Seite - 1123 - in The Complete Aristotle

however, they are about twenty months old, but it is universally allowed that they are capable in this respect at the age of two years. The cow goes with calf for nine months, and she calves in the tenth month; some maintain that they go in calf for ten months, to the very day. A calf delivered before the times here specified is an abortion and never lives, however little premature its birth may have been, as its hooves are weak and imperfect. The cow as a rule bears but one calf, very seldom two; she submits to the bull and bears as long as she lives. Cows live for about fifteen years, and the bulls too, if they have been castrated; but some live for twenty years or even more, if their bodily constitutions be sound. The herdsmen tame the castrated bulls, and give them an office in the herd analogous to the office of the bell-wether in a flock; and these bulls live to an exceptionally advanced age, owing to their exemption from hardship and to their browsing on pasture of good quality. The bull is in fullest vigour when five years old, which leads the critics to commend Homer for applying to the bull the epithets of ‘five-year-old’, or ‘of nine seasons’, which epithets are alike in meaning. The ox sheds his teeth at the age of two years, not all together but just as the horse sheds his. When the animal suffers from podagra it does not shed the hoof, but is subject to a painful swelling in the feet. The milk of the cow is serviceable after parturition, and before parturition there is no milk at all. The milk that first presents itself becomes as hard as stone when it clots; this result ensues unless it be previously diluted with water. Oxen younger than a year old do not copulate unless under circumstances of an unnatural and portentous kind: instances have been recorded of copulation in both sexes at the age of four months. Kine in general begin to submit to the male about the month of Thargelion or of Scirophorion; some, however, are capable of conception right on to the autumn. When kine in large numbers receive the bull and conceive, it is looked upon as prognostic of rain and stormy weather. Kine herd together like mares, but in lesser degree. < div id=“section123” class=“section” title=“22”> 22 In the case of horses, the stallion and the mare are first fitted for breeding purposes when two years old. Instances, however, of such early maturity are rare, and their young are exceptionally small and weak; the ordinary age for sexual maturity is three years, and from that age to twenty the two sexes go on improving in the quality of their offspring. The mare carries her foal for 1123