Aristotle, Third Part of THE HISTORY OF ANIMALS Complete

Translated by D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson.

Aristotle Bilingual Anthology  Studies  Aristotle in Print

III: 59 pages - You are on Page 19

Part 6

When bears are running away from their pursuers they push their cubs in front of them, or take them up and carry them; when they are being overtaken they climb up a tree. When emerging from their winter-den, they at once take to eating cuckoo-pint, as has been said, and chew sticks of wood as though they were cutting teeth.

Many other quadrupeds help themselves in clever ways. Wild goats in Crete are said, when wounded by arrows, to go in search of dittany, which is supposed to have the property of ejecting arrows in the body. Dogs, when they are ill, eat some kind of grass and produce vomiting. The panther, after eating panther's-bane, tries to find some human excrement, which is said to heal its pain. This panther's-bane kills lions as well. Hunters hang up human excrement in a vessel attached to the boughs of a tree, to keep the animal from straying to any distance; the animal meets its end in leaping up to the branch and trying to get at the medicine. They say that the panther has found out that wild animals are fond of the scent it emits; that, when it goes a-hunting, it hides itself; that the other animals come nearer and nearer, and that by this stratagem it can catch even animals as swift of foot as stags.

The Egyptian ichneumon, when it sees the serpent called the asp, does not attack it until it has called in other ichneumons to help; to meet the blows and bites of their enemy the assailants beplaster themselves with mud, by first soaking in the river and then rolling on the ground.

When the crocodile yawns, the trochilus flies into his mouth and cleans his teeth. The trochilus gets his food thereby, and the crocodile gets ease and comfort; it makes no attempt to injure its little friend, but, when it wants it to go, it shakes its neck in warning, lest it should accidentally bite the bird.

Previous Page / First / Next Page of the HISTORY OF ANIMALS

Aristotle Home Page ||| Search Aristotle's works

Plato ||| Other Greek Philosophers ||| Elpenor's Free Greek Lessons

Development of Greek Philosophy ||| History of Greek Philosophy ||| History of Ancient Greece

Reference address : https://ellopos.net/elpenor/greek-texts/ancient-Greece/aristotle/history-animals-c.asp?pg=19