Section Xliii. Galen Remarks That the Human Frame Becomes Habituated to

bear the action of these medicines without injury. He mentions the case of an old Attic woman, who by little and little had accustomed herself to take hemlock in any quantity. (De Simpl. iii.)

Avicenna states that the great indications of cure in all cases of poisoning are to comfort and rouse the vital heat, and to resolve (neutralize?) or expel the poison. When the poison is distributed over the system, his remedies are venesection, purging, and the like. He states decidedly that the proper time for venesection is either when the poison is distributed over the body, more especially when it is in a plethoric state, or when the poison is a substance not likely to be absorbed. His other remedies are such as expel the poison from the body, namely, emetics and sudorifics, or such as prevent it from entering the system, namely, ligatures to the extremities, prohibiting sleep, applying cupping instruments, or leeches, sucking the wound, amputation of the limb, using actual and potential cauteries, and keeping the wound long open. Upon the whole the general remedies recommended by him and the other Arabians are little different from those of the Greeks, especially of Dioscorides, who is the great authority upon theriacs.

Haly Abbas allows bleeding when the poison is distributed over the body, and like the others also, makes mention of cupping with heat and of amputation. He also joins in the general praise of the theriac.

Alsaharavius recommends strong ligatures, cupping, and, in urgent cases, amputation. He also approves of applying the bodies of hens still warm. Serapion approves of bleeding under the same circumstances as the others, and of the same general treatment that they recommend. Rhases recommends sucking and cupping the wound, and the application of stimulant dressings, such as a plaster consisting of mustard, lime, and pitch. He, and most of the ancient authorities on toxicology, recommend salt as an application to the wound. Most of them also join Dioscorides in recommending the application of caustic leys. They also in general direct us to prevent sleep. The ligature to prevent absorption is recommended by Rhases, as it is in fact by most of the ancient authorities. As a matter of course all of them speak highly of the theriac, and acquiesce in Galen’s celebrated eulogy upon its virtues. (Ad Pison. ii, 457, ed. Basil.)

The Arabian authorities notice cursorily the treatment of poisoned weapons of war, more especially of the Armenian arrows. Galbanum and assafœtida administered internally, and applied to the wounds in various forms, are the two articles which are most generally approved of by them. They also recommend sucking the wound, as in other cases of poisoning by a wound. (See further, B. vi, 88.)

SECT. III.—ON PERSONS BITTEN BY MAD DOGS, AND ON HYDROPHOBIA.

We have placed the account of persons bitten by mad dogs before all the others because these animals are numerous and domestic, and are frequently seized with madness; because the complaint is difficult to guard against, and the danger inevitable, unless one have recourse to many and suitable remedies. Dogs for the most part become mad during violent heat, but also, as Lycus says, sometimes in extreme cold. When mad they shun drink and food, for they are thirsty but do not drink, and for the most part they pant, hang their ears, and emit much frothy saliva. Generally they utter no sounds, and are as it were delirious, so that they do not recognize persons with whom they are familiar. Wherefore they attack equally without barking all animals, whether wild beasts or men, and bite them. Their bite at first occasions nothing disagreeable except the pain of the wound; but afterwards it brings on the affection called hydrophobia, which makes its attack with convulsions, redness of the whole body, but especially of the countenance, sweating, and anxiety; and those affected shun water when they see it, and some every fluid that is presented to them. Some bark like dogs and bite those who approach them, and so doing they occasion the same affection. The cause of the other symptoms is obvious, being occasioned by the poison affecting all the parts, but as to the dread of water some have said that it is occasioned by inordinate dryness, as if the whole fluids of the body had undergone a change. But Ruffus has pronounced it to be a species of melancholy which affects them, the poison putting on the nature of that humour in like manner as we know other melancholic persons dreading some one thing and some another; which reason accords also with those who say that they think they see the image of the dog that bit them in the water. Of persons falling into this affection we know none who has been saved, except that we have learned the histories of one or two cases, and these were of persons who had been bitten, not by a mad dog, but by some person who had been bitten and imparted the disease to them. But before the affection has made its attack many, even of those who have been bitten by a dog, have been saved. Wherefore we must begin the treatment from thence. And since often from the attack of hydrophobia having not yet come on (for most commonly it comes on about the fortieth day, and in some cases after six months, nay, instances are related of its coming on after seven years,) some supposing that the dog who inflicted the bite was not mad, and making haste to heal up the wound have thereby given rise to the complaint. By the following experiment you may ascertain whether the bite was inflicted by a mad dog or not: Pound walnuts carefully and apply them to the wound, and next day take and present them for food to a cock or hen. At first indeed he will not touch them, but if he is compelled by hunger to eat of them, observe, for if the dog that inflicted the bite was not mad, then the fowl will live, but if mad he will die next day; and then you must hasten to open the wound, and after a few days repeat the same experiment; and when the fowl does not die you may bring the wound to cicatrization, inasmuch as the patient is then freed from danger. Oribasius recommends this experiment: If from the symptoms which we have mentioned we know for certain that the dog is mad, we must have recourse to medicines for laying open the sore, the principal of which is that from pitch, very acrid vinegar, and opoponax, which is described accurately in the section on the wounds of nervous parts. But if the person who has been bitten has a tender skin, it is to be diluted with oil of iris, of balsam, or the like; or having first fomented the sores, apply a cataplasm of garlic. This also forms eschars. A dry escharotic for persons bitten by mad dogs: Of fossile salts, dr. viij; of chalcitis, dr. xvj; of squills, dr. xvj; of green rue, dr. iv; of scraped verdigris, dr. iv; of the seed of horehound, dr. j; use it at first dry that it may form an eschar, and then with rose-oil that the eschars may fall off. Keep the parts from cicatrizing for forty-two days at least. A cataplasm for persons bitten by mad dogs, which keeps the mouth of the wound open: Apply a cataplasm of onions with salts and rue, or of laserwort with salts, or of old pickle, or of the cinders of burnt wood with oil, or of garlic, or apply the leaves of the elder tree, or mint, or baum, each with salts, or walnuts with onions, salts and honey, or the ashes of figs mixed with cerate. Wash the sore with a decoction of camomile in water, and the root of the wild dock. But some burn the sore with heated irons. They ought in the first place to get draughts of simple things, such as buckthorn, wormwood, the juice of laserwort, germander, the water germander, and poley. These are compound applications: Of river crabs, of the shoots of the white vine burnt in a vessel of copper or bronze two spoonfuls, of gentian root triturated one spoonful, give to drink for forty days, with two cyathi of old undiluted wine. Some add two spoonfuls of the blood of the partridge. The crabs are to be taken when the moon is on the increase before sun-rising. But to those who do not drink it every day give a double doze, and sometimes a triple. And the theriac from vipers may be given with advantage. The patient is to be purged with the preparation from the wild cucumber, which is to be given every day with the decoction of sage, or with the Heraclean ironwort, which is also called alysson. Some also give the liver of the dog that inflicted the bite to eat. Such a diet is to be given as blunts and extinguishes the power of the poison, and at the same time prevents it from being carried deeper into the system. Both these ends may be accomplished by drinking old sweet wine that is both undiluted and strong, or milk, and in like manner by eating garlic, onions, and leeks. But if from some hinderance at the commencement the remedies which we have described have been neglected, scarification, cupping, or burning the wound, must not be had recourse to, because the poison has already been carried to the deep-seated parts; but we must use the remedies called metasyncritica, that is to say, when the attack of hydrophobia has not come on. Purging with hiera and divided milk is also to be had recourse to, with sudorifics; and calefacient plasters, and sinapisms are to be applied to every part of the body. But the most effectual of all remedies is a course of hellebore frequently repeated.

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COMMENTARY. Aristotle is the first author who mentions hydrophobia, but his account of it is remarkably incorrect, if the text be not corrupted. He says, all animals that are bitten by a rabid dog are affected with the disease except man; and that the disease proves fatal to all animals but man. (H. A. viii, 22.) But see the Annotations of Schneider. (l. c.) Ovid ranks inveterate gout and hydrophobia among the incurable diseases:

“Tollere nodosam nescit medicina podagram, Nec formidatis auxiliatur aquis.”

Ex Ponto, i, 3, 24.

Celsus, also, was well aware of the fatal nature of the disease, for which he says the only remedy is to plunge the patient unexpectedly into the cold bath, after which, to prevent convulsions, he is to be put into warm oil. He also approves of giving undiluted wine. As a preventive of the disease he directs the wound to be cauterized. (v, 27.)

