The Scorpion
Of the Scorpion, Pliny says:--"This animal is a dangerous scourge, and
has a venom like that of the serpent; with the exception that its
effects are far more painful, as the person who is stung will linger for
three days before death ensues. The sting is invariably fatal to
virgins, and nearly always so to matrons. It is so to men also, in the
morning, when the animal has issued from its hole in a fasting state,
and ha
not yet happened to discharge its poison by an accidental
stroke. The tail is always ready to strike, and ceases not for an
instant to menace, so that no opportunity may possibly be lost....
"In Scythia, the Scorpion is able to kill even the swine, with its
sting, an animal which, in general, is proof against poisons of this
kind in a remarkable degree. When stung, those swine which are black,
die more speedily than others, and more particularly if they happen to
throw themselves into the water. When a person has been stung, it is
generally supposed that he may be cured by drinking the ashes of the
Scorpion mixed with wine. It is the belief also that nothing is more
baneful to the Scorpion than to dip it in oil.... Some writers, too, are
of opinion that the Scorpion devours its offspring, and that the one
among the young which is most adroit avails itself of its sole mode of
escape, by placing itself on the back of the mother, and thus finding a
place where it is in safety from the tail and sting. The one that thus
escapes, they say, becomes the avenger of the rest, and, at last, taking
advantage of its elevated position, puts its parents to death."
Topsell has some marvels to relate concerning the generation of
Scorpions:--"And it is reported by Elianus, that about Estamenus in
India, there are abundance of Scorpions generated, onely by corrupt
raine water standing in that place. Also, out of the Baziliske beaten
into peeces, and so putrified, are Scorpions engendred. And when as one
had planted the herbe Basilica on a wall, in the roome or place
thereof hee found two Scorpions. And some say that if a man chaw in his
mouth, fasting, this herbe Basill before he wash, and, afterwards, lay
the same abroade uncovered where no sun commeth at it for the space of
seaven nights, taking it in all the daytime, he shall at length find it
transmuted into a Scorpion, with a tayle of seaven knots.
"Hollerius, to take away all scruple of this thing, writeth that in
Italy, in his dayes, there was a man that had a Scorpion bredde in his
braine, by continuall smelling to this herbe Basil; and Gesner by
relation of an Apothecary in Fraunce, writeth also a storie of a young
mayde, who by smelling to Basill, fell into an exceeding head-ach,
whereof she died without cure, and, after her death, beeing opened,
there were found little Scorpions in her braine.
"Aristotle remembreth an herbe which he calleth Sisimbriae, out of
which putrified Scorpions are engendered. And wee have showed already,
in the history of the Crocodile, that out of the Crocodile's egges doe
many times come Scorpions, which at their first egression doe kill theyr
dam that hatched them."
There is a curious legend, that if a Scorpion is surrounded by fire, so
that it cannot escape, it will commit suicide by stinging itself to
death.