apparant and important a decay. As for the statute Standles,
commonly called Hawketrees, the breach of the sea, & force of the
weather doe so pare and gall them, that they can [22] passe vnder no
better title then scar-crowes.

Among creatures of a breathing life, I will only note such as minister
some particular cause of remembrance.

Touching venimous Wormes, Cornwall can plead no such Charter of
natures exemption, as Ireland. The countrey people retaine a
conceite, that the Snakes, by their breathing about a hazell wand,
doe make a stone ring of blew colour, in which there appeareth the
yellow figure of a Snake, & that beasts which are stung, being giuen
to drink of the water wherein this stone hath bene socked, will
therethrough recouer. There was such a one bestowed on me, and the
giuer auowed to haue seene a part of the stick sticking in it: but
Penes authorem sit sides.

This mention of Snakes, called to my remembrance, how not long since,
a merry Cornish Gentleman tryed that old fable to be no fable, which
sheweth the dangerous entertayning of such a ghest. For he hauing
gotten one of that kind, and broken out his teeth (wherein consisteth
his venome) used to carrie him about in his bosome, to set him to his
mouth, to make him licke his spittle, & when he came among
Gentlewomen, would cast him out suddenly, to put them in feare: but
in the end, their vaine dread proued safer then his foole-hardinesse:
for as he once walked alone, and was kissing this gentle playfellow,
the Snake in good earnest, with a stumpe, either newly growne vp, or
not fully pulled out, bit him fast by the tongue, which therewith
began so to rankle and swell, that by the time hee had knocked this