Pliny in like manner reckons the disease dangerous, and mentions hellebore as a remedy for it. (H. N. viii, 63; xxix, 32.)

But without doubt the best account of hydrophobia contained in any ancient author is that given by Cælius Aurelianus. We shall now give a short abstract of it. He says the disease may be produced not only by the bite, but likewise by the breath of a rabid dog. This fact is mentioned by other authorities, such as Aretæus (Morb. Acut. vii), and Vegetius (Mulo. Med. iii, 84); and it is confirmed by modern writers, as Gokel, Lister, Rhazouz, and others. He also relates the case of a sempstress who fell into the disease from having sewed a robe which had been torn by a mad dog. Similar cases are related by Hildanus and Heister. He likewise states, what is confirmed by the Arabian authorities, and also by modern experience, that the disease may be brought on by the bite of wolves, bears, leopards, horses, and asses. He mentions the case of a person in whom it was occasioned by a wound inflicted with the spurs of a cock while fighting. Sometimes, too, he adds, it arises in the human subject without any manifest cause, which also is confirmed by modern experience. We once saw the horror of water in a case of Phrenitis. He mentions a singular case of hydrophobia in a child which was affected with a horror of its mother’s breast. His description of the symptoms, if compared with modern descriptions (for example that given by Dr. Goden in Hufeland’s ‘Journal,’ Jan. 1816), will be found in every respect complete and accurate. Thus Cælius says that the pulse is densus, parvus, inordinatus, and Goden found it intermittent and irregular. Cælius says there is a frequent desire of making water, which Goden found to be a constant attendant of the disease. Cælius thought that the stomach is more deranged than any other part, and Goden is of opinion that the splanchnic nerves are particularly affected. In short, Cælius maintained that it is an incendium nervorum; and it appears from him that some of the ancient authorities believed it an inflammatory affection, and treated it by bleeding. He treats it upon much the same principles as Tetanus, that is to say, his great object seems to have been to remove constriction, and with this view he recommends friction with tepid oil, venesection, and all remedies of a relaxant nature. He also directs us to administer clysters of tepid water and oil; and proposes to quench the thirst by forcing a cooling injection up to the stomach; for which purpose pressure with the hands is to be applied externally. He makes mention of the internal administration of hellebore, but disapproves of it. The use of white hellebore, however, is favorably mentioned by Aëtius (vi, 24), by Actuarius (Meth. Med. vi, 11), by Theomnestus (Geopon. xix, 3), by Dioscorides (ii, 3), by Alexander Trallian (i, 15), and by Avicenna (iv, 6, 9.)

Galen, in his work on ‘Antidotes,’ gives prescriptions for several compositions of this sort for the prevention and cure of hydrophobia; and mentions the disease incidentally in several parts of his works, but has nowhere given any description of it. Dioscorides’ account of the symptoms, and his plan of treatment are nearly the same as our author’s. He strongly recommends the cautery.

The external application of the cautery is also commended by Celsus, Galen, Pliny, Scribonius Largus, Aëtius, Actuarius, Nonnus, Avicenna, Rhases, and Alsaharavius.

See a good account of hydrophobia in Haly Abbas (Theor. viii, 20); and in Alsaharavius (Pract. xxx, 2, 30.) None of the ancient authorities insists with so much earnestness as Haly Abbas on the necessity of applying strong stimulants to the wound, namely, the most acrid vinegar, copperas, and the like, so as to keep up a discharge from it for a considerable time. Rhases is a strong advocate for bleeding when the poison is distributed over the system. (Cont. xxxv.)

Perhaps Alexander Aphrodisiensis is correct in stating that the disease in the dog is a species of fever. (Problem.)

There is a sensible account of hydrophobia in a ‘Fragment’ of an anonymous Greek author, published in Bernard’s ‘Reliquiæ.’ The complaint is said to arise either from the bite of a dog, or from humours engendered in the body. It is correctly stated that persons affected with it dread all liquids, so that at the bare mention of them they start up with a scream, trembling, cold sweats, and chattering of the teeth. Among other things cold applications over the stomach and chest are recommended.

SECT. IV.—FOR THE BITES OF DOGS THAT ARE NOT MAD.

On the bites of dogs that are not rabid, as even in this case they possess some poisonous quality, immediately sprinkle some vinegar, and strike the bite with your hand spread out, and then having rubbed nitre with vinegar, pour it from above upon the part. Afterwards, having soaked a new piece of sponge in vinegar or in the vinegar and nitre, apply it for three days, and moisten it; for it will effect a complete cure. Or apply the flour of tares mixed with oil, or new sponge, or unwashed wool soaked in vinegar and oil may be applied; or triturate the leaves of bramble with vinegar, and apply; or onions triturated with honey, or equal parts of the hair of marjoram, of salt, and of onions with honey; or black horehound, which they also call ballotes, with salts. When the bites have already suppurated, apply the flour of tares mixed with honey, for it is particularly applicable. When they are inflamed anoint with litharge triturated with water.

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COMMENTARY. See Rhases (ad Mansor. viii, 9; Cont. xxxv); Haly Abbas (Pract. iv, 28); Alsaharavius (Pract. xxx, 2, 31). Haly adopts the treatment laid down by our author. Alsaharavius recommends a composition of fat, wax, pitch, and galbanum.

SECT. V.—ON WASPS AND BEES.

Those who have been stung by bees experience pain, redness, and swelling in the wound, the surrounding parts become tumefied, and the sting remains in the wound; and those stung by wasps experience all the other symptoms, and that in an aggravated degree, only the sting does not remain. Both cases are remedied by rubbing the parts with clay, or cow’s dung, or with the juice of figs, or with the triturated leaves of sycamore, or of mallows; or by applying a cataplasm of barley flour mixed with vinegar. Foment also with brine or sea-water.

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COMMENTARY. See a similar plan of treatment recommended by Aëtius, Dioscorides, Nonnus, and Rhases. Simeon Seth recommends the decoction of mallows, which appears to have been a domestic remedy generally used in such cases. See also Geopon. (xii, 12); and Pliny (H. N. xx). Virgil alludes to this practice in a passage which has been often misunderstood. (Georg. iv, 230.) Haly Abbas recommends cold water or snow, also Armenian earth with vinegar, and other applications of the same nature. (Pract. iv, 34.) Alsaharavius mentions the same remedies as Haly, but expresses himself sceptical as to their efficacy. (Pract. xxx, 2, 29.) Rhases, among other applications, mentions a composition of camphor and vinegar; and another containing opium, henbane, and camphor, to be used along with a cloth moistened in snow-water. The Arabian writers on husbandry also recommend the composition from mallows and oil, as a preservative of the face and hands from the stings of bees and wasps. (Casiri, Bibl. Arab. Hisp. 335.)

SECT. VI.—ON THE PHALANGIA, OR VENOMOUS SPIDERS.

When a person has been bitten by a phalangion the part itself appears red, and as if pricked by a sharp-pointed instrument, but it does not swell, nor is it very warm, but it is moderately red, cold, and itchy. Those who have been stung experience a great sense of cold, trembling, heaviness of the body, a cold sweat, constant pain, paleness, and a perpetual desire to make water; in some cases there are dysuria, erection of the genital member, humid eyes, and spasmodic distension about the groins and thighs, a violent gnawing pain of the stomach, loss of taste in the tongue, vomiting of water, or of substances resembling webs, and sometimes these substances are discharged by the urine or bowels. By going into hot water they are freed from pain, but the pain returns again with violence. They are relieved by the application of the ashes of figs mixed with salts triturated in wine, or of the pounded root of the wild pomegranate, or of birthwort with barley flour mixed with vinegar. Bathe the ulcers with hot sea-water, or with the decoction of baum, the leaves of which may also be applied. Recourse must also be had frequently to baths, and potions composed of these things, the seed of southernwood, dill, birthwort, wild chick-peas, Ethiopian cumin, pounded cedar-berries, the bark of the plane tree, the seed of the herb trefoil, the fruit of tamarisk; give two drachms of each of these with one hemina of wine, or a decoction of the green parts of cypress, or of its balls mixed with wine. Some say that the river crab when reduced to juice, with milk, and the seed of parsley, and given, removes the mischief.

