Familiar Colloquies/Concerning Friendship
CONCERNING FRIENDSHIP.
Ephorinus and John.
Ep. I often wonder with myself what god nature consulted when it intermixed certain secret amities and enmities in all things, for which there is no probable reason to be given, unless for her own entertainment, as we set cocks and quails a fighting to make us diver- sion. Jo. I do not very well take in what you aim at. Ep. Well, then, I will tell you in familiar instances. You know that serpents generally are enemies to mankind. Jo. I know there is an old enmity betwixt them and us, and an irreconcilable one, which will be so as long as we remember that unlucky apple.
Ep. Do you know the lizard 1 Jo. Why not ? Ep. There are very large green ones in Italy. This creature is by nature very friendly to mankind, and an utter enemy to serpents. Jo. How does this appear ? Ep. Which way soever a man turns his face they will gather about him, turn their heads toward him, look stedfastly in his face, and view him a long time. If he spits they will lick up his spittle ; nay, I have seen them drink up a boy's piss. They suffer themselves to be handled by boys, and will suffer themselves to be hurt by them with- out doing them any harm ; and if you put them to your mouth, they love to lick your spittle ; but if you catch them, and set them a fight- ing together, it is wonderful to see how fierce they are, and will not at all meddle with him that set them a fighting. If any one is walking in the fields in a hollow way, by rustling the bushes sometimes in one place and sometimes in another, they will make him take notice of them. One that is not acquainted with it would think they were serpents ; when you look at them they turn their heads to look at you till you stand still ; if you go on they follow you ; and if a man be doing anything, they will make him take notice of them. You would think they were sporting, and mightily delighted with the sight of a man. Jo. It is very admirable.
Ep. I saw once a very large and charming green lizard fighting with a serpent at the entrance of a hole. I wondered at first what was the meaning of it, for I could not see the serpent. An Italian told me that the serpent was within ; by and by the lizard comes to us, as if it were shewing us her wounds, and begging a remedy, and did not only suffer herself to be touched, but as often as we stood still, she stood still, viewing us very earnestly. The serpent had almost gnawed away one of her sides, and of green had made it red. Jo. Had I been there, I should have had a mind to avenge the lizard's quarrel. Ep. But her enemy had hid herself in the bottom of the hole. But some (]?.ys after, we had the pleasure to see her revenge herself. Jo. I am gla.d a^ my heart ; but prithee, how was it ? Ep. We happened to be walking near the same place, and the ser- pent had been drinking at a spring hard by, for. it. was so violent hot weather, that we were like to perish with thirst. A boy of about thirteen years old, the man's son where we lodged, having fled' from Bononia for fear of the pestilence, happened very luckily to come by with a hay- rake upon his shoulder ; as soon as he saw the serpent he cries out. Jo. Perhaps for fear. Ep. No ; for joy, rejoicing that he had found the enemy. The boy strikes him with the rake, the serpent rolls him- self up, but he laid on, till having broke his head, the serpent stretched himself out, which they never do but when they are dying ; that is the reason, that you have heard the apologist concerning a crab-fish, who killing a serpent that was his enemy, when he saw him stretched out, says thus, You ought to have gone so when you were alive. Jo. That was bravely done ; but how then? Ep. The boy takes him upon his rake, and hangs him upon a shrub over the cave, and in a few days' time we saw the leaves tinctured with the blood of the serpent. The husbandmen of that place related to us a wonderful strange thing for a certain truth ; that the countrymen being weary sometimes, sleep in that field, and have sometimes with them a pitcher of milk, which serves both for victuals and drink ; that serpents are great lovers of milk, and so it often happens that, they come in their way. But they have a remedy for that. Jo. Pray, what is it? Ep. They daub the brims of the pitcher with garlic, and the smell of that drives away the serpents.
Jo. What does Horace mean, then, when he says garlic is a poison more hurtful than henbane, when you say it is an antidote against poison ? Ep. But heaj a little, I have something to tell you that is worse than that. They often creep slily into the mouth of a man that lies sleeping with his mouth open, and so wind themselves into his stomach. Jo. And does not a man die immediately that has enter- tained such a guest ? Ep. No, but lives most miserably ; nor is there any remedy but to feed the man with milk, and other things that; the serpent loves. Jo. What, no remedy against such a calamity ? Ep. Yes, to eat abundance of gai'lic. Jo. No wonder, then, mowers love garlic. Ep. But those that are tired with heat and labour have their remedy another way ; for, when they are in danger of this misfortune, very often a lizard, though but a little creature, saves a man. Jo. How can he save him ? Ep. When he perceives a serpent lying per- due in wait for the man, he runs about upon the man's neck and face, and never gives over till he has waked the man by tickling him, and clawing him gently with his nails ; and as soon as the man wakes, and sees the lizard near him, he knows the enemy is somewhere not far off in ambuscade, and looking about seizes him. Jo. The wonderful power of nature !
