Natural history in Shakespeare's time : being extracts illustrative of the subject as he knew it / Made by H. W. Seager, M. B., &c. Also pictures thereunto belonging.

  • Seager, H. W. (Herbert West), 1848-
Date:
1896
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Natural history in Shakespeare's time : being extracts illustrative of the subject as he knew it / Made by H. W. Seager, M. B., &c. Also pictures thereunto belonging. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    as cranes have ; and, for they dread the goshawk, they be busy to comfort the leaders. Only those birds have the falhng-evil as a man hath, and the sparrows also. And they pass the sea, and, when they be weary, they fall down upon the water, and rest upon the one wing, and maketh his sail of the other wing. His best meat is venomous seeds and grains, and for that cause in old time men for- bade eating of them ; and an herb that hight hellebore is curlews' meat, and if another beast eateth it in great quantity, it is perilous and poison. For beasts have broad and wide veins, by which the smoke passeth, and by strength of that herb, the heart is suddenly cooled and dead ; and curlews have strait veins about the heart, and therefore venomous smoke hath no true passage, but he bideth in the stomach, and is there defied [digested] and made subtle, and so it grieveth them not. And he runneth upon the earth most swiftly. And such birds love birds of their own kind. Bartholomew (^Berthelei)^ bk. xii. § 7. As touching Quails, they always come before the cranes depart. The manner of their flying is in troops ; but not without some danger of the sailors, when they approach near to land. For oftentimes they settle in great number on their sails, and there perch, which they do evermore in the night, and with their poise bear down barks and small vessels, and finally sink them. When the south wind blows, they never fly. The foremost of them, as he approacheth near to land, payeth toll for the rest unto the hawk, who presently for his welcome preyeth upon him. Whensoever at any time they are upon their remove and departure out of these parts, they persuade other birds to bear them company. If a contrary wind should arise and drive against them, and hinder their flight—to prevent this inconvenience, they be well provided ; for they fly well ballasted either with small, weighty stones within their feet, or else with sand stuffed in their craw. Holland's Plitiy, bk. x. ch. xxiii. [On the passage in Antony and Cleopatra, Douce (Illustra- tions, vol. ii. p. 86-7) gives a note on the classical Quail- fighting. Shakespeare probably got the idea from North's Plutarch.