Part 57

Vere magis, quià vere calor redit ossibus.

εἴαρι δὲ γλυκὺς οἶστρος ἀναγκαίης Ἀφροδίτης καὶ γάμοι ἡβώωσι, καὶ ἀλλήλων φιλότητες πᾶσιν ὅσοι γαῖάν τε φερέσβιον, αἵ τ’ ἀνὰ κόλπους ἠέρος, οἵ τ’ ἀνὰ πόντον ἐριβρύχην δονέονται.

All the Cynegetica agree with Arrian as to the spring being the most fit season for breeding and rearing puppies. Ἡ γὰρ ὥρα πρὸς τὰς αὐξήσεις τῶν κυνῶν κρατίστη αὕτη, says Xenophon; and the same opinion is repeated by the copyists of later date, with little addition. Indeed, the reasons alleged in the text are the best that can be adduced for preferring the spring to any other season:

εἰ δὲ νύ τοι κεράσαι φίλον ἔπλετο δῖα γένεθλα, εἴαρι μὲν πρώτιστα λέχος πόρσυνε κύνεσσιν.

The Cynosophium specifies January and February as the best breeding months. “La droite saison,” says Fouilloux, “en laquelle doivent naistre est en Mars, Avril, et May, que le temps est tempéré, et que les chaleurs ne sont trop véhémentes.” He gives the same reasons as our author for avoiding summer and autumn, and is, of course, followed verbatim by Turberville. Markham would “put them together to ingender and breed, eyther in January, February, or March, according as they shall grow proud; for those are the three most principall monthes in the yeare for hound, bitches, or bratches, to be limed in: not but that they may conceive and bring forth as good whelps in other monthes; but because there will be much losse of time in the entering of them.” He farther enjoins that “the moone be eyther in the signe Aquarius or Gemini; for it is held amongst the best huntsmen of this land, that the whelpes that are ingendred under those two signes, wil never runne mad, and for the most part the litter will have at least double so many dogge whelpes as bitch whelpes.”

Ἄλλως τε καὶ ἀπορίᾳ γάλακτος. The want of this essential article of nutriment renders the winter objectionable for the rearing of whelps; but its abundance in the spring gives to this season an additional claim:

passim nam lactis abundans Tempus adest, albent plenis et ovilia mulctris.

Ὅτι χειμὼν ἐπιλαμβάνει τὰ σκυλάκια. The greyhound puppy is remarkably tender and susceptible of cold; indeed Fronto says that the whelp of the pastoral dog requires to be fostered in warmth, δυσχείμερον γάρ ἐστι τοῦτο τὸ ζῶον: and if an animal, necessarily of a hardy constitution, be, when young, impatient of severe cold, we shall readily acknowledge the importance of such a seasonable birth for the delicate Celtic whelp, as will give him during his period of growth two summers to one winter. “Il faut, autant qu’il est possible, faire couvrir les lices à la fin de l’hiver ou au commencement du printems, par la raison que les jeunes chiens, à qui les froids sont toujours nuisibles, ont pour eux deux étés contre un hiver, et qu’en conséquence ils s’élèvent plus aisément.”

It is an essential part of kennel management to support brood bitches with the most nutritious aliment. Varro (in Geoponicis) recommends barley bread, in preference to wheaten, as more nutritious, with mutton broth from bones, &c. poured over the bread, to be given before whelping; and afterwards, barley meal with cow’s or goat’s milk, boiled bones, and water to drink. The same instructions are delivered, almost αὐτολεξεὶ, by Varro, de Re Rusticâ, L. +ii.+ c. +ix.+ In the latter reference, the author expressly says the bitches are more nourished by barley than wheaten bread, “magis eo aluntur, et lactis præbent majorem facultatem.” But the experiments of the late Sir H. Davy on the quantum of nutritious matter contained in the different varieties of bread corn, and the test to which they have been put, in kennel feeding, by practical sportsmen, induce us to believe that the “Scriptores de Re Rusticâ” are mistaken on this point. The farina of wheat is the best food for brood bitches, boiled with milk, or scalded with meat-broth. Of the importance of keeping brood bitches on highly nutritious food, the old huntsman, Pan, “Deus Arcadiæ,” was fully aware; for Diana found him carving a lynx for their repast:

——ἵκεο δ’ αὖλιν Ἀρκαδικὴν ἐπὶ Πανός· ὁ δὲ κρέα λυγκὸς ἔταμνε Μαιναλίης, ἵνα οἱ τοκάδες κύνες εἶδαρ ἔδοιεν.

The number of whelps in a litter varies much. The translator’s experience affords instances of twelve at a birth, and of a solitary puppy, from the same Celtic dam. Aristotle states the former number to be the greatest in a canine litter; but Julius Cæsar Scaliger (a celebrated dog-fancier) certifies, in his annotations on the Stagirite’s Animal History, a litter of fourteen whelps, as within his own knowledge: and this is again surpassed by the case of the canis leporaria recorded by Aldrovandus, “Canis leporaria hic Bononiæ, unicâ fœturâ, catulos septenos supra decem enixa est.”

Μὴ ἐᾲν ἐκτρέφειν αὐτήν. Whether the bitch be again required for the field or not, no humane courser will allow her to suckle more than four or five whelps. If she be young, Columella advises that the first litter should be taken from her: “primus effœtæ partus amovendus est, quoniam tiruncula nec rectè nutrit; et educatio totius habitûs aufert incrementum.” Nemesian also destroys the first litter, and the smallest pups of subsequent litters:

Sed quamvis avidus, primos contemnere partus Malueris, mox non omnes nutrire minores. Nam tibi si placitum populosos poscere fœtus, Jam macie tenues, succique videbis inanes, Pugnantesque diu, quisnam prior ubera lambat, Distrahere invalidam lassato viscere matrem.