Ep. Now, there is no living creature that is so great an enemy to man as a crocodile, who oftentimes devours men whole, and assists his malice by an artifice ; having sucked in water, he makes the paths slippery where they go to the Nile to draw water, and when they fall down, there swallows them up. Nor can you be ignorant that dolphins that live in a quite different element are great lovers of men. Jo. I have heard a very famous story of a boy who was beloved by one ; and a more famous one than that, about Arion. Ep. Besides that, in catching mullets the fishermen make use of the assistance of dolphins instead of dogs, and when they have caught their prey, give them part for their pains. Nay, more than that, they suffer themselves to be chastised if they commit any fault in their Imnting them. They fre- quently appear to mariners at sea, rejoicing and playing upon the top of the waves ; sometimes swimming to the ship sides, and leaping over the spread sails, they are so delighted with the conversation of men. But again, as a dolphin is so very great a lover of men, so he is a mortal enemy to the crocodile. He goes out of the sea, and dares to venture into the River Nile, where the crocodile domineers, and attacks the monstrous animal that is defended with teeth, claws, and scales, more impenetrable than iron, when he himself is not very well framed for biting neither, his mouth inclining to his breast. Yet, for all that, he runs violently upon his enemy, and coming near him, diveth down on a sudden, gets under his belly, and setting up his fins, pricks him in the soft part of his belly, which is the only place he can be wounded in. Jo. It is a wonderful thing that an animal should know his enemy, though he never saw him before in his life ; and to know both why he should be attacked, and where he can be hurt, and how to defend him- self, when a man has not that faculty, who would not have sense enough to be afraid of a basilisk, unless he were warned beforehand, and taught by having received harm.
Ep. A horse, you know, is a creature devoted to the service of man ; and there is a capital enmity between him and a bear, that is an enemy to man. He knows his enemy, though he has never seen him before, and presently prepares himself to engage him. Jo. What arms does he fight with ? Ep. Rather with art than strength. He leaps over the enemy, and strikes his hind legs on his head. The bear, on the other hand, claws at the soft part of the horse's belly. The poison of an asp is incurable to a man ; and the ichneumon makes war with the asp, and is likewise a mortal enemy to the crocodile. An elephant is also very well affected towards mankind ; for they very kindly shew the way to a traveller that has happened to lose it, and they know and love their teacher. There are likewise examples of an extraordinary love toward mankind ; for one of them fell in love with an Egyptian maid that sold garlands, and another loved Menander of Syracuse so affectionately that he would not eat his victuals when he was out of sight.
But not to mention any more of this nature, though there is abundance related : When King Bacchus had a mind to exercise his cruelty toward thirty persons, he determined to expose them, bound to stakes, to so many elephants ; but they that were sent out among the elephants to provoke them could never bring them to be executioners of the king's cruelty. There is likewise a very destructive antipathy between this creature so friendly to mankind, and the Indian dragons, which are reported to be the largest that are, so that they oftentimes both perish in the engagement. There is the like disagreement between the eagle and the lesser dragon, although it is harmless towards men, as it has been reported to have borne amorous affections towards certain maidens. There is likewise a deadly enmity between the eagle and the cymindis, or night-hawk. And also an elephant hates a mouse, a troublesome creature to mankind, and will not touch a bit of provender that it sees a mouse in, nor is there any manifest cause why it hates him so. It is with good reason it hates the horse-leech, because if it happens to sup it up in its drink it torments him miserably. There is scarce any animal that is more friendly to man than a dog is, nor a greater enemy to him than a wolf, so that a man loses his speech if he sees him, and between these two there is the utmost dis- cord ; as a wolf is the most bitter enemy to sheep, which have their dependence merely upon the providence of mankind, whose care it is to defend this harmless creature made for the nourishment of man. They are all in arms against the wolf, as against the common enemy of man- kind, especially the whole army of dogs ; so that it is grown into a proverb, " I will give you no more quarter than a dog does to a wolf." The sea-hare is an incui-able poison to mankind, if anybody taste it unawares ; again, on the other hand, the touch of a man is death to that hai-e. A panther is a very fierce beast towards a man, and yet is so afraid of a hyaena that it does not dare to engage him ; and hence they say, that if anybody carry a piece of hyeena skin about him, a panther will not set upon him, there is such a sagacity in their natural sense ; and they add also, that if you hang their two skins one over against the other, the panther hair will fall off.
