224 SHAKESPEARE'S [OTTER. 



SOME reasonless creatures likewise are by nature bold, as 

 Ostriches. Holland's Pliny, bk. xi. ch. xxxvii. 



THE Ostrich has a small bone under its wings, by which 

 it purges itself in the side, and shakes it when it is pro- 

 voked to anger. It has a very strong skin, by which with 

 its feathers it is protected from the troublesome cold. 



Hcrtus Sanitatis, bk. iii. 109-10. 



Sir Gosling : Sing or howl, or I'll break your Ostrich 

 egg-shell there. 



Birdlime: My egg hurts not you. 



[Birdlime is an elderly lady with not the best of 

 characters.] Webster, " Westward Ho !" v. 3. 



[OSTRICH] a foolish bird that forgetteth his nest, and 

 leaveth his eggs for the sun and sand to hatch, that eateth 

 any thing, even the hardest iron, that heareth nothing. 



Purcbas' " Pilgrims," p. 560 (ed. 1616). 



Otter. 



Neither fish nor flesh. 



i. KING HENRY IV., iii. 3, 142-4. 



THERE is no doubt but this beast is of the kind of 

 beavers, saving in their tail, for the tail of a beaver is fish, 

 but the tail of an Otter is flesh. It hath very sharp teeth, 

 and is a very biting beast. So great is the sagacity and 

 sense of smelling in this beast, that he can directly wind 

 the fishes in the water a mile or two off. There is a kind 

 of Assa called Benjoin, a strong herb, which, being hung 

 in a linen cloth near fish-ponds, driveth away all Otters 

 and beavers. The skin doth not lose its beauty by age, 

 and no rain can hurt it, and is sold for seven or eight 

 shillings ; thereof they make fringes in hems of garments, 

 and face about the collars of men and women's garments, 

 and the skin of the Otter is far more precious than the 

 skin of the beaver. Topsell, "Four-footed Beasts," s.v. 



I MARVEL how it came into the writer's head to affirm 

 that the beaver constraineth the Otter in the winter-time 

 to trouble the water about her tail to ^the intent it may not 

 freeze. 