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COMMENTARY. Nicander describes several species of phalangia, whose bites occasion a variety of symptoms, such as a cold horror, tremblings of the limbs, and in some instances tension of the genital members. On the phalangia, see Aristotle (Hist. Anim. ix, 39); Xenophon (Memorab. i, 3); Pliny (H. N. xix, 9, and xxix, 27); Ælian (H. A. xvii, 11); Solinus (Polyhist. xvii); Phile. (66). The distinction between the phalangia and common spiders is thus stated by Humelbergius: “Araneorum primâ divisione duo genera sunt, unum eorum qui innoxii sunt quos Græci arachnas, Latini araneos dicunt, quorum etiam a Dioscoride duo genera recensentur, unum quod holcon et lycon vocat, alterum vero dicit esse quod candidas, tenues et densas telas operetur. Alterum genus est eorum qui noxii sunt, quos et Græci et Latini phalangia vocant.” (Apud Apuleium.)

Similar modes of treatment to that of our author are recommended by Dioscorides (vi, 42); Celsus (v, 27); Nonnus (270); Aëtius (xiii, 16); Actuarius (Meth. Med. vi, 10); Haly Abbas (Theor. viii, 22); and Alsaharavius (Pract. xxx, 2, 26).

Sprengel allows that there is considerable difficulty in determining the nature of the ancient phalangia. He attempts, however, to refer the different species described by Nicander to their proper names in the Linnæan classification. (Comment. in Dioscoridem.)

Many modern authorities, for example, Gesner, Baglivi, and Andreas Laurentius, have held that the Tarantula, so famous in the annals of the Dancing Mania, was a species of the phalangium. See further Hecker’s Epidem. 113. This seems to be confirmed by Rhases calling a species of the phalangium by the name of tarantula (Contin. xx and xxii); and, indeed, Ardyen seems to settle the question that the tarantula is a species of the phalangia. (De Venen. viii, 5.)

SECT. VII.—ON THE BITE OF THE SPIDER.

There is also a kind of spider, the sting of which occasions intense pains about the middle of the hypochondrium, difficulty of making water, erythema, and sometimes convulsions. Those who are stung by such animals, are relieved by the Theban wild cumin, the seed of the chaste-tree, and by draughts from the leaves of the white poplar, or by applying garlic alone, and taking full draughts of undiluted wine.

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COMMENTARY. For the sting of the spider, Celsus recommends garlic mixed with rue and pounded in oil. (vi, 27.) See also Pliny (H. N. xxix, 27); Haly Abbas (Pract. iv, 35); Alsaharavius (Pract. xxx, 2, 24).

SECT. VIII.—ON THE STING OF THE SCORPION.

When one has been stung by a scorpion, the part immediately begins to inflame, becoming hard, red, tense, and painful, being seized at one time with heat, and at another with cold; and when pain is an attendant symptom, it has remissions and exacerbations. These symptoms are followed by sweating, a sense of shivering, trembling, coldness of the extremities, tumour of the groins, and erection of the genital member: sometimes there is a discharge of flatus by the anus with a loud noise, and horripilation, and a painful discoloration on the skin, the pain resembling the prick of a needle. These are immediately relieved by having the juice of the fig poured into the wounds, and the scorpion which stung the person may be pounded and applied to the bite; afterwards salts triturated with linseed and the seed of marshmallows may be applied. Native sulphur, mixed with rosin or turpentine, is also of service; and in like manner, galbanum, spread out into the shape of an oblong pledget and applied, or calamint pounded and applied; and crude barley-flour prepared in wine and the decoction of rue; and in like manner the pounded seed of the herb trefoil may be applied with advantage. They may also take propomata containing two drachms of birthwort, more particularly of its bark with wine; or gentian pounded, or pennyroyal properly boiled, and ten bay-berries bruised, and calamint long boiled with oxycrate, and cyperus with wine; and in like manner, rue, the juice of the fig, and laserwort, if at hand; but otherwise we must use the Parthian juice. The fruit of trefoil and the seed of basil-royal may be taken in a draught with advantage. Silver immediately applied to the wound has a wonderful effect. The benefit of all these may be increased by the frequent use of the bath, copious perspirations, and drinking strong or diluted wine. The following compound propomata may be taken: Of sulphur vivum to the size of an Egyptian bean, with eight grains of pepper in half a hemina of wine, or the juice of laserwort triturated with crabs in wine, or equal parts of gith, Ethiopian cumin, and the seeds of the chaste-tree in wine.

For severe stings of scorpions and phalangia. Of the lees of wine, dr. xvi; of pellitory, dr. iv; of the seed of wild rue, dr. iij; of castor, of the seeds of rocket, of each, dr. ij; let them be mixed with the blood of the sea-tortoise. The dose is four oboli with wine, or three cyathi of unmixed vinegar.—Another: Of pellitory, of birthwort, of each, oz. iv; of pepper, dr. ij; of the juice of the laserwort, dr. j. The dose is the size of an Egyptian bean.

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COMMENTARY. Nicander describes several species of the scorpion. The white, he says, is innoxious. The red occasions a fiery heat with restlessness and great thirst. The black brings on inquietude, delirium, and laughter. The green occasions chilliness with horror. The symptoms superinduced by the other species are also detailed. (See Theriac. 775.) Ælius Promotus gives a very circumstantial description of the effects produced by the sting of the different species of scorpions, but it would appear to be mostly taken from Galen and other Greek authorities. On the nature of the scorpion, see further, Pliny (H. N. xi, 25); and Ælian (vi, 20.)

On the medical treatment, see in particular Dioscorides (vi, 44); Aëtius (xiii, 19); Nonnus (269); Actuarius (Meth. Med. vi, 10); Celsus (v, 27); Rhases (ad Mansor. viii, 3); Haly Abbas (Theor. viii, 22, and Pract. iv, 33); Alsaharavius (Pract. xxx, 2, 20); Avicenna (iv, vi, 5.)

Galen gives a variety of prescriptions for the composition of antidotes for the cure of persons stung by scorpions. The following one may be taken as a specimen of them: Of birthwort, dr. iv; of pepper, dr. ij; of opium, dr. j; of pellitory, dr. iv; form into trochisks of the size of an Egyptian bean, and give to swallow along with two cyathi of undiluted wine. (De Antidot. ii.) Rhases gives another receipt of Galen’s for the sting of the scorpion, viz. equal parts of opium and of the seed of henbane given with honey. (Contin. xx, 24.)

On the use of venesection for the cure of the sting of the scorpion, Celsus says, “Cognovi tamen medicos qui ab scorpione ictis nihil aliud quam ex brachis sanguinem miserunt.” Rhases has pointed out the proper time and circumstances which require venesection: “When you have administered the theriac, and the pain has subsided, if fever supervene, bleed the patient on the following day in the morning, and give him barley-water and diluent food.” The symptoms as detailed by Haly Abbas are pain, swelling, hardness, and inflammation, which occasionally superinduce asphyxy and epilepsy. He directs a ligature to be put immediately around the member, and a bruised scorpion to be applied to the wound. He also mentions cataplasms with olive oil, and recommends the internal use of wine either alone or with garlic. The treatment as given by Alsaharavius is very similar. Dioscorides, Aëtius, Haly Abbas, Alsaharavius, Actuarius, and Nonnus, omit to mention venesection.

The veterinary surgeons recommend bleeding, scarifications, and burning with red-hot irons. See Vegetius (Mulom. iii, 77, and Geopon. xvi, 20.)

Sprengel remarks that Nicander’s division of scorpions is adopted by modern naturalists. (Hist. de la Méd.) Conrad Gesner gives a very elaborate dissertation on them. The scorpio Europæus, L., is not venomous. The African, however, is a very dangerous reptile. The inhabitants of Morocco, at the present day, treat its bite with the ligature, the cautery, and by applying the body of a dead scorpion to the wound. See Jackson’s Morocco (108). The Arabian authorities describe a highly venomous species of scorpion, which they call scorpius rastellans, carrareti, and algreta. See in particular Rhases, Haly Abbas, and Alsaharavius.

SECT. IX.—ON THE LAND AND SEA SCOLOPENDRA.

