22 MEMOIR OF PLINY. 



sides to be acquainted with it ? But wee were not 

 contented to feed with the peril of so many men, 

 vnlesse we be clad and araied also therewith. O the 

 folly of vs men ! See, how, there is nothing that 

 goeth to the pampering and trimming of this our car- 

 casse, of so great price arid account, that is not bought 

 with the vtmost hasard, and costeth not the venture 

 of a man's life '" 



The attention of Pliny, even at this early age. was 

 attracted by the interesting productions of nature, 

 and particularly by the remarkable animals which 

 the emperors exhibited in the public spectacles. He 

 relates in detail, in his ninth book, and as an eye- 

 witness, the capture of a huge whale, or other large 

 monster of the deep, which was taken alive in the 

 harbour of Ostia, at the mouth of the Tiber, and 

 slain by the darts and javelins of certain Praetorian 

 cohorts, for the amusement of the people of Rome. 

 This event having taken place while Claudius was 

 constructing the port in question, that is, in the second 

 year of his reign, the youthful philosopher could not 

 have been at that time more than about nineteen 

 years of age. We learn from himself that, about his 

 twenty-second year, he resided for a time on the coast 

 of Africa. It was at this period that some modern 

 writers have alleged, on no very substantial evidence 

 however, that he served in the Roman fleet, and 

 visited Britain, Greece, and some other eastern coun- 

 tries. But these suppositions do not accord with 



