The Zoology of Herodotus 



The mistake he makes about the camel is also 

 a most preposterous one ; for, premising that he 

 will not describe this animal, as being already- 

 well known to the Greeks, he gravely remarks 

 of it, as a peculiarity which has escaped their 

 notice, that it has in its hind-legs four thigh- 

 bones and four knee-joints. After this remark 

 of his about a creature which was so familiar, it 

 is well for students to be cautious in disbelieving 

 entirely in any given animal he describes because 

 of monstrous impossibility of detail. And when 

 we remember that so generally respected an 

 observer as Gilbert White inclined towards the 

 preposterous notion that swallows hibernated 

 under water, whereas Herodotus knew of their 

 migration ; and that the sage of Selborne like- 

 wise committed himself to such absurdities as 

 the statement that coots, moorhens, and dab- 

 chicks flew in an erect position, and that ducks 

 and geese did not roost on trees because they 

 were web-footed, we should not be too severe 

 on the errors of a writer who was at any rate 

 the first European naturalist whose work is pre- 

 served, whatever may be thought of his merits 

 as a historian. 



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