When one is bitten by a scolopendra the general symptoms are lividity of the parts around the bite, and swelling; sometimes it is of a feculent appearance, and sometimes, though rarely, red; and a painful and ill-conditioned ulcer takes place, beginning with the part that is bitten; and in addition to these, there is a sensation of pruritus over the whole body. Those bitten by the sea scolopendra in particular have a watery and transparent swelling, whereas that occasioned by the land scolopendra is red. It is proper therefore to apply to the wound pounded salts, or levigated rue, or ashes mixed with vinegar, or squills. Bathe the part with vinegar and brine; but Archigenes directs it to be done with much hot oil, and thus to apply the things formerly mentioned; and to administer potions containing birthwort with wine, or wild thyme, or calamint, or wild rue, or trefoil, or the juice of the root of asphodel to the amount of half a hemina with wine.

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COMMENTARY. Nicander says, that the scolopendra has two heads, and walks in both directions upon its many feet. Avicenna admits that he was wholly unacquainted with it. See in particular Ælian (H. A. iv, 22; and vii, 35.) Our author and Actuarius copy almost every word from Dioscorides. See also Aëtius (xiii, 15); Nonnus (272); Alsaharavius (Pract. xxx, 2, 23); Avicenna (iv, vi, 3.) Avicenna calls them, saculufudurni; and Alsaharavius, alhatrabay. Alsaharavius approves of wine with birthwort, rue, mint, &c., internally; and of salt, with honey, vinegar, &c., externally. The Pseudo-Dioscorides recommends salt with vernix, pitch, and honey. (Euporist. ii, 121.) We need have no hesitation in deciding with Sprengel and the other authorities on this subject, that the land scolopendra is the scolopendra morsitans, and the sea, the aphrodite oculeata, L.

SECT. X.—ON THE STELLIO OR SPOTTED LIZARD.

Those bitten by the spotted lizard experience intense pain and lividity of the part, but are relieved by the immediate application of cataplasms consisting of onions and garlic to the wound; and some by eating these things and drinking undiluted wine have been cured.

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COMMENTARY. That the galeotes and ascalabotes are but different names for the same animal is evident from Aristophanes (Nubes, 170, et seq.); and from the Scholiast’s note on Nicander (Ther. 484.) Pliny says of the stellio: “Hunc Græci coloten vocant et ascalaboten.” (H. N. xxix, 28.) On the stellio, see further Bochart (Hieroz. ii, 510); Harris (Nat. Hist. of the Bible, in the word spider); and Dr. Martyn on Virgil (Georg. iv, 244.) All agree that it was a kind of lizard. In short it is the lacerta stellio, L. A learned modern authority says it is venomous in Greece, but innocuous in Sicily. He describes it as resembling the lizard in shape, and the chamæleon in nature. (Agricola de Anim. Subterran.)

Dioscorides does not treat of the stellio. Aëtius recommends very nearly the same treatment as our author. (xiii, 12.) Avicenna and Rhases direct us to get the wound sucked, to put the patient into a warm bath and administer the theriac. The harbæ of Avicenna is probably only a species of the stellio.

Alsahaya and alvesghe of Alsaharavius seem to have been two species of stellio. (Pract. xxx, 2, 27.) He approves of the same treatment as that recommended by Avicenna and Rhases.

SECT. XI.—ON THE MUS ARANEUS OR SHREW-MOUSE.

When persons are bitten by the shrew-mouse, throbbing pains supervene, erythema of every part pierced by a tooth, blisters along the skin filled with an ichorous fluid, and all the surrounding parts are livid; and if the skin be stripped off from the blister, the ulcer appears white, owing to the skin being torn into nervous membranes. In addition to these symptoms, the mortified parts drop off, the disease extending like a spreading ulcer; and besides tormina supervene, with dysuria and the discharge of a cold fluid. They are relieved by the application of galbanum in the form of an oblong pledget, by itself, or triturated with vinegar, or of barley-flour mixed up with oxymel. And the shrew-mouse itself which inflicted the bite may be torn in pieces and applied, and pellitory may be applied, or the boiled rind of the sweet pomegranate, or wild mallows, or pounded garlic, or mustard triturated with vinegar; and the parts may be bathed with warm brine, and then a cataplasm of burnt barley with vinegar may be applied. They may take propomata of southernwood boiled in wine, or sisymbrium, or wild thyme, or rocket, or galbanum, or sage, or the tender balls of cypress with oxymel, or pellitory with wine, or the root of chameleon, or the rennet of a kid or of a lamb, or gentian root, or vervain. These things may also be administered in the form of a cataplasm. But some give in a potion the shrew-mouse itself that inflicted the bite, having triturated it with wine. This one also is effectual: Of myrrh, dr. vj; of the bark of birthwort, dr. iv. To the bites of the shrew-mouse and of the scolopendra apply salts with liquid pitch, or cedar-rosin with honey, or garlic with the leaves of the fig-tree and cumin, or the leaves of calamint, or barley with vinegar.

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COMMENTARY. Nicander says that the bite of the blind Mus araneus is mortal. Our author’s plan of treatment is taken from Dioscorides. Oribasius recommends garlic and cumin, mixed with oil. (De Morb. Curat. iii, 70.) Aëtius says that the Mus araneus is an animal resembling the weasel. His plan of treatment is similar to our author’s. (xiii, 14.)

Isodorus says of it: “Mus araneus, cujus morsu aranea moritur, est in Sardiniâ animal perexiguum, araneæ formâ, quæ solifuga dicitur, eo quod diem fugiat.” (Orig. xii, 3.)

Vegetius, the veterinary surgeon, recommends garlic pounded with nitre, or with salt and cumin. (Mulom. iii, 82.) See also Columella (vi, 17); and Ælian (H. A. ii, 37.)

Most of the Arabians treat of this case in the same terms as the Greeks.

Without doubt it is the sorix araneus, L. The accounts which the ancients give of its venomous qualities are said by Buffon and Sprengel to be exaggerated. Probably Agricola states the matter correctly when he says, that the mus araneus is venomous in warm climates, but innocent in cold. In size, he says, it is nearly equal to a small weasel. (De Anim. Subter.)

SECT. XII.—ON VIPERS AND ECHIDNÆ.

When persons have been bitten by the viper or echidna, or some such venomous animal, pain supervenes, at first of the part which has been bitten, but afterwards of the whole body. In the bite there appear two perforations at a little distance from one another, from which there is a discharge of blood and ichorous fluid, and afterwards of an oily one, but in all cases of a poisonous fluid, which they affirm to be the poison of the reptiles. Swelling comes on around the wound, which is reddish and livid; there is paleness of the whole body, vertigo, and resolution of the stomach, deliquium animi, and in some cases bilious vomitings and dysuria. Around the bite blisters arise, as from burning with fire, the disease spreads by extending to the surrounding parts, and the gums discharge blood. Trembling, heavy sleep, and a cold perspiration succeed these symptoms. Those bitten by the echidna appear to escape with less danger than those by the viper; and of these they run the least risk who have previously taken food. In treating them the most effectual remedy is eating garlic and drinking wine, so that if one can endure this course he will not stand in need of any other remedy. And let them eat also leeks, onions, and acrid pickle. Some likewise give frogs prepared with sauce to eat. The following things are effectual, each of which may be taken with wine: the dried blood of the sea tortoise with wild cumin, the rennet of a hare or a hind to the amount of three oboli, a drachm of the dried testicle of a stag, a whole alkanet with the slender leaves, which also some apply as an amulet. In like manner the juice of leeks, to the amount of half a hemina, in honied water, the juice of baum leaves, wild rue, the brains of domestic fowls, the root of panacea boiled in wine, one drachm of agaric, juniper berries, the root of asphodel, pounded pistachia, the seed of the chaste tree, two drachms of dried weasel, the root and juice of vipers’ bugloss, river and sea crabs alone or with stavesacre, salts and poley, the root of birthwort with equal parts of myrrh, gentian, and bay-berries mixed with honey. The following is an admirable remedy of Oribasius for persons bitten by vipers: Of anise, an acetabulum; of pepper, dr. iv; of the bark of birthwort, of opium, of castor, and of myrrh, of each, dr. j; triturate with must, and form to the size of a Grecian bean, and give according to the patient’s strength in three cyathi of diluted wine.—Another, from the works of Lycus, a medicine for the bites of vipers: Of myrrh, of castor, of pepper, of purslain, of each, dr. j; of the seed of dill, an acetabulum; triturate in must, and give.—Another, from the works of Archigenes: Pound carefully twenty crabs with a sufficient quantity of wheaten flour in a mortar, and having mixed some calamint and salt with it, form trochisks of it, and dry. Use in a cataplasm with milk, and give one in a draught with honied water. But, says he, if you have not river-crabs, use sea-crabs. Goat’s dung applied externally to the wound with wine is a powerful remedy; or bay-leaves boiled with oil, or bay-berries, or calamint, heath, rue, parsley, southernwood, galbanum on a pledget, green marjoram pounded; also young fowls torn in pieces, and applied warm and frequently changed, the flour of tares mixed with wine, the pounded bark of radish, boiled squills, raw barley-flour in oxymel, the leaves of the wild cucumber with fine polenta, the lees of wine in like manner with fine polenta, rue with salts and honey, bran boiled in vinegar, ashes with vinegar, cedar-pitch with salts, liquid pitch with salts. Bathe also with the decoction of trefoil, or of pennyroyal, or with vinegar and brine. When the blisters become bloody let out their contents without taking off the skin, then bathe with much water, and apply a cataplasm of boiled lentils with honey till the cure is completed. The antidote of vipers is particularly efficacious, both when taken in a draught and applied externally.

