Page:The whole familiar colloquies of Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam.djvu/339

THE GAME OF COCKAL 335 and oftentimes they come from a battle one-footed, and sometimes without ever a foot at all. But, as for the word, you would be more at a loss if you were to read Horace, who attributes the tali to plays. For thus, I think, he writes in his Art of Poetry

Securus cadat, an recto stet fabula talo.

Being regardless whether or no the comedy fall or stand upon its talus.

Qu. Poets have a liberty of speaking as they please, who give ears to Tmolus, and make ships speak and oaks dance. Ch. But your own Aristotle could have taught you this, that there are half tali, which he calls ij/imarpaydAoue, that he attributes to those beasts that are of the lynx kind. And he says that lions have that which is instead of the talus, but it is crooked or turned to and fro ; and that which he calls Aa/Bup/v^wSec, Pliny translates tortuosum [full of turn- ings and windings]. And in the last place, bones are everywhere inserted into bones, for the conveniency of bending the joints ; and there are cavities for the receiving the prominences that answer to them, that are defended on each side with a slippery cartilage, the parts being so environed, or kept in, that they cannot hurt one another, as the same Aristotle teaches us. And there is, for the most part, in these something that answers pretty near both in form and use to the talus. In the lower part of the leg, near the heel, where is the bend- ing of the whole foot, there is a prominence which resembles the talus, which the Greeks call atyvpbv. Again, we see in the bending of the knee a vertebra, which, if I am not mistaken, they call iaiov. And we also see something like this in the hips, in the shoulders, and, lastly, in the joints of the toes and fingers. And, that it may not seem strange to you, the Greeks write that the .word cicrrpayaAoc is, in approved authors, applied to the bones of which the spine is composed, especially in the neck. For they quote you this verse

'Etc e juot av^riv aorpaydAwv EtiArj. My neck-bone was broke on the outside the tali.

And, as Aristotle says, the fore-legs are given to animals upon the account of swiftness, and for that reason are without the tali; the hind-legs for firmness, because the weight of the body bears upon that part, as also it contribiites to strength in those creatures that kick. Horace, to signify that the play was not cut short but acted quite to the end, says, Stetit fixo talo; and uses the word talus in a play in the same sense as we apply the word calx to a book, and also says the umbilicus voluminis, or navel of a volume. Qu. In troth, you play the part of a grammarian very cleverly. Ch. But to confirm it, the more learned Greeks will have 'AorpayaAoe derived of arpt^w, and the privative particle a, because it is never bended, but is immovable. But others choose to derive aorpayaAoe from aordyaAoCj by inserting the letter p, because it cannot stand by reason of its slippery volubility.

Qu. If you go that way to work, you may make a great many more guesses ; but I think it a fairer way to confess ignorance in the matter. Ch. This guess will not seem so very absurd if you consider