BOOK VIII. Lxviii. 168-170 



regularly froni three ; they can breed as many 

 times as mares, and in the same months and in a 

 similar way. But the womb cannot retain the 

 genital fluid but discharges it, unless the animal is 

 whipped into a gallop after coupHng. It seldom 

 bears twins. When about to bear a foal it shuns 

 the sunlight and seeks the shadow, so as not to be 

 seen by a human being. It breeds through all its 

 Hfetime, which is thirty years. It has a very great 

 affection for its young, but a greater disUke for water : 

 she-asses will go through fire to their foals, but yet 

 if the smallest stream intervenes they are afraid of 

 merely wetting their hooves. Those kept in pastures 

 will only drink at springs they are used to, and where 

 they can get to drink by a dry track ; and they will 

 not go across bridges with interstices in their structure 

 allowing the gleam of the river to be seen through 

 them ; and, surprising to say, they may be thirsty 

 and liave to be forced or coaxed to drink, if the stream 

 is not the one they are used to. Only a wide allow- 

 ance of stall-room is safe for them to he down in, 

 for when asleep they have a variety of dreams and 

 frequently let out with their hooves, which at once 

 causes lameness by hitting timber that is too hard 

 unless they have plenty of room to kick in. The 

 profit made out of she-asses jsurpasses the richest 

 spoils of war. It is knowTi that in Celtiberia their 

 foals have made 400,000 sesterces" per dam,especially 

 when mules are bred. They say that in she-asses 

 the hair of the ears and the eye-lids is an important 

 point, for although the rest of the dam's body is all 

 one colom-, the foal reproduces all the colours that 

 were in those places. Maecenas set the fashion 

 ()f eating donkey foals at banquets, and they were 



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