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Many other quadrupeds help themselves in clever ways. Wild goats in Crete are said, when wounded by arrows, to go in search of dittany, which is supposed to have the property of ejecting arrows in the body.

It is the hind, too, that, as already stated, first made us acquainted with dictamnon, or dittany; for when wounded, it eats some of this plant, and the weapon immediately falls from the body. This plant grows nowhere but in Crete. The branches of it are remarkably thin; it resembles pennyroyal in appearance, and is hot and acrid to the taste. The leaves are the only part employed, it being destitute of blossom, seed, and stem: the root is thin., and never used. In Crete even, it is found growing only in a very limited locality, and is sought by goats with singular avidity.

In place of it, the pseudodictamnum is employed, a plant that is found growing in many countries. In leaf it is similar to the other, but the branches are more diminutive: by some persons it is known as "chondris." Its properties not being so strongly developed, the difference is immediately recognized: for an infusion of the very smallest piece of the real dittany, [p. 5116] is sufficient to burn the mouth. The persons who gather it are in the habit of enclosing it in a stem of fennel-giant or in a reed, which they close at the ends that the virtues of it may not escape. Some persons say, that both plants grow indiscriminately in numerous localities, the inferior sort being the produce of rich soils, and the genuine dittany being found nowhere but in rugged, uncultivated spots.