A spider is an animal that is one of a man's own family, but is very destructive to a serpent; so that if he happen to see a serpent sunning himself under a tree, it will spin down and fix his sting so sharply in his forehead that the serpent will roll himself up, and die at last. I have heard it told by those that have seen it, that there is the like enmity between a toad and a spider ; but that the toad cures himself when he is wounded by biting of a plantain leaf. I will tell you an English story : I suppose you know it is the custom there to strew the floor with green rushes; a certain monk had carried some bundles of these rushes into his chamber, to strew them at his leisure, and happening to take a nap after dinner a great toad creeps out and gets upon his mouth while he lay asleep, fixing his feet, two upon his upper and two upon his under lip. To draw off the toad was certain death, to let him be there was worse than death itself. Some persuaded that the monk should be carried and laid upon his back in the window where a great spider had his web. It was done: the spider presently seeing her enemy, spins down, darts her sting into the toad, and runs up again to her web; the toad swelled, but was not got off. The spider spins down a second time and gives him another wound; it swells more, but still is alive. The spider repeats it a third time, then, the toad takes off his feet and drops off dead. This piece of service the spider did her landlord. Jo. You tell me a wonderful strange story.
Ep. I will tell you now not what I have heard, but what I have seen with my own eyes. An ape has an unmeasiirable aversion to a tortoise; a certain person gave me a specimen of this when I was at Rome. He set a tortoise upon the head of his servant, and put his hat upon it, and then brought him to the monkey; the ape presently, with much alacrity, leaps upon the lad's shoulders to catch lice in his head, and taking off his hat spies the tortoise. It was amazing to see with what horror he leaped away, how frightened he was, and with what tearfulness he looked back to see whether the tortoise followed him or not. There was likewise another specimen : the tortoise was tied to the monkey's chain that he could not avoid seeing him. It is incred- ible how much he was tormented; he was almost dead with fear : some- times turning his back, he would endeavour to beat off the tortoise with his hinder feet; at last, he pissed and shit towards him all that was in his belly, and with the fright fell into such a fever that we were forced to let him loose, and put him into a bath made of wine and water. Jo. There was no reason that the monkey should be afraid of the tortoise.
Ep. There may, perhaps, be something natural in it that we are not acquainted with. Why a linnet should hate an ass is easily accounted for; because he rubs himself against the thorns, and eats off the flowers of the hedge where she makes her nest; and she is so affrighted at the sight of an ass, that if she hear him bray, though it be a great way off, she throws down her eggs, and her young ones fall out of the nest for fear. But, however, she does not suffer him to pass, unrevenged. Jo. How can a linnet do any hurt to an ass 1 ? Ep. She pecks his foreback, that is galled with blows and burdens, and the soft part of his nose. We may also guess at the cause why there is a mutual grudge between the fox and the kite, because the ravenous fowl is always lying in wait to catch the fox's whelps; and very likely, on the other hand, that the fox does the same by her young ones, which is the cause of the dissension between the rat and the heron. And the same reason may be given for the enmity between the little bird called a merlin and the fox : the merlin breaks the crow's eggs ; the foxes persecute them, and they the foxes, pecking their whelps, which the crows seeing, join their assistance as against a common enemy.
But I cannot find out any reason why the swan and the eagle, the raven and the green-bird, the rook and the owl, the eagle and the wren should hate one another, unless it be that the latter hates the eagle because he is called the king of birds. Why should an owl be an enemy to small birds, a weasel to a crow, a turtle-dove to a candle- fly, the ichneumon (Indian rats) wasps to the spiders called jrftalangice, clucks to sea-gulls, the harpe to the buzzard-hawk, the wolf to the lion ? And besides, why should rats have an aversion to a tree where ants a: % e 1 Why is there so irreconcilable an enmity between a beetle and an eagle? for the fable was framed from the nature of that animal. Hence it is that near to Olynthus, in a certain place beetles will not live if they are brought into it. And then, again, between creatures that live in the water; what reason is there why the mullet and the pike mutually hate one another, as the conger and the lamprey, that gnaw one another's tails'? The lobster has such an hatred to the polypus that if it chance to see it near him he dies with fear. On the contrary, a certain hidden affection of goodwill has united other creatures, as peacocks and doves, turtles and parrots, blackbirds and thrushes, crows and herons, who mutually assist one another sigainst the fox; the harpe and kite against the triorche, which is a kind of hawk, and a common enemy to them. The musculus, a little fibii swimming before the whale, is a guide to him; nor does it appear. why he is thus serviceable to him. For that the crocodile opens his jaws for the little wren is not to be attributed to friendship, when either creature is led by its own advantage. The crocodile loves to have his teeth cleansed, and therefore embraces the pleasure of having them picked; and the wren seeks her food, feeding upon the fragments of fish that stick in the other's teeth, and for the same reason a crow rides upon a sow's back. There is such a stubborn enmity between the anthus and segythus, that it is affirmed their blood will not mingle one with the other; just as it is related of other birds, that their feathers will consume away if they be mingled with those of the eagle.
