Part 53

Μέγαν βασιλέα. This is the title given by all Greek authors to the king of Persia; and it is preserved to the successors of Mahomet in that of the Grand Seignor. Cyrus was the youngest son of Darius by Parysatis, and brother to Artaxerxes. His father, therefore, and brother, were both called, κατ’ ἐξοχὴν, “the great king.”

Xenophon. Anabas. L. +i.+ 5. 2.

The inhabitants of this part of Arabia are denominated Σκηνίται Ἄραβες by Strabo; a vagabond people, living by depredation. “Nomades, infestioresque Chaldæorum, Scenitæ,” says Pliny, “à tabernaculis cognominati;” afterwards Saracens.

Ἐπὶ γυμνῶν τῶν ἵππων.

Gens quæ nudo residens Massylia dorso Ora levi flectit frænorum nescia virgâ.

The allusions to the tractable and fleet Numidian horse, and his expert rider, are too numerous in the authors of antiquity for citation of more than a few. The barbs, in the language of our great dramatist,

will follow where the game Makes way, and run like swallows o’er the plain.

In the army of Hannibal, the “equi hominesque paululi, discinctus et inermis eques, equi sine frænis,” are eulogized by the Roman historian: and Strabo notices the docility of the African little steeds to be such ὥς τ’ ἀπὸ ῥαβδίου οἰακίζεσθαι.

Virgil speaks of the “Numidæ infræni,” (Æneid. L. +iv.+ 41.): Silius Italicus of the

velocior Euris Et doctus virgæ sonipes:—L. +iii.+

and again, in the first book of his Punic War:

Hic passim exultant Numidæ gens inscia fræni, Queîs inter geminas per ludum nobilis aures Quadrupedem flectit non cedens virga lupatis.

But the poets of the chase, Oppian and Nemesian, have left us in detail their shape and qualifications:

——ὁππότε δ’ αὖτε καὶ μούνοις ἵπποισι κυνῶν ἄτερ ἰθὺς ἐλαύνειν· ἵπποισιν κείνοισιν ὅσοι περὶ Μαυρίδα γαῖαν φέρβοντ’, ἢ Λιβύεσσιν, ὅσοι μὴ κάρτεϊ χειρῶν ἄγχονται ψελίοισι βιαζομένοιο χαλινοῦ, πείθονται δὲ λύγοισιν, ὅπη βροτὸς ἡγεμονεύει. τοὔνεκεν ἱππελάται κείνων ἐπιβήτορες ἵππων ἠδὲ κύνας λείπουσι φίλους, πίσυνοι τ’ ἐλόωσιν ἵπποις, ἠελίου τε βολῇ, καὶ νόσφιν ἀρωγῶν.

Quemque coloratus Mazax deserta per arva Pavit, et assiduos docuit tolerare labores. Nec pigeat quod turpe caput, deformis et alvus Est ollis, quodque infrenes, quod liber uterque, Quodque jubis pronos cervix diverberet armos. Nam flecti facilis, lascivaque colla secutus Paret in obsequium lentæ moderamine virgæ. Verbera sunt præcepta fugæ, sunt verbera freni. Quin et promissi spatiosa per æquora campi Cursibus acquirunt commoto sanguine vires, Paulatimque avidos comites post terga relinquunt.

The same fact is related by Ælian, in his Natural History of Animals, L. +xiv.+ c. 10.; and Beckman (Hist. of Inventions, Vol. +iv.+ p. 292.) observes, on the authority of Vancouver, that the βρόχος, or noose-rope, is still employed by the Hungarians, for the subjugation of wild horses.

See these instruments of predatory hunting described in the early part of the Appendix, and accurately represented in the spirited engravings of the “Venationes Ferarum” of Stradanus and Galle. The metrical skill of A. C. Kilian Dufflæus, the poet of the annexed quatrains, is not commensurate with that of the engraver.

Ἐκ τοῦ εὐθέος διαγωνιζόμενοι. Many are the instances recorded in which the agency of the hound of chase was despised by “the light-footed sons of Chiron’s school.” The heroes and heroines of old were all-sufficient for the capture of the fleetest animals of the forest and plain. This was indeed coursing in good earnest, and is well illustrated by the simile of the text. In this way Diana furnished her chariot with deer, her πρωτάγριον, the swiftest beasts of draught—

——πίσυρας δ’ ἕλες ὦκα θέουσα, νόσφι κυνοδρομίης, ἵνα τοι θοὸν ἅρμα φέρωσι.

In this way, the son of Peleus arrested the attention of her sylvan ladyship and the goddess Pallas,

when, if we credit tales believed of old, His speed subdued the bounding stag, his spoil— By hounds unaided and the treach’rous toil.

Mithridates, in later days, was wont, during his rustication, “feras cursu aut fugare, aut persequi, cum quibusdam etiam viribus congredi.” And in our own annals, “King Henrye the fift,” says Holinshed, “thought it a mere scoffery to pursue any fallow deare wyth hounds or greyhounds, but supposed hym selfe alwayes to have done a sufficient acte, when he had tired them by his own travaile on foote, and so kylled them wyth hys handes, in the upshot of that exercise and ende of hys recreation.”

Περὶ Ἀρτεμίσιον.

ὅθι παῖδες Ἀθηναί- ων ἐβάλοντο φαεννὰν κρηπῖδ’ ἐλευθερίας.

Plato (λόγος ἐπιτάφιος) gives the first and principal honours (ἀριστεῖα) to the victors of Marathon—τὰ δὲ δευτερεῖα, τοῖς περὶ Σαλαμῖνα καὶ ἐπ’ Ἀρτεμισίῳ ναυμαχήσασι καὶ νικήσασι. Artemisium was a northern promontory of the island of Eubœa; Psyttalia, a small, rocky, and barren isle, off the coast of Attica, and near to Salamis; Cyprus, an island of the Mediterranean Sea. The naval victories of Themistocles and Cimon are too well known to need any detail.

Having taken a summary view of the different modes of coursing amongst the Celts, and elsewhere, he now enters in detail into the treatment, initiation, &c. of young hounds.

The elder Xenophon mentions an earlier date for entering puppies—bitches at eight months, dogs at ten months old: but he does not allude to greyhounds. Pollux would introduce bitches at six months, and dogs at eight; Onomast. L. +v.+ c. +ix.+ The courser will follow the example of his Bithynian predecessor, whose instructions, indeed, are in exact accordance with modern practice.

He recommends a later period for entering dog-puppies; see the next Chapter. Nemesian makes no distinction between the dog and bitch on this point: