Hence, no doubt, many a bloody Battle happens, with various success
to the Combatants; sometimes with great slaughter of the _long-necked
Squadron_; sometimes with great effusion of _Pygmaean_ blood. And this may
well enough, in a _Poet's_ phancy, be magnified, and represented as a
dreadful War; and no doubt of it, were one a _Spectator_ of it, 'twould be
diverting enough.
[Footnote A: _Plinij. Hist. Nat._ lib. 7. cap. 2. p.m. 13.]
[Footnote B: _Strab. Geograph_. lib. 15. pag. 489.]
-----_Si videas hoc
Gentibus in nostris, risu quatiere: sed illic,
Quanquam eadem assidue spectantur Praelia, ridet
Nemo, ubi tota cohors pede non est altior uno_.[A]
[Footnote A: _Juvenal. Satyr_. 13 vers. 170.]
This Account therefore of these Campaigns renewed every year on this
Provocation between the _Cranes_ and the _Pygmies_, contains nothing but
what a cautious Man may believe; and _Homer's Simile_ in likening the
great shouts of the _Trojans_ to the Noise of the _Cranes_, and the
Silence of the _Greeks_ to that of the _Pygmies_, is very admirable and
delightful.
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