The works of Francis Bacon, lord chancellor of England.

CENT. VIII. NATURAL HISTORY. 101
but a nail. But no living creatures that have 754. Horses have, at three years old, a tooth
shells very hard, as oysters, cockles, muscles, put forth, which they call the colt's tooth: and at
scallops, crabs, lobsters, craw-fish, shrimps, and four years old there cometh the mark tooth, which
especially the tortoise, have bones within them, hath a hole as big as you may lay a pea within
but only little gristles. it, and that weareth shorter and shorter every year,
748. Bones, after full growth, continue at a till that at eight years old the tooth is smooth,
stay; and so doth the skull: horns, in some and the hole gone: and then they say, that the
creatures, are cast and renewed: teeth stand at a mark is out of the horse's mouth.
stay, except their wearing: as for nails, they 755. The teeth of men breed first, when the
grow continually: and bills and beaks will over- child is about a year and half old: and then they
grow, and sometimes be cast, as in eagles and cast them, and new come about seven years old.
parrots. But divers have backward teeth come forth at
749. Most of the hard substances fly to the ex- twenty, yea some at thirty and forty. Query, of
tremes of the body: as skull, horns, teeth, nails, the manner of the coming of them forth. Trhey
and beaks: only the bones are more inward, and tell a tale of the old Countess of Desmond, who
clad with flesh. As for the entrails, they are all lived till she was seven-score years old, that she
without bones: save that a bone is sometimes did dentire twice or thrice, casting her old teeth,
found in the heart of a stag; and it may be in and others coming in their place.
some other creature. 756. Teeth are much hurt by sweetmeats; and
750. The skull hath brains, as a kind of mar- by painting with mercury; and by things over.
row, within it. The back-bone hath one kind of hot; and by things over-cold; and by rheums.
marrow, which hath an affinity with the brain; And the pain of the teeth is one of the sharpest
and other bones of the body have another. The of pains.
jaw-bones have no marrow severed, but a little 757. Concerning teeth, these things are to be
pulp of marrow diffused. Teeth likewise are considered. 1. Thepreserving of them. 2. The
thought to have a kind of marrow diffused, which keeping of them white. 3. The drawing of them
causeth the sense and pain; but it is rather with least pain. 4. The staying and easing of
sinew: for marrow hath no sense, no more than the tooth-ache. 5. The binding in of artificial
blood. Horn is alike throughout; and so is the nail. teeth, where teeth have been strucken out. 6.
751. None other of the hard substances have And last of all, that great one of restoring teeth
sense, but the teeth; and the teeth have sense, in age. The instances that give any likelihood
not only of pain, but of cold. of restoring teeth in age, are the late coming of
But we will leave the inquiries of other hard teeth in some, and the renewing of the beaks in
substances unto their several places, and now in- birds, which are commaterial with teeth. Query,
quire only of the teeth. therefore, more particularly how that cometh.
752. The teeth are, in men, of three kinds: And again, the renewing of horns. But yet that
sharp, as the fore-teeth: broad, as the baclk-teeth, hath not been known to have been provoked by
which we call the molar-teeth, or grinders, and art; therefore let trial be made, whether horns
pointed teeth, or canine, which are between both. may be procured to grow in beasts that are not
But there have been some men that have had horned, and how? And whether they may be
their teeth undivided, as of one whole bone, with procured to come larger than usual, as to make
some litle mark in the place of the division, as an ox or a deer have a greater head of horns?
Pyrrhus had. Some creatures have over-long or And whether the head of a deer, that by age is
out-growing teeth, which we call fangs, or tusks: more spitted, may be brought again to be more
as boars, pikes, salmons, and dogs, though less. branched? for these trials, and the lilke, will
Some living creatures have teeth against teeth, as show, whether by art such hard matter can be
men and horses; and some have teeth, especially called and provoked. It may be tried, also,
their master-teeth, indented one within another whether birds may not have something done to
like saws, as lions; and so again have dogs. them when they are young, whereby they may be
Some fishes have diverse rows of teeth in the made to have greater or longer bills; or greater
roofs of their mouths, as pikes, salmons, trouts, and longer talons? And whether children may
&c. And many more in salt-waters. Snakes not have some wash, or something to make their
and other serpents have venomous teeth, which teeth better and stronger? Coral is in use as a
are sometimes mistaken for their sting. help to the teeth of children.
753. No beast that hath horns hath upper
teeth; and no beast that hath teeth above wanteth Experiments in consort touching the generalion and
them below: but yet if they be of the same kind, bearing of living creatures in the womb.
it followeth not, that if the hard matter goeth not 758. Some living creatures generate but at cerinto upper teeth, it will go into horns, nor yet e tain seasons of the year, as deer, sheep, wild
converse; for does, that have no horns, have no conies, &c., and most sorts of birds and fishes:
upper teeth. others at any time of the year, as men: and a'!
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