice, and also in sheep for excessive numbers of flesh flies, if they
be suffered to lie unburied or uneaten by the dogs and swine, who often
and happily present such needless generations.
As concerning bees, I think it good to remember that, whereas some ancient
writers affirm it to be a commodity wanting in our island, it is now found
to be nothing so. In old times peradventure we had none indeed; but in my
days there is such plenty of them in manner everywhere that in some
uplandish towns there are one hundred or two hundred hives of them,
although the said hives are not so huge as those of the east country, but
far less, and not able to contain above one bushel of corn or five pecks
at the most. Pliny (a man that of set purpose delighteth to write of
wonders), speaking of honey, noteth that in the north regions the hives in
his time were of such quantity that some one comb contained eight foot in
length, and yet (as it should seem) he speaketh not of the greatest. For
in Podolia, which is now subject to the King of Poland, their hives are so
great, and combs so abundant, that huge boars, overturning and falling
into them, are drowned in the honey before they can recover and find the
means to come out.
Our honey also is taken and reputed to be the best, because it is harder,
better wrought, and cleanlier vesselled up, than that which cometh from
beyond the sea, where they stamp and strain their combs, bees, and young
blowings altogether into the stuff, as I have been informed. In use also
of medicine our physicians and apothecaries eschew the foreign, especially
that of Spain and Pontus, by reason of a venomous quality naturally
planted in the same, as some write, and choose the home-made: not only by
reason of our soil (which hath no less plenty of wild thyme growing
therein than in Sicilia and about Athens, and maketh the best stuff) as
also for that it breedeth (being gotten in harvest time) less choler, and
which is oftentimes (as I have seen by experience) so white as sugar, and
corned as if it were salt. Our hives are made commonly of rye straw and
wattled about with bramble quarters; but some make the same of wicker, and
cast them over with clay. We cherish none in trees, but set our hives
somewhere on the warmest side of the house, providing that they may stand
dry and without danger both of the mouse and the moth. This furthermore is
to be noted, that whereas in vessels of oil that which is nearest the top
is counted the finest and of wine that in the middest, so of honey the
best which is heaviest and moistest is always next the bottom, and
evermore casteth and driveth his dregs upward toward the very top,
contrary to the nature of other liquid substances, whose grounds and leeze
do generally settle downwards. And thus much as by the way of our bees and
English honey.
As for the whole-bodied, as the _cantharides_, and such venomous creatures
of the same kind, to be abundantly found in other countries, we hear not
of them: yet have we beetles, horseflies, turdbugs or dors (called in
Latin _scarabei_), the locust or the grasshopper (which to me do seem to
be one thing, as I will anon declare), and such like, whereof let other
intreat that make an exercise in catching of flies, but a far greater
sport in offering them to spiders, as did Domitian sometime, and another
prince yet living who delighted so much to see the jolly combats betwixt a
stout fly and an old spider that divers men have had great rewards given
them for their painful provision of flies made only for this purpose. Some
parasites also, in the time of the aforesaid emperor (when they were
disposed to laugh at his folly, and yet would seem in appearance to
gratify his fantastical head with some shew of dutiful demeanour), could
devise to set their lord on work by letting a flesh fly privily into his
chamber, which he forthwith would eagerly have hunted (all other business
set apart) and never ceased till he had caught her into his fingers,
wherewith arose the proverb, "_Ne musca quidem_," uttered first by Vibius
Priscus, who being asked whether anybody was with Domitian, answered "_Ne
musca quidem_," whereby he noted his folly. There are some cockscombs here
and there in England, learning it abroad as men transregionate, which make
account also of this pastime, as of a notable matter, telling what a sight
is seen between them, if either of them be lusty and courageous in his
kind. One also hath made a book of the spider and the fly, wherein he
dealeth so profoundly, and beyond all measure of skill that neither he
himself that made it nor any one that readeth it can reach unto the
meaning thereof. But if those jolly fellows, instead of the straw that
they must thrust into the fly's tail (a great injury no doubt to such a
noble champion), would bestow the cost to set a fool's cap upon their own
heads, then might they with more security and less reprehension behold
these notable battles.
Now, as concerning the locust, I am led by divers of my country, who (as
they say) were either in Germany, Italy, or Pannonia, 1542, when those
nations were greatly annoyed with that kind of fly, and affirm very
constantly that they saw none other creature than the grasshopper during
the time of that annoyance, which was said to come to them from the
Meotides. In most of our translations also of the Bible the word _locusta_
is Englished a grasshopper, and thereunto (Leviticus xi.) it is reputed
among the clean food, otherwise John the Baptist would never have lived
with them in the wilderness. In Barbary, Numidia, and sundry other places
of Africa, as they have been,[191] so are they eaten to this day powdered
in barrels, and therefore the people of those parts are called
_Acedophagi_: nevertheless they shorten the life of the eaters, by the
production at the last of an irksome and filthy disease. In India they are
three foot long, in Ethiopia much shorter, but in England seldom above an
inch. As for the cricket, called in Latin _cicada_, he hath some
likelihood, but not very great, with the grasshopper, and therefore he is
not to be brought in as an umpire in this case. Finally, Matthiolus and so
many as describe the locust do set down none other form than that of our
grasshopper, which maketh me so much the more to rest upon my former
imagination, which is that the locust and the grasshopper are one.