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COMMENTARY. Most of the ancient authorities appear to have considered the echidna the female viper; but, as will be seen below, there is reason to suppose that it was a different species altogether. It is the colubra of Celsus. (v, 27, 3.)

Our author’s description of the symptoms is closely copied from Nicander, who also recommends similar treatment. Dioscorides in like manner directs us to give wine, and various articles of an acrid and calefacient nature, such as garlic, onions, pepper, squills, &c. Archigenes (ap. Aëtium, xiii, 21) affirms that eating garlic and drinking undiluted wine, constitute the most effectual part of the treatment. Of course these things were given upon general principles with the view of supporting the strength and vital heat. Hence it may be understood why the ancients reposed so much confidence in the theriac of Andromachus, most of the ingredients of which were stimulant, acrid, and calefacient substances. The body of the viper, which entered into this famous composition, is said by a modern authority on the Materia Medica, Moses Charras, to contain a certain volatile oil. (See Book VII, sec. ii, of this work.)

Avicenna delivers his plan of treatment at great length, enumerating many Arabic substances, the nature of which cannot now be easily determined. His general principles, however, seem to have been much the same as those of our author. He recommends in the first place the ligature, and cupping with scarifications. Wine and the theriac are to be given unless inflammatory symptoms come on, in which case the patient is to be bled. (iv, 6.) In another place he praises the juice of the citron as a remedy against the sting of the viper. Haly Abbas recommends immediate amputation of the part when this is practicable, and otherwise directs us to apply a ligature around it, to make scarifications, and use stimulant applications, such as onions, leeks, &c. Like most of the other authorities, he recommends the theriac, and wine, with other stimulants, such as pepper, birthwort, bay-berries, &c. In certain cases he also approves of bleeding. (Pract. iv, 32.) Alsaharavius recommends cupping, the ligature, and in short nearly the same plan of treatment as Haly. (Pract. xxx, 2, 18.)

Garlic was used in common cases as a substitute for the theriac, both internally and in cataplasms. (See, in particular, Geopon. xii, 30.)

On the viper, see Ælian (H. A. x, 9); Phile (70); Galen (Ther. ad Pison.) The ancient stories of the fatal copulation of the male viper with the female, and of the loves of the muræna and viper, are probably fabulous. (See De Pauw, apud Phile.) The latter story is told by Aristotle (H. A. v, 10); Ælian (i, 50); Oppian (Hal. i, 554); Pliny (ix, 23); Athenæus (vii); Achilles Tatius (i.) One of Athenæus’s authorities, however, questions the truth of it. (Deipn. l. c.)

According to Sprengel, the Asiatic ἐχίδνα is the coluber Ægyptius; the ἔχις, probably the C. ammodytes; and the European ἐχίδνα, the C. berus. (Comment. in Dioscor.)

It is clear, however, from Nicander’s description of the viper, that the term ἔχις was applied to a considerable variety of venomous snakes. It must not then be supposed to apply in all cases to the coluber ammodytes. It is also certain, as will be seen under their proper heads, that other serpents, to which specific names were given, such as the cerastes, the hæmorrhus, and the asp, were merely varieties of the vipera.

The seps is not treated of by the Greek authorities on Toxicology, except Nicander, but is briefly noticed by the Arabian under the name of famusus. Avicenna states that the treatment of the viper applies to it. (iv. 6, 3, 48.) From the description of it given by Nicander, it would appear to have been a variety of the hæmorrhus. (See Theriac, 320, with the Commentary of Eutecnius.)

SECT. XIII.—ON THE AMPHISBÆNA AND SCYTALA.

The same symptoms follow their bites, and the same remedies are applicable to them; therefore it is unnecessary to treat of them particularly.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. Nicander says that the amphisbæna is a small serpent with two heads, and small eyes. The scytala, he says, is like the amphisbæna, but thicker and larger towards the tail. Avicenna doubts whether the amphisbæna moves both ways. He says it is a serpent of equal thickness at both extremities, which probably gave rise to the supposition that it had two heads. He calls it a snake of the fragile nature, which description evidently points to the blind-worm. (See further, Matthiolus, Comment. in Dioscor.) We suppose the altahban and alhuidia of Alsaharavius are the amphisbæna and scytala. (Pract. xxx, 2, 19.) He recommends general treatment, namely, the ligature, cupping, scarifications, with cold water to drink.

Sprengel inclines to think that the scytala was the anguis eryx. He makes the amphisbæna to be the anguis fragilis, L.; he questions, however, the accuracy of the ancient accounts respecting its venomous qualities. (Notæ in Dioscor.) But, indeed, Aëtius states distinctly that these serpents are not venomous, and that their sting merely occasions inflammation like that of wasps and bees. (l. c.) Nicander also merely describes these serpents, and says nothing about their being venomous.

SECT. XIV.—ON THE DRYINUS. THE INTRODUCTION FROM GALEN.

The dryinus, that lives at the roots of oaks, is so pernicious and destructive an animal, that if one tread on him he will excoriate one’s foot, and great swelling will seize upon the whole limbs; and, what is more wonderful, they say that if one attempt to dress the wound, one’s hands will be excoriated; and that if any person attempts in defence to kill the animal, he emits such a stench as overpowers all other smells. When one has been stung by the dryinus, tumefaction of the part takes place with redness, and blisters on the surrounding parts, along with a discharge of a watery ichor. These symptoms are followed by cardialgia and tormina. Birthwort given as a draught with wine is serviceable in these cases, and the herb trefoil, and the root of asphodel, taken in like manner, and the fruit of all kinds of oak triturated and taken in a draught. In like manner the roots of the ilex pounded and applied to the part are of use.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. Nicander says it is also called chelydros and hydros. He makes a distinction between the chelydros and the chersydros, but subsequent authorities confound them together. (See below.) He says it inhabits lakes and marshy grounds, feeding upon locusts and frogs. Its back is black, and its smell fetid. The symptoms occasioned by its sting are livid swelling, delirium, cutaneous pustules, dimness of vision, suppression of urine, coma, singultus, and vomiting of blood or bile.

Haly Abbas calls it adresa, and says that it emits a fetid smell, and brings on inflammatory redness with an aqueous discharge from the wound. (Theor. viii, 21.) Avicenna calls it kedusu duras. (iv, 6, 3.) Isidorus says, “Chelydros serpens qui et chersydros dicitur quia et in terris et in aquis moratur.” (Origines.)

Virgil translates Nicander’s account of this serpent into verses of inimitable spirit and elegance. It will be remarked by the curious reader that he mixes up together circumstances collected from Nicander’s separate descriptions of the chelydros and dryinus. (Georg, iii, 425.) Though critical emendation of the text of ancient authors be foreign to the design of this work, we cannot omit the present opportunity of stating that, from a comparison of the descriptions given by the Greek and Latin poets, we are inclined to think that the 434th line of Virgil should run thus:

Sævit agris asperque siti atque exterritus œstro.

This is founded upon the 417th line of Nicander’s Theriacs.

It seems to be the chersydros which Dante alludes to in the following verses:

“Come le rane innanzi alla nemica Biscia per l’acqua si dileguan tutte, Finch’ alla terra ciascuna s’ abbica.”

Inferno, canto ix.

For an account of the hydrus, see the sixteenth section.

According to Sprengel, the dryinus is the coluber lebetinus. (Notæ in Dios.)

Agricola finds fault with Lucan for distinguishing the chersydros from the hydrus or natrix. He remarks that the boa is a species of hydrus. (De Anim. sub.) They are now generally held to be different. See, however, our commentary on the sixteenth section.

