ll over
her body, like those of a young calf. In the Ashmolean museum at
Oxford, a substance much resembling the horn of a goat is shown,
which is said to have sprung from the forehead of a female named
Mary Davis, whose likeness is there shown. The excrescence was most
probably produced by a deranged secretion of the hair, and something
of a similar nature may perhaps have befallen Genucius Cippus,
which, of course, would be made the most of in those ages of
superstition. Valerius Maximus, with all his credulity, does not say
that they were real horns that made their appearance, but that they
were 'just like horns.'

It is not improbable that the story originally was, that Cippus, on
his return to Rome, dreamt that he had horns on his head, and that
having consulted the augurs, and received the answer mentioned by
Ovid, he preferred to suffer exile, rather than enslave his country;
and that, in length of time, the more wonderful part of the story
was added to it.

FABLE VII. [XV.622-744]

Rome being wasted by a pestilence, the Delphian oracle is consulted;
and the answer is given, that to cause it to cease AEsculapius must
be brought to Rome. On this, ambassadors are sent to Epidaurus to
demand the God. The people refuse to part with him; but he appears
to one of the Romans in a dream, and consents to go. On his arrival
at Rome the contagion ceases, and a Temple is built in his honour.

Relate, now, ye Muses, the guardian Deities of poets (for you know, and
remote antiquity conceals it not from you), whence {it is that} the
Island surrounded by the channel of the Tiber introduced the son of
Coronis into the sacred rites of the City of Romulus. A dire contagion
had once infected the Latian air, and the pale bodies were deformed by a
consumption that dried up the blood. When, wearied with {so many}
deaths, they found that mortal endeavours availed nothing, and that the
skill of physicians had no effect, they sought the aid of heaven, and
they repaired to Delphi which occupies the centre spot of the world, the
oracle of Phoebus, and entreated that he would aid their distressed
circumstances by a response productive of health, and put an end to the
woes of a City so great. Both the spot, and the laurels, and the quivers
which it has, shook at the same moment, and the tripod[61] gave this
answer from the recesses of the shrine, and struck {with awe} their
astonished breasts