Milton was in error when he wrote,—
“Thick as Autumnal leaves that strew the brooks in Vallambrosa.”
The trees of Vallambrosa, being pines, do not fall thick in autumn, and the brooks, consequently, are not strewed with them.
Dante as a Naturalist
Dante says in the “Inferno” (Canto xvii),—“As at times the wherries lie on shore, that are part in water and part on land, the beaver adjusts himself to make his war,” etc.
“Lo bevero s’assetta a far sua guerra.”
Bevero should be lontra, the otter. The latter answers to the description, seeking his prey half on land and half in water, and living on the fish he cunningly catches, whereas the subsistence of the beaver is drawn exclusively from the vegetable kingdom. The otter is carnivorous; the beaver derives his nutriment from the bark of deciduous trees, preferably, as shown by their cuttings, birch, poplar, willow, maple, and ash, together with the roots of the pond lily, and also the coarse grasses that grow on the margins of their ponds.
Cassio or Iago?
John Hill Burton, in the Book-Hunter, speaking of purloining from books leaves of whose intrinsic value the owner is ignorant, says,—
“The notions of the collector about such spoil are the converse of those which Cassio professed to hold about his good name, for the scrap furtively removed is supposed in no way to impoverish the loser, while it makes the recipient rich indeed.”