SECT. XV.—ON THE HÆMORRHUS, PRESTER, OR DIPSAS.

Those bitten by the hæmorrhus experience violent pains, and both longitudinal and lateral contractions of the porous parts of the body, occasioned by the persistence of the pains. From the bite there is a copious discharge of blood, and if there happen to be a sore on any part of the body it bursts out and discharges blood. The alvine evacuations likewise are bloody, and the blood which is evacuated is thrombous. When they cough they bring up blood from the lungs, and they die at last vomiting blood irremediably. Those bitten by the dipsas experience intolerable heat and intense thirst which is insatiable and unceasing, so that they swallow copious draughts, and yet they feel as if they had never drunk; and the whole system is affected, as in dropsy, owing to constant ingestion of drink. Hence the animal has been called prester, causon, and dipsas. By most of the ancients those bitten by the hæmorrhus and dipsas were given over as incurable. But if we have no particular remedies for this reptile we ought to make trial of the general applications, and immediately have recourse to scarifications and burning, and, if the part permit, to amputation of the extremities. Then acrid cataplasms may be applied. All kinds of acrid food are also useful, especially that from pickles, drinking undiluted wine, and using baths. These things are to be applied perseveringly, and repeated at short intervals, before the complaints make their attacks; for after they make their appearance no advantage can be derived from medical aid. We find these topical remedies described for their bites, namely, for those of the dipsas, the powdered leaves of purslain with vinegar, polenta, and bramble leaves powdered with honey, plantain, hyssop, white garlic, leeks, rue, and nettle; and for those of the hæmorrhus the same things, and, in addition, boiled vine leaves triturated with honey. By the mouth the burnt head of the animal itself may be taken in a draught, or garlic with oil of iris. They may likewise eat dried grapes.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. According to Nicander, the hæmorrhus is about a foot in length, of a black or fiery colour, with two horns on its head, and eyes like those of locusts. The symptoms brought on by its bite, as described by Nicander, appear to have been very similar to those of the disease called purpura hæmorrhagica, namely, a discharge of blood from the gums, nose, ears, bladder, bowels, or any open sore. Ælian gives exactly the same account of it. (H. A. xv, 13.)

It appears from Dioscorides that the dipsas was also sometimes called prester and causon. (vi.) See also Ælian (H. A. vi, 51.) Lucian and Isidorus, however, make a distinction between the dipsas and prester. Lucian says that it resembles the viper de dipsadibus. In fact the dipsas seems to have belonged to the viper kind. (See Bochart, Hieroz. ii, 367.) Galen states that he was informed by the Marsi, who made a living in Rome by dealing in serpents, that the dipsades were not a peculiar species of serpents, but a variety of the viper found on the sea-shores of Africa. (De Simpl. x.) Isidorus thus defines them: “Hæmorrhois aspis nuncupatur, eo quod sanguinem sudet qui ab eo morsus fuerit: ita ut dissolutis venis, quicquid vitæ est per sanguinem evocat.” “Dipsas genus est aspidis quæ Latine situla quia quem memorderit siti perit.” (Orig. xii, 4.) The effects produced upon the system by the sting of the dipsas seem to have been of a highly inflammatory nature. According to Nicander, it kindles a flame in the heart, the lips become parched, and the person is seized with an unquenchable thirst. These symptoms are strongly portrayed by Lucan:

“Ecce subit virus tacitum, carpitque medullas Ignis edax, calidâque accendit viscera tabe. Ebibit humorem circum vitalia fusum Pestis, et in sicco linguam torrere palato Cæpit.... Ille vel in Tanaim missus, Rhodanumque, Padumque, Arderet, Nilumque bibens per rura vagantem. Accessit morti Libye, factique minorem Famam Dipsas habet terris adjuta perastis.”

Pharsal. ix, 754.

Sic lege non factiq.

The Arabians give a similar description of its effects. Haly Abbas says, that it occasions great heat and burning. Dioscorides treats the wounds of the dipsas and hæmorrhus upon general principles, namely, by the external application of cauteries and cataplasms; and the internal administration of wine and acrid food. Actuarius, in like manner, recommends undiluted wine and acrid food, and also directs us to amputate the part, or apply acrid cataplasms according to the degree of danger. Most of the ancient authorities concur in recommending the theriac; for an account of the modus operandi of which in this case, see Alexander Aphrodisiensis (Prob. i, 152.)

We may mention that, after considering the descriptions given by Nicander, his commentator Eutecnius, Galen, Actuarius, and Avicenna, we are disposed to think that the text of our author at the beginning of this section must be corrupt; but we have not ventured to deviate from it, as we could not hit upon a conjectural emendation to satisfy us. None of the others mention contractions of the interstices or porous parts of the body, and all state that there is a discharge of blood from the pores of the skin. Now it is not probable that our author should have omitted a symptom so striking as this cutaneous hemorrhage, and substituted one which the others take no notice of.

Sprengel makes the dipsas to be the coluber prester, and the hæmorrhus the C. cerastes. That they were both vipers is quite obvious from the ancient descriptions of them, and more especially from the account of them given by Galen. (l. c.)

SECT. XVI.—ON THE HYDRUS, OR WATER SERPENT.

When a person has been bitten by a water serpent, the wound becomes broad, large, and pale, and a black, copious, and fetid discharge, as from a spreading ulcer, takes place, and the cure of the mischief is accomplished only after a length of time, and with difficulty. Wherefore powdered marjoram mixed with water is to be applied to their bites, or oak ashes mixed with oil, or barley-flour with melted honey is given to drink, and birthwort to the amount of two drachms in diluted wine, or two cyathi of oxycrate; and afterwards the juice of horehound, or its decoction with wine, or wild cresses, or the fruit of asphodel, or the flour or the seed of hog’s fennel, with wine. A fresh honeycomb may also be eaten with vinegar.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. This section is taken almost word for word from Dioscorides. The chersydros, says Nicander, is like the asp, and its bite is followed by malignant symptoms. The skin about the wound becomes parched and putrid, along with heat and pains all over the body. Isidorus says of it: “Hydros aquatilis serpens a quo icti obturgescunt.” (Orig. xii, 4.) See also Pliny. (H. N. xxix, 22.) Haly Abbas says, it occasions lividity of the part, from which a black fetid discharge takes place. (Theor. viii, 21.)

Bochart makes this to have been the serpent which so annoyed the children of Israel in the wilderness. (Hier. ii, 421.)

According to Sprengel, it is the coluber natrix. (Notæ in Dioscor.) Gesner and Dr. Milligan make it to have been the coluber lutrix vel chersea, L. It is now generally held not to be venomous. We have alluded in our commentary on the fourteenth section to the confusion of the hydrus with the dryinus. Schneider has a learned annotation on this subject in his ‘Curæ posteriores’ to Nicander’s Theriacs, (l. 432.)

SECT. XVII.—ON THE CENCHRINUS.

When a person is bitten by the cenchrinus, the bite is like that of the echidna, mortification supervenes, and the flesh melts away, having been previously swelled as in dropsy, and he becomes lethargic and comatose. Erasistratus says that the liver, bladder, and colon are affected; for upon dissection these parts were found corrupted. Wherefore they are remedied by a cataplasm composed of the fruit of lettuce with linseed, and by pounded savory, and by wild rue, and by wild thyme triturated with asphodel; and two drachms of the root of centaury should be immediately given in a draught with three cyathi of nine, or the root of birthwort in like manner, and so also cresses and gentian.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. According to Nicander, the cenchrinus, called also the lion, has a body of varied size, and marked with punctated squamæ.

Dioscorides and Actuarius give exactly the same account of this serpent as our author. Haly Abbas in like manner describes it as occasioning mortification and putridity of the part. (Theor. viii, 21.) Isidorus says of it, “Cenchris serpens in flexuosis qui semper iter rectum efficit. De quo Lucanus: Et semper recto lapsurus limite cenchris.”

Sprengel conjectures that it is a variety of the coluber berus, or viper, which is highly probable. According to Belon, it is three palms long, of the thickness of the little finger; of a cinereous colour, with black spots. Aëtius makes it to be the same as the acontias, which there can be no doubt was the same as the jaculus of Lucan. Yet Lucan treats of the jaculus and cenchris separately. (Phars. ix.)

SECT. XVIII.—ON THE CERASTES AND ASP.

