The =Hart=, saith Avicene, "is never troubled with fevers, because he hath
no gall. He hath a bone in his hert, as precious as yvery. He feareth
muche the voyce of the foxe, and hateth the serpent. He is long lived. For
Aristotle writeth, that Diomedes did consecrate a hart to Diana, with a
coller of golde about his necke, which had these wordes, DIOMEDES DIANÆ.
After whose tyme, almost a thousand yeres, Agathocles the kynge of Sicile
did kill the same harte, and offered him up with his coller to Jupiter, in
hys temple, which was in Calabria."[146]
"The =Bore= is the ryght Esquier, for he beareth both armor and shielde,
and fighteth sternelye. When he determineth to fight, he will frot his
left shield the space of halfe a day, against an oke. Because that when he
is streking thereon with the tuskes of his enemy, he shal feele no griefe
thereof, and when they have fought one day together then they wil depart
of themselves, keping good appointment, to meete in the same place, the
next day after, yea, and the third day, till one of them be victor."[147]
Of the =Wolf= he says. "It is sayde, if a man be seene of hym first, the
man leseth his voyce. But if the wolfe be scene of manne first, then the
wolfe leseth his boldenesse and hardines. Plinie wryteth, he loueth to
playe with a chylde, and that he will not hurt it, tyll he be extreame
houngry, what time he will not spare to devowre it.... Avicene telleth
that he desyreth greatly to eate fishe. And Phisiologus writeth that he
may not bend his necke backewarde, in no moneth of the yere but in May....
He enfecteth the wolle of shepe that he byteth, and is adversarye to them
and theyr lambes.... There is nothynge that he hateth so much as the
knockynge together of two flint stones, the whiche he feareth more then
the hunters. Aristotle sayeth that all kinde of wolves are contrary to all
kynde of sheepe. For profe wherof Cornelius Agrippa also affirmed that if
a man make a string of the wolves guts and put it on the harpe with
stringes made of shepes guttes, it will never bee brought with any consent
of harmony to agree with the other."[148]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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