As for more sensible arguments, and such as relate unto experiment: from these we have also reason to doubt its age, and presumed vivacity: for where long life is natural, the marks of age are late: and when they appear, the journey unto death cannot be long. Now the age of Deer (as _Aristotle_ not long ago observed) is best conjectured, by view of the horns and teeth. From the horns there is a particular and annual account unto six years: they arising first plain, and so successively branching: after which the judgment of their years by particular marks becomes uncertain. But when they grow old, they grow less branched, and first do lose their ἀμυντῆρες or _propugnacula_; that is, their brow-antlers, or lowest furcations next the head, which _Aristotle_ saith the young ones use in fight: and the old as needless, have them not at all. The same may be also collected from the loss of their Teeth, whereof in old age they have few or none before in either jaw. Now these are infallible marks of age, and when they appear, we must confess a declination: which notwithstanding (as men inform us in _England_, where observations may well be made), will happen between twenty and thirty. As for the bone, or rather induration of the Roots of the arterial vein and great artery, which is thought to be found only in the heart of an old Deer, and therefore becomes more precious in its Rarity; it is often found in Deer much under thirty, and we have known some affirm they have found it in one of half that age. And therefore in that account of _Pliny_, of a Deer with a Collar about his neck, put on by _Alexander_ the Great, and taken alive an hundred years after, with other relations of this nature, we much suspect imposture or mistake. And if we grant their verity, they are but single relations, and very rare contingencies in individuals, not affording a regular deduction upon the species. For though _Ulysses_ his Dog lived unto twenty, and the _Athenian_ Mule unto fourscore, yet do we not measure their days by those years, or usually say, they live thus long. Nor can the three hundred years of _John_ of times [SN: _Psalm_ 90.], or _Nestor_, overthrow the assertion of _Moses_, or afford a reasonable encouragement beyond his septuagenary determination.