THALIA. 55

of the world. Their horses are not so large as the
Nisaean horses of Media. They have also a great
abundance of gold, which they procure partly by dig­
ging, partly from the rivers, but principally by the
method above described. They possess likewise a kind
of plant, which, instead of fruit, produces wool, of a
finer and better quality than that of sheep: of this the
natives make their clothes.
CVII. The last inhabited country towards the south,
is Arabia, the only region of the earth which produces
frankincense, myrrh, cinnamon, cassia, and ledanum.
Except the myrrh, the Arabians obtain all these aro-
matics without any considerable trouble. To collect
the frankincense, they burn under the tree which pro­
duces it, a quantity of the styrax, which the Phoeni­
cians export into Greece; for these trees are each of
them guarded by a prodigious number of flying ser­
pents, small of body and of different colours, which
are dispersed by the smoke of the gum. It is this
species of serpent which, in an immense body, infests
Egypt.

CVIII. The Arabians, moreover, affirm that their
whole country would be filled with these serpents, if
the same thing were not to happen with respect to
them which We know happens, and, as it should seem,
providentially, to the vipers. Those animals which
are more timid, and which serve for the purpose of
food, to prevent their total consumption are always
remarkably prolific, which is not the case with those
which are fierce and venomous. The hare, for instance,
the prey of every beast and bird, as well as of man,
produces young abundantly. It is the singular property
of this animal, that it conceives a second time, when
it is already pregnant, and at the same time carries in
its womb young ones covered with down, others not
yet formed, others just beginning to be formed, whilst
the mother herself is again ready to conceive. But
the lioness, of all animals the strongest and most fe­
rocious, produces but one young one in her life, for at
the birth of her cub she loses her matrix. The rea­
son of this seems to be, that as the claws of the lion
are sharper by much than those of any other animal,