A hawk is a deadly enemy to the dovekind, but the little bird the kestrel defends them, for a hawk is wonderfully afraid either to see or hear that bird. Nor are the pigeons ignorant of this; wheresoever the kestrel has her nest, they will never leave that place, relying upon their defenders. Who can give a reason why a kestrel should be so friendly to pigeons, or why a hawk should be so afraid of a kestrel ? And as a very little animal is sometimes a safeguard to a great beast, so, on the contrary, a very little one is often a destruction to a great one. There is a little fish in the form of a scorpion, and of the size of the fish quaquiner; he sometimes sticks his sting into the fin of tunnies, that often are bigger than a dolphin, and puts them to that torture that they sometimes leap into ships, and the same he does to the mullet. What should be the reason that a lion, that is terrible to all anim-als, should be struck with fear at hearing a cock crow ? Jo. That I may not be altogether scot-free in this entertainment, I will tell you what I saw with my own eyes in the house of that famous Englishman Sir Thomas More : He kept in his house a large monkey, who, that he might the sooner get well of a wound he had received, was suffered to go loose. At the end of the garden there were rabbits kept in hutches, and a weasel used to watch them very narrowly. The monkey sitting aloof off quietly, as though uncon- cerned, observed all his motions till he saw the rabbits were in no danger from him. But perceiving the weasel had lodsened a board in the back part of the hutch, and that now they were in danger to be attacked in the rear, and so be made a prey to their enemy, the ape runs, jumps up on the plank and put it into its former place with as much dexterity as any man could have done ; from whence it is plain that apes are great lovers of this animal. So the coneys, not knowing their own danger, that used to kiss their enemy through the grate, were preserved by the monkey. Apes are mightily delighted with all young whelps, and love to hug them and carry them about in their arms. Ep. But that good-natured monkey did really deserve to be. made amends for his kindness. Jo. And he was too. Ep. How ? Jo. He found there a piece of bread that had, I suppose, been thrown there by the children, which he took up and ate.
Ep. But it seems most admirable to me that this kind of sympathy and antipathy, as the Greeks call a natural affection of friendship and enmity, should be found even in things that have neither life nor sense. I omit to mention the ash tree, the very shadow of which a serpent cannot endure; so that how far soever it spreads, if you make a circle of fire of the same bigness, the serpent will sooner go iuto the fire than into the shadow of the tree ; for there are examples innumerable of this kind. Moths included in parchment are trans- formed into butterflies by some secret workmanship of nature, though they seem as if they were dead, and stir not if you touch them, xmless a spider creep near them; then only they appear to be alive. They cannot feel the touch of a man's finger; but they feel the feet of a very small animal crawling. Jo. An insect, before it is alive, can be sensible of his capital enemy. That which is related concerning persons mvirdered is very like this, to whom if other persons approach, there is no alteration; but if he that killed them comes nigh, presently blood flows fresh out of the wound; and they say that by this token the author of a murder has been often discovered.
Ep. What you have heard as to that matter is no fiction. But, not to mention democritical stories, do we not find by experience that there is a mighty disagreement between an oak and an olive tree, that they will both die if they be planted into the ground of each other 1 ? And that an oak is so opposite to a walnut tree that it will die though it be set at a good distance from it; and, indeed, a walnut tree is hurtful to most sorts of plants and trees. Again, though a vine will twine its sprigs round all other things else, yet it shuns a colewort; and, as though it were sensible of it, turns itself another way, as if some person gave the vine notice that his enemy was near at hand. The juice of cole worts is a thing contrary to, wine, and they are used to be eaten against drunkenness. But the colewort has its enemy too ; for if it be set near the herb called sow-bread, or wild marjoram, it will wither presently. There is the like disposition between hemlock and wine; as hemlock is poison to a man, so is wine to hemlock. What secret commerce is there between the lily and the garlic, that growing near to one another they seem as it were mutually to congratulate one another ? The garlic is the stronger, but the lily flower smells the sweeter. Why should I speak of the marriage of trees one "with another, the females being barren unless the male grows near them ? Oil will only mix with chalk, and both of them have an antipathy to water. Pitch attracts oil, though they are both fat things. All things but gold swim in quicksilver, and that only draws it to itself and embraces it. What sense of nature is that which seems to be in a diamond that will resist everything that is hard, but grow soft in a goat's blood 1 Nay, you may see an antipathy even in poisons them- selves. A scorpion, if it chance to creep through henbane, grows pale and benumbed. And the herb cerastis is so noxious to a scorpion, that he that handles the seed of it may take a scorpion into his hand. There are abundance of things of this kind, b.ut the consideration of them more properly belongs to physicians.