“In nutricatu secundum partum,” says Varro, “si plures sunt, statim eligere oportet quos habere velis, reliquos abjicere: quàm paucissimos reliqueris, tam optimi in alendo fiunt propter copiam lactis.” Fronto also agrees with him, and out of a litter of seven recommends only three or four to be left with the mother; out of three, only two.

Many are the diagnostics, recorded in the ancient Cynegetica, to assist the classic sportsman in selecting the most promising puppies:

tum deinde monebo, Ne matrem indocilis natorum turba fatiget, Percensere notis, jamque inde excernere parvos. Signa dabunt ipsæ, teneris vix artubus hæret Ille tuos olim non defecturus honores: Jamque illum impatiens æquæ vehementia sortis Extulit, affectat maternâ regna sub alvo. Ubera tota tenet, à tergo liber aperto, Dum tepida indulget terris clementia mundi. Verum ubi Caurino perstrinxit frigore vesper Ira jacet, turbâque potens operitur inerti. Illius è manibus vires sit cura futuras Perpensare: leveis deducet pondere fratres: Nec me pignoribus, nec te mea carmina fallent.

Nemesian demands our assent to a novel and somewhat cruel mode of ascertaining the best puppies of a numerous litter, and states that it is founded on actual experiment:

quæ prodidit usus Percipe, et intrepidus spectatis annue dictis. Pondere nam catuli poteris perpendere vires, Corporibusque leves gravibus prænoscere cursus. Quin et flammato ducatur linea longè Circuitu, signetque habilem vapor igneus orbem. Impunè in medio possis consistere circo. Hùc omnes catuli, hùc indiscreta feratur Turba, dabit mater partus examine honestos, Judicio natos servans, trepidoque perîclo. Nam postquam conclusa videt sua germina flammis, Continuo saltu transcendens fervida zonæ Vincla, rapit rictu primum, portatque cubili; Mox alium, mox deinde alium. Sic conscia mater Segregat egregiam sobolem virtutis amore.

The same diagnostics occur in the Cynosophium of Demetrius, and the Alcon of Fracastorius. The former says, the dam φυσικῷ τινὶ πόθῳ διακρίσει τὰ βελτίονα, καὶ ἐξάγει, and recommends the refuse to be disposed of by sale or gift, after having been placed under foster-parents. The heavier whelps should be placed, according to this writer, under their own dam. But, of course, our diagnostic canons must vary with each variety of dog. Gesner reconciles the conflicting opinions of the Greek and Latin Cynegetica, on the selection of puppies, in these words: “ego ita conciliârim, ut ad robur præferendi sunt graviores; ad celeritatem, leviores.”

“Optimus in fœtu,” says Pliny, “qui novissimè cernere incipit, aut quem fert primum in cubile fœta:” and he is supported by the Virgilian poet of Barga—

Namque ea quem secum tulit in stramenta, toroque Composuit primum, primoque affecit honore, Ille alios omnes cursuque animisque superbis Vincet ovans, simul ac loris exire solutis Quiverit, et saltu transgressus inania campi Intervalla cito diffugerit ocyus Euro.

He condemns the large and heavy pup as likely to be hereafter deficient in speed:

Continuò cujus subsidunt pondere membra Atque artus major moles gravat, ille volucri Insuetus cursu longè post ultima fratrum Terga relinquetur, frustraque optabit adempta Præmiaque, et multo perfusam sanguine prædam.

“Touching greyhounds,” says the practical author of Countrey Contentments, “when they are puppies or young whelpes, those which are most raw-boned, leane, loose-made, sickle or crooked hought, and generally unknit in every member, are ever likely to make the best dogges, and most shapely: but such as in the first three or foure monthes, are round, and close trust, fat, straight, and as it were full sum’d and knit in every member, never prove good, swift, or comely.”

The courser, in selecting youngsters from a numerous litter, will not be indifferent to

The marks of their renown’d progenitors— Sure pledge of triumphs yet to come;

but will preserve all such “with joy,” while he casts “the dwindling refuse to the merciless flood,” fearful of overloading “the indulgent mother.”

Τὸ γὰρ τῶν ἀγεννῶν γάλα οὐ ξύμφυλον ταῖς γενναίαις. It is difficult to prove that the quality of the milk of varieties of the same species of animal is absolutely different, and productive of effects, beyond its physical nutriment, upon the innate powers and propensities of the young animal supported by it: and yet such an opinion is too much countenanced by naturalists to make us unhesitatingly condemn it as destitute of all foundation. It was a favourite notion of ancient physiologists, and many moral inferences were drawn from it by Galen and others. “Non frustrà creditum est,” says A. Gellius, on the authority of the philosopher Favorinus, “sicuti valeat ad fingendas corporis atque animi similitudines vis et natura seminis, non secùs ad eandem rem lactis quoque ingenia et proprietates valere; neque in hominibus id solùm, sed in pecudibus quoque animadversum,” &c. Wherefore Sir Thomas Elyot enjoins, when speaking of nutrication, “a nourse shoulde be of no servile condicion, or vyce notable: for as some auncient writers do suppose, oftentymes the chylde sucketh the vyce of hys nouryse with the mylke of her pappe.” See Brathwait’s English Gentleman, p. 94.