AN ESSA y ON LONGEVITY. 65 



SO much curled as wool is. The rams generate not 

 before the third year, and continue able for genera- 

 tion until the eighth. The ewes bear young as long 

 as they live. The sheep is a diseased creature, and 

 rarely lives to his full age. 



12. The goat lives to the same age with the 

 sheep, and is not much unlike in other things, though 

 he be a creature more nimble, and of somewhat 

 a firmer flesh, and so should be longer lived ; but 

 then he is much more lascivious, and that shortens 

 his life. 



13. The sow lives to fifteen years, sometimes to 

 twenty ; and though it be a creature of the moistest 

 flesh, yet that seems to make nothing to length of 

 life. Of the wild boar or sow we have nothing 

 certain. 



14., The cat's age is betwixt six and ten years ; a 

 creature nimble and full of spirit, whose seed (as 

 .^lian reports) burneth the female ; whereupon it is 

 said, that the cat conceives with pain, and brings 

 forth with ease. A creature ravenous in eating, rather 

 swallowing down his meat whole than feeding. 



15. Hares and coneys attain scarce to seven years, 

 being both creatures generative, and with young ones 

 of several conceptions in their bellies. In this they 

 are unlike, that the coney lives under ground, and the 

 hare above ground. And, again, that the hare is of 

 a more duskish flesh. 



16. Birds, for the size of their bodies, are much 



F 



