Chap. 34.] -WOLVES. 283 



away the voice of a man,"* if it is the first to see him. Africa 

 and Egypt produce wolves of a sluggish and stunted na- 

 ture;** those of the colder climates are fierce and savage. 

 That men have heen turned into wolves, and again restored to 

 their original form,"' we must confidently look upon as untrue, 

 unless, indeed, we are ready to believe all the tales, which, for> 

 so many ages, have been found to be fabulous. But, as the 

 belief of it has become so firmly fixed in the minds of the 

 common people, as to have caused the term " VersipeHis"*'' to 

 be used as a common, form of imprecation, I mU. here point 

 out its origin. Euanthes, a Grecian author of no mean repu- 

 tation, informs us that the Arcadians assert that a member 

 of the family of one Anthus is chosen by lot, and then taken 

 to a certain lake in that district, where, after suspending 

 his clothes on an oak, he swims across the water and goes, 

 away into the desert, where he is changed into a wolf and as- 

 sociates with other animals of the same species for a space of 

 nine years. If he has kept himself from beholding a man 

 during the whole of that time, he returns to the same lake, 

 and, after swimming across it, resumes his original form, only 

 with the addition of nine years in age to his former appear- 

 ance. To this Fabius'* adds, that he takes his former clothes as 

 well. It is reaUy wonderful to what a length the credulity °' of 



°''* Hence the proTorbial expression applied to a person who is suddenly 

 silent upon the entrance of another ; " Lupus est tibi visus." 



'5 Cuvier says, that the wolve? of Africa are of the ordinary size, and 

 conjectures that this remark probably applies to the chakale, or " Canis 

 aureus " of Linnaeus, which is of the colour of the wolf, and the size of the 

 fox, and is common throughout all Africa. — B. 



*^ The opinion that men were converted into wolves by enchantment, or 

 a preternatural agency, was at one time so generally received, as to have 

 led to judicial processes, and the condemnation of the supposed criminal. , ' 

 — B. To the relator of the above story-that men lose their voice on seeing a 

 wolf, Soaliger wishes as many blows as at different times he had seen a wolf 

 without losing his voice. 



«' This literally means " changing the skin _;" it was applied by some 

 ancient medical writers to a peculiar form of insanity, where the patient 

 conceives himself changed into a wolf, and named XvKav9pi!>7ria, " lyoan- , 

 thropy." The word appears to have been in common use among the Ro- 

 mans, and to have hein applied by them to any one who had undergone a 

 remarkable change in his character and habits ; in this sense it is used by 

 Plautus, Amphitryon, Prol. 1. 123, and Bacchides, A. iv. sc. 4, 1. 12. — B. 



^ It is not known who is here referred to ; it is not probable that it is 

 Fabius Kctor, the Roman historian. — B. > 



*' It is rather curious to find Pliny censuring others for credulity ; indeed 