According to Galen, there are three kinds of asps: that called the land asp, the chelidonian, and the third the ptyas, which is the most pernicious of all; for, stretching its neck, and measuring a convenient distance, with great sagacity, it disgorges the poison into the body. This is said to be the kind of asp which Queen Cleopatra, when Augustus, having vanquished Antony, wished to seize on her, took and applied to her left breast, and being bitten by it she died very quickly. When a person is bitten by the cerastes the part becomes tumefied, with hardness and blisters, and from the bite there flows an ichor which is sometimes black and sometimes pale, and like leeks; the whole system becomes of a dark pale colour, with erection of the privy member, and mental alienation; then dimness of sight comes on, and they die at last convulsed, as in tetanus. When a person is bitten by an asp, the bite resembles the prick of a needle, being very small in appearance, and without tumefaction, and it discharges blood not copiously but in small quantity, and of a black colour. Straightway dimness of the eyes seizes them, and various pains all over the body, which are altogether slight, and not without enjoyment, supervene; wherefore Nicander has properly said, “and without suffering dies the man.” The colour is changed and becomes as green as grass, there is a gnawing pain at the orifice of the stomach, the forehead is constantly drawn upwards, the eyelids are moved insensibly as in sleep, and with these symptoms death cuts off the man before the third part of a day has passed over. In both these cases speedy amputation of the extremities averts the evil. Wherefore the bitten part is to be amputated without delay, if possible, or the flesh is to be cut off immediately down to the bone, in order that the poison may not pass through the parts which are bitten and the adjacent ones. Then what remains is to be seared by cauteries. For the poison of these, like that of the basilisk and bull’s blood, quickly coagulates the blood and spirits in the arteries.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. According to Nicander, the most pestiferous asp is about an ell in length, its colour squalid, its eyes of a drowsy appearance, and when it bites a person it leaves a very small wound; neither swelling nor inflammation is perceived, “and the man without pain sinks into a profound sleep.” This is the serpent which Cleopatra despatched herself with. See some curious remarks upon this event, and the nature of the serpent in Galen (Ther. ad Pison.), from which our author borrows his account of it.

Nicander says of the cerastes that it resembles the male viper, only that the latter has no horns, whereas the former has either two or four. Isidorus says of them, “Aspis vocata quod morsu venena immittat et aspergat: ἱὸς enim Græci venenum dicunt, et inde aspis quod morsu venenato interimat” (Orig. xii, iv); and of the cerastes, “Cerastes serpens dictus eo quod in capite cornua habeat similia arietum: sunt autem quadrigemina cornicula, quorum ostentatione, veluti escâ illiciens sollicitata animalia perimit.” (Ibid.) Harris says, “The shephephon (Gen. xlix. 17) is probably the cerastes, a serpent of the viper kind.” (Nat. Hist. of the Bible.) Bochart, however, has proved that the shephephon signifies both the cerastes and the hæmorrhus, which are very much alike, being both vipers. (Hier. ii, 416.) Sprengel, in fact, makes the hæmorrhus to be the same as the cerastes.

Our author’s treatment is principally taken from Dioscorides. Aëtius, however, gives the fullest account of them. He says the sting of the most fatal species of asp proves fatal in three hours; and that those wounded by the cerastes generally live nine days. He represents the asp as occasioning great coldness, torpor, and at last convulsions. Besides the local remedies applicable in all such cases, he recommends in an especial manner vinegar, which is to be administered in great quantities. Celsus thus explains the way in which vinegar proves efficacious for counteracting the effect of a frigorific poison: “Credo quoniam id (acetum) quamvis refrigerandi vim habet, tamen habet etiam dissipandi. Quo fit ut terra respersa eo spumat. Eadem ergo vi verisimile est spissescentem quoque intus humorem hominis ab eo discuti, et sic dari sanitatem.”

The author of the work ‘Euporistôn,’ usually published with those of Dioscorides, recommends, in the case of a person stung by the asp, constant shaking, beating, and movement of the whole body, with the affusion of hot salt water. (Euporist. ii, 120.)

Pliny says the poison of an asp proves immediately fatal when introduced into a fresh wound, more slowly when the sore is old, and that it is perfectly innoxious when swallowed by the mouth. (N. H. xxix, 18.)

The account which Avicenna gives of these serpents is mostly taken from Aëtius and our author.

Agricola describes the asp to be four feet long, and of the thickness of a spear. The cerastes, he says, in other respects resembles a viper, except that it has two or four substances on its head like horns.

Madden, a late traveller in the East, gives a different account of the horned serpent (coluber cerastes); he says that of two which he purchased from the Psylli one was a foot long, and the other a foot and a half. A lancet smeared with the venom of one of them killed a dog in three hours. The French naturalists who attended the expedition to Egypt found a viper, called hage by the inhabitants, which they held to be identical with the asp of the ancients. We need have no hesitation then in deciding that the coluber Ægyptiacus is the celebrated asp of antiquity. That the cerastes was a variety of the asp seems highly probable from the description which Nicander gives of both. (Theriac 177 and 259.) See also Wilkinson’s ‘Thebes,’ p. 378. In fine, the asp and cerastes were merely varieties of the common viper of Egypt.

SECT. XIX.—ON THE BASILISK.

This reptile seldom comes under the sight of men; but Erasistratus says, when the basilisk bites one the wound becomes of a faint golden colour, and he also says that three drachms of castor taken in a draught proves a remedy in such cases, and in like manner the juice of poppy; but we have had no trial of these things.

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COMMENTARY. The basilisk, according to Nicander, has a sharp body about three palms in length, of a bright yellow colour, and is called the king of reptiles, because all the others flee from his hiss. Pliny, Solinus, and most of the ancient authorities seem to copy Nicander’s description of the basilisk. The symptoms produced by his sting are said to be inflammation of the whole body, lividity and putrefaction of the flesh. (Theriac. l. c.) See also Galen (Ther. ad Pison.)

Avicenna states that the basilisk stupefies birds and other animals which approach him. He relates the case of a soldier who transfixed a basilisk with his spear, and the poison proved fatal both to him and his horse, whose lip was accidentally wounded with the spear. Lucan relates the case of a soldier in the army of Cato, who having wounded a basilisk with a spear, and having felt his hand affected with the poison, saved his life by immediately cutting it off with his sword. (Phars. ix, 830.) Similar histories are given by Pliny, Dioscorides, Actuarius, and Isidorus. Solinus affirms that it proves fatal to all beasts, birds, and vegetables.

For an explanation of the passages of scripture wherein mention is made of the basilisk, see Bochart (Hier. ii, 339.)

Sprengel says: “Linnæus omnem fabulam (de Basilisco) ad Lacertæ genus, capite cristato, Iguanæ proximum, reduxit.” (Comment. in Dioscor.) M. l’Abbé Bonneterre also affirms that the basilisk is not poisonous. (Encyc. Méthod.) It may be doubted, however, if we be now acquainted with the basilisk of the ancients. It would appear to us almost certain that the ancient basilisk must have been either the cobra di capello, or one of the serpents described by an intelligent traveller under the names of buskah and el effah as being still found in Morocco. (Jackson’s Account of Morocco, 109.) The former of these, indeed, judging of it from the drawing which he gives must be a variety of the cobra or coluber naja, L. We may add that a very intelligent modern authority on the toxicology of the ancients, Ardoyn, gives such a description of the basilisk as applies very well to the cobra. The crown (corona) on the head can refer to no other serpent than the hooded snake. (De venenis, vi.) It is now well ascertained that the cobra is indigenous in Africa.

SECT. XX.—ON THE SEA PASTINACA AND MURÆNA.

In the case of sea animals, such as the fire-flaire and murene, the diagnosis is obvious, for these fishes are well known. Those who are bitten by them are remedied by four drops of the juice of figs, or a little more, with three or four small branches of wild thyme in a draught, and those things used for echidna.

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COMMENTARY. Nicander says that the sting of the pastinaca occasions putridity in the flesh of a man who is wounded by it, and that it proves fatal to a tree in like manner. The same thing is asserted by Aëtius, Oppian, Phile, and Ælian. Our author and Actuarius copy from Dioscorides.

Avicenna recommends an embrocation of hot vinegar, and ointments composed of bay-leaves, oil of pellitory, and so forth; and in like manner recommends various calefacient medicines internally.

