BOOK VIII. L. 116-119 



though thenceforward the horns grow again Hke the 

 old ones and the age cannot be told by them. But 

 old age is indicated by the teeth, for the old have 

 either few or none, nor have they tines at the bottom 

 of the horns, though otherwise these usually jut out 

 in front of the brow when they are younger. When 

 stags have been gelt the horns do not fall ofFnor grow 

 again, but burst out with excrescences that keep 

 springing again, at first resembHng dry skin, and 

 then grow up with tender shoots into reedy tufts 

 feathered with soft down. As long as the stags are 

 without them, they go out to graze in the nights. 

 When they are growing again they harden them with 

 the heat of the sun, subsequently testing them on 

 trees, and only go out into the open when satisfied 

 with their strength ; and before now they have 

 been caught with green ivy on their antlers, that has 

 been grafted on the tender horns as on a log of wood 

 as a result of rubbing them against trees while testing 

 them. Stags are sometimes even of a white colour, 

 as Quintus Sertorius's hind is said to have been, 

 which he had persuaded the tribes of Spain to beHeve 

 prophetic. Even stags are at war with a snake ; 

 they track out their holes and draw them out by 

 means of the breath of their nosti-ils in spite of their 

 resistance. Consequently the smell made by burn- 

 ing stag's horn is an outstanding thing for driving 

 away sei-pents, while a sovereign cure against bites 

 is obtained from the rennet of a fawn killed in its 

 mother's womb. Stags admittedly have a long Hfe, 

 some having been caught a hundred years later with 

 the gold necklaces that Alexander the Great had 

 put on them already covered up by the hide in great 

 folds of fat. This animal is not Hable to feverish dis- 



voL. 111. D 85 