What a mighty power of either sympathy or antipathy is there between the steel and the loadstone, that a matter heavy by nature should run to and cleave to a stone, as though it kissed it, and with- out touching it should fly backward 1 And as to water, which readily mingles with all things, but most of all with itself, yet there are some waters which, as though they hated one another, will not mix ; as for instance, the river flowing into the Lake Fucinus runs over it, as Addua does to Larius, as Ticinus to Verbanus, Mincius to Benacus, Ollius to Rhodanus to Lemanus : some of which for many miles only carry their hospitable streams through them, and go put just as much and no more than they came in. The River Tigris flows into the Lake Arethusa, and is carried through it like a passenger, that neither the colour, the fish, nor the nature of the water intermixes one with the other. And besides, whereas other rivers generally seem as it were in haste to flow into the sea, yet some rivers, as though they had an aversion to it, before they come at it hide themselves in the earth. There is something of a like nature to be obs.erved concerning the winds : the south wind is pestilential to mankind ; the north wind, on the contrary, healthful; one collects the clouds, the other scatters them. And if we may believe astrologers, there is a certain sympathy and antipathy in the very stars themselves ; some are friendly to man- kind, and others hurtful ; and some are helpful to a man against the influences of the noxious ones : so that there is nothing in nature but by these sympathies and antipathies brings a man injuries and remedies. Jo. And perhaps you may find something aboye the skies too ; for if we believe the magi, there are two genii, a good and a bad, that attend every man. Ep. I think it is very well, and enough for us that we are got so far as heaven, without passing over the limits of it. But let us return to oxen and horses. Jo. In truth, you make a very fine transition. Ep. It is the more admirable to us that in the same species of animals we find ma.nifest footsteps of sympathy and antipathy, no cause of it appearing : for so your horse- coursers and herdmen endeavour to persuade us, that in the same pastures and the same stable one horse shall desire to have one horse nigh him, and will not endure another. Indeed, I am of opinion that there is the like affec- tion in all kind of living creatures, besides the favour of sex, but is in no kind so evident as it is in man. For what Catullus expresses of his Volusius concerning his afiectiqn of inind is manifest in a great many others :
I love thee not, "Volusius ; and if thou askest why ? | I love thee not, Volusius, is all I can reply.
But in adult persons, a person may conjectxire another cause. In chil- dren, that are only led by the sense of nature, what can it be that makes a child love one so dearly, and have such an aversion to another ] I myself, when I was a boy not eight years of age, happened to fall into the acquaintance of one of my own age, or perhaps a year older, of so vain a humour that upon every occasion he would invent, without study, most monstrous lies. If he met a woman, he would say to me, Do yoii see that woman I I answered, Yes, I see her. Why, says he, I have lain with her ten times. If we went over a narrow bridge nigh a mill, when he perceived me shocked at the sight of the water looking black by reason of the depth, he would say, I fell into this place once ; what say you to that ? and there I found the dead body of a man, with a purse tied about him, and three rings in it. And thus he would do continually. And though it is common for others to be delighted with such romances as these, I abhorred him more than a viper, and knew no reason for it, lout only a certain hidden instinct in nature. Nor was this only temporary ; but to this very day I so naturally hate those vain lying persons, that at the very sight of them I perceive my whole constitution to be shocked. Homer" takes notice of something of the like nature in Achilles, when he says he hated lies as much as the gates of hell. But though I was born with this natural disposition, yet contrary to it I seem to have been born to have to do with liars and impostors through the whole course of my life. Jo. But I do not take in what this tends to. Ep. I will tell you in a few words : there are some that fetch their felicity from magical arts, others from the stars. I think there is no surer way of coming at it, than if every one would abstain from that sort of life that he has a natural aversion to, and be- take himself to that he has a natural inclination to, always excluding those things that are dishonest ; and that he would withdraw himself from the conversation of those whose disposition he perceives does not agree with his own, and join himself with such as he finds he has a natural propensity to. Jo. If that were done there would be friend- ship between some few. Ep. Christian charity extends itself to all ; but familiarity is to be contracted with but few : and he that does no hurt to anybody, though he be bad, and would rejoice if he would grow better, in my opinion, loves all as becomes a Christian to do.