Vermiculi genus est, qui per aërem liquando aranearum horoscopis idoneas sedes tendit, dehinc devorat, mox alvo reddere; proinde si necaveris, animata jam stamina volves.
It is a kind of worm, which extends abodes like the dials of spiders by floating them through the air. It then devours them so as to restore them to its stomach. Therefore, if you kill it, you will roll living threads. (See [chap. ix].)
In the same treatise (De Pallio, c. 4.) we find the following notice:
Such as Hercules was in the silk of Omphale.
Soon after, the same author, speaking of Alexander the Great, says,
Vicerat Medicam gentem, et victus est Medicâ veste:——pectus squamarum signaculis disculptum, textu pellucido tegendo, nudavit: et anhelum adhuc ab opere belli, ut mollius, ventilante serico extinxit. Non erat satis animi tumens Macedo, ni illum etiam vestis inflatior delectâsset.
He had conquered the Medes, and was conquered by a Median garment. When his breast exhibited the sculptured resemblances of scales, he covered it with a pellucid texture, which rather laid it bare; panting from the work of war, he cooled and mollified it by the use of silk, exposing it to the wind. It was not sufficient for the Macedonian to have a tumid mind; he required to be delighted also with an inflated garment.
He afterwards says of a philosopher,
He went wearing a garment of silk, and sandals of brass.
Again he says of a low character, “She exposes her silk to the wind.”