[Footnote B:  Strabo ibid. p.m. 30.]

But how came the Cranes and Pygmies to fall out?  What may be the Cause of this Mortal Feud, and constant War between them?  For Brutes, like Men, don’t war upon one another, to raise and encrease their Glory, or to enlarge their Empire.  Unless I can acquit my self herein, and assign some probable Cause hereof, I may incur the same Censure as Strabo[A] passed on several of the Indian Historians, [Greek:  enekainisan de kai taen ’Omaerikaen ton Pygmaion geranomachin trispithameis eipontes], for reviewing the Homerical Fight of the Cranes and Pygmies, which he looks upon only as a fiction of the Poet.  But this had been very unbecoming Homer to take a Simile (which is designed for illustration) from what had no Foundation in Nature.  His Betrachomyomachia, ’tis true, was a meer Invention, and never otherwise esteemed:  But his Geranomachia hath all the likelyhood of a true Story.  And therefore I shall enquire now what may be the just Occasion of this Quarrel.

[Footnote A:  Strabo Geograph. lib. 2. p.m. 48.]

Athenaeus[A] out of Philochorus, and so likewise AElian[B], tell us a Story, That in the Nation of the Pygmies the Male-line failing, one Gerana was the Queen; a Woman of an admired Beauty, and whom the Citizens worshipped as a Goddess; but she became so vain and proud, as to prefer her own, before the Beauty of all the other Goddesses, at which they grew enraged; and to punish her for her Insolence, Athenaeus tells us that it was Diana, but AElian saith ’twas Juno that transformed her into a Crane, and made her an Enemy to the Pygmies that worshipped her before.  But since they are not agreed which Goddess ’twas, I shall let this pass.

[Footnote A:  Athenaei Deipnosoph. lib. 9 p.m. 393.]

[Footnote B:  AElian.  Hist.  Animal. lib. 15. cap. 29.]

Pomponius Mela will have it, and I think some others, that these cruel Engagements use to happen, upon the Cranes coming to devour the Corn the Pygmies had sowed; and that at last they became so victorious, as not only to destroy their Corn, but them also:  For he tells us,[A] Fuere interius Pygmaei, minutum genus, & quod pro satis frugibus contra Grues dimicando, defecit. This may seem a reasonable Cause of a Quarrel; but it not being certain that the Pygmies used to sow Corn, I will not insist on this neither.

[Footnote A:  Pomp.  Mela de situ Orbis, lib. 3. cap. 8.]