It is recorded of him--that in one
_missio_ he sent forward on the arena a hundred lions. Nor was he less
distinguished by the rarity of the wild animals which he exhibited than by
their number. There were elephants, there were crocodiles, there were
hippopotami at one time upon the stage: there was also the rhinoceros, and
the still rarer _crocuta_ or _corocotta_, with a few _strepsikerotes_.
Some of these were matched in duels, some in general battles with tigers;
in fact, there was no species of wild animal throughout the deserts and
sandy Zaarras of Africa, the infinite _steppes_ of Asia, or the lawny
recesses and dim forests of then sylvan Europe, [Footnote: And not
impossibly of America; for it must be remembered that, when we speak of
this quarter of the earth as yet undiscovered, we mean--to ourselves of
the western climates; since as respects the eastern quarters of Asia,
doubtless America was known there familiarly enough; and the high bounties
of imperial Rome on rare animals, would sometimes perhaps propagate their
influence even to those regions.] no species known to natural history,
(and some even of which naturalists have lost sight,) which the Emperor
Pius did not produce to his Roman subjects on his ceremonious pomps.
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