De sollertia animalium

There are many examples of cunning and subtlety abounding in land creatures; but to omit slights and artifices of foxes, cranes, and jackdaws, of which I shall say nothing, because they are things already so well known, I shall make use of the testimony of Thales, the ancientest of our philosophers, who is reported to have chiefly admired the most excellent in any art or cunning.

A certain mule that was wont to carry salt, in fording a river, by accident happened to stumble, by which means the water melting away the salt, when the mule rose again he felt himself much lighter; the cause of which the mule

was very sensible of, and laid it up in his memory, insomuch that every time he forded the same river, he would always stoop when he came into the deepest part, and fill his vessels with water, crouching down, and leaning sometimes to one side, sometimes to the other. Thales hearing this, ordered the vessels to be well filled with wool and sponges, and to drive the mule laden after that manner. But then the mule, as he was wont, filling his burthens with water, reasoned with himself that he had ill consulted his own benefit, and ever afterwards, when he forded the same river, was so careful and cautious, that he would never suffer his burthens so much as to touch the water by accident.

Another piece of cunning, joined with an extraordinary affection to their young ones, is to be observed in partridges, which instruct their young ones, ere they are able to fly, when they are pursued by the fowlers, to lay themselves upon their backs, their breasts covered with some clod of earth or little heap of dirt, under which they may lie concealed. On the other side, the old partridges do deceive the fowlers, and draw them quite a contrary way, make short flights from one place to another, thereby enticing the fowlers to follow them; till thus allured from their young ones, the fowlers give over all hopes of being masters of their game.

In like manner, hares returning to their forms dispose their leverets one to one place, another to another, at the distance many times of an acre of ground; so that, upon the tracing either of men or hounds, they are sure not to be all in danger at one time,—themselves in the mean time not easy to be tracked, by reason of the various windings and turnings which they make, until at length, by giving a large leap, they discontinue the print of their feet, and so betake themselves to their rest.

A bear, when she perceives her winter sleep coming

upon her, before she grows stiff and unwieldy, cleanses the place where she intends to conceal herself, and in her passage thither lifts up her paws as high as she can, and treads upon the ground with the top of her toes, and at length turning herself upon her back, throws herself into her receptacle.

Your hinds generally calve at a distance from all places frequented by flesh-devouring beasts; and stags, when they find themselves unwieldy through surplusage of flesh and fat, get out of the way and hide themselves, hoping to secure themselves by lurking, when they dare not trust to their heels.

The means by which the land hedge-hogs defend and guard themselves occasioned the proverb,

Many sly tricks the subtle Reynard knows,

But one the hedge-hog greater than all those.

For the hedge-hog, as Ion the poet says,[*](Fragment 38.) when he spies the fox coming,

Round as a pine-nut, or more sphere-like ball,

Lies with his body palisaded all

With pointed thorns, which all the fox’s slight

Can find no way to touch, much less to bite.

But the provision which the hedge-hogs make for their young ones is much more ingenious. For when autumn comes, they creep under vines, and shake off the grapes with their feet; which done they roll themselves up and down, and take them up with their prickles, so that when they creep away again, you would think it a walking cluster (and this we have looked on and seen them do); after which returning to their holes, they lay themselves down for their young ones to feed. Their holes have two openings, one to the south, the other to the north. So that when they perceive the alteration of the air, like pilots shifting their sails, they stop up that which lies to the wind and open the other. Which a certain person that lived at Cyzicus observing, took upon him from thence at any time to tell in what corner the wind would sit.