The murene of the ancients was that elegant species of eel to which the scientific name of muræna helena is now applied. It is rarely found on the British coasts but is common in the Mediterranean. The pastinaca marina of the ancients, was the raia pastinaca, L., i. q., trygon pastinaca, Cuvier, namely, the sting-ray or fire-flaire. Sprengel affirms that its sting is not venomous, as the ancients represent; but there can be no doubt that it is capable of producing inflammation. See Yarrel (British Fishes, ii, 588.) We may mention in this place that the account of the copulation between the viper and the murene which is given by Nicander, Oppian and other ancient authors, is held to be fabulous by Andreas, the physician, as quoted by the scholiast on Nicander. (Ad Theriac, 822.)

SECT. XXI.—ON THE SEA-DRAGON.

Rub the wound inflicted by the sea-dragon with lead, or apply a cataplasm of pounded wild thyme, or of boiled lentil, or of sulphur with vinegar, or the dragon itself may be torn in pieces and applied. Wash the part with human urine, and give potions of wormwood with diluted wine, or of sage, or of fig branches steeped in sweet wine, or of the brains of the fish itself.

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COMMENTARY. A great variety of remedies for the wound of the sea-dragon are described by Nicander. For an account of the draco, see Dioscorides (vi, 45); Aristotle (H. A. viii, 13); Ælian (H. A. xiv, 12); Nonnus (276); Pliny (H. N. xxix, 20); Aëtius (xiii, 39); Phile (80); Avicenna (iv, 6, 3.)

We need have no hesitation in referring the sea-dragon of the ancients to the trachinus draco, L., Angl., the great weever or sting-ball. This is agreed upon by all the best commentators, as Rondelet, Artedi, Coray, and Sprengel. Fishermen are still very apprehensive of its sting. See Yarrel (Brit. Fishes, i, 25.)

SECT. XXII.—ON THE SEA-SCORPION.

The wound of the sea-scorpion is cured by a surmullet torn in pieces and applied, by sulphur vivum rubbed with vinegar, or by three bay-berries pounded and drunk.

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COMMENTARY. See Dioscor. (vi, 45); Nonnus (277); Aëtius (xiii, 40); Athenæus (353, ed. Casaubon.); Avicenna (iv, 6, 3, 23.)

Bochart says of the sea scorpion: “Is cum terrestri nihil habet commune præter venenatos aculeos, non in caudâ sed in capite et toto corpore sparsos.” (Hierob. ii, 635.)

According to Sprengel, it is either the scorpæna scrofa or the cottus scorpius Bloch. (Comment. in Dios.) It is a fish still very much dreaded on account of its sharp spines. See Yarrel (Br. Fishes, i, 76.)

SECT. XXIII.—THE PREPARATION OF THE BLOOD OF THE SEA-TORTOISE.

The blood of the sea-tortoise is to be prepared for keeping in this way. Having stretched the tortoise with its belly upwards on a wooden or earthen vessel, cut off its head quickly, and when its blood is coagulated, divide it into many parts with a reed, put a sieve upon the vessel in place of a lid and lay it up in the sun. When dried take it and use for bites of vipers, as aforesaid; two drachms with one cyathus of vinegar, on the second day four drachms with two cyathi of vinegar, and on the third eight drachms with three cyathi of vinegar.

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COMMENTARY. This section is copied from Aëtius (xiii, 24.) In our translation we have followed the text of Aëtius, that of our author being manifestly corrupt.

SECT. XXIV.—ON PERSONS BITTEN BY CROCODILES.

For the bites of the crocodile apply levigated natron until the ulcer be cleansed, then fill it with honey, butter, stag’s marrow, or the fat of geese. But Galen says, that he has known persons bitten by crocodiles manifestly relieved by the application of the fat of the crocodiles themselves to the wounds.

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COMMENTARY. This case is more fully treated of by Aëtius (xiii, 6.) His remedies are mostly of an acrid stimulant nature such as misy, pickle, salts, myrrh, verdigris, &c. The application recommended by our author upon the authority of Galen is ascribed by Aëtius to Apollonius.

SECT. XXV.—ON PERSONS BITTEN BY A MAN.

It will not be foreign to my subject along with venomous animals also to treat of persons bitten by men, since the bites inflicted by men are much more malignant than other ulcers, more especially if the person who bit happens to be fasting, or had previously eaten some pulse, particularly dried lentil. Wherefore, the general remedies for poisonous animals may be applied externally to the bite with advantage at the commencement, with the exception of such as are very acrid and caustic; in particular having first rubbed the bite with oil, apply a cataplasm of the roots of hog’s fennel with honey, or apply the flour of beans with oxycrate, and vinegar and rose oil, sponging it frequently. And use the following plaster: Of squama æris, of galbanum, of verdigris, of each, oz. j; of wax, lb. j; of molybdæna, lb. ij; of oil, one sextarius. The molybdæna being first boiled in the oil receives the verdigris and squama æris, and when it thickens it receives the soluble substances. When the inflammation subsides treat it as a common ulcer.

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COMMENTARY. Similar treatment is recommended by Aëtius (xiii, 1); Apuleius (9, 2); Serenus (45); Pliny (H. N. xxviii, 4); Oribasius (de Morb. Curat. iii, 71); Avicenna (iv, 6, 4); and Haly Abbas (Pract. iv, 28.)

It may be proper to mention in this place that instances have not been wanting in modern times to confirm the accounts given by ancient authorities, of fatal effects being occasioned by the bite of a man. See Hildanus (Chirurg. i); Forestus (xxx, 12); Hoffman (Diss. de saliv. et op. morb. 5); Zacutus Lusitanus (Prax. adm. iii, 84, 89.)

SECT. XXVI.—ON POISONS.

Having given a compendious account of venomous animals, we shall next treat of deleterious substances, giving an exposition of the simple ones, and detailing the symptoms of them with their general and particular remedies. As to the compound ones we leave them to be treated of by any person who chooses; for some have described the compositions of certain deadly medicines which are more likely to prove injurious than beneficial to the reader. For neither are the exact symptoms which occurred in those who took them described, by which a suitable remedy might be found out; for the symptoms varying according to the nature of the prevailing ingredient, one might, from conjecture, vary the remedies accordingly. Wherefore here again we must begin with the prophylactics.

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COMMENTARY. We now enter upon the consideration of the second and most important division of toxicology; namely, alexipharmics, which treats of poisonous substances taken inwardly. All the writers on theriacs treat also of alexipharmics, and of these the most ancient, and one of the most interesting, is the Colophonian poet Nicander. Of the subsequent authors, Dioscorides and Aëtius among the Greeks, and Avicenna and Alsaharavius among the Arabians, are most particularly deserving of notice.

SECT. XXVII.—ON THE PRESERVATIVES FROM POISONS.

Of the doctrine of poisonous substances, the most difficult part is the prophylactic; because those who administer poisons in a concealed manner, prepare them so as to deceive the most skilful. Thus they take away the bitterness of deleterious substances by mixing them with sweet things, and the fetid smell by a mixture with aromatics. Sometimes in diseases, while appearing to administer such things as wormwood, southernwood, opoponax, and castor, for a beneficial purpose, they mix poisons with them; or they give them in the food, namely, in the harder and more complex articles, mixing the poisons with them. Wherefore a person who entertains suspicions, ought to avoid all prepared dishes and every intense quality, such as sweetness, saltness, and acidity; and in particular to take plenty of water, for when the appetite is satiated, the particular qualities are afterwards easily detected. There is likewise another efficacious mode of prophylaxis: for they who suspect anything of this kind should take such things as will blunt and take away the effect of the poisons, as dried grapes with walnuts, rue, a lump of salt, and citrons. Let them also take rape-seed to the amount of a drachm in wine, or the leaves of calamint, or Lemnian earth, and twenty leaves of rue, and they will not be hurt by any poison. And certain antidotes taken with wine every day to the amount of an Egyptian bean will protect completely, such as the one from skink, that from blood, and the Mithridate, which king Mithridates took every day as a preservative from deadly poison; and being captured by the Romans, he drank twice of a deadly poison, and not being able to despatch himself thereby, he killed himself with his sword. And since people are sometimes exposed to deleterious things accidentally in desert places without design, if they happen to take up their abode under certain trees, such as pines or firs, they ought to be on their guard against deadly animals, which fall from them and the roofs of houses, and keep the vessels in which their wine is contained, and in which they boil victuals, well covered up, as has been stated when treating of the preservatives from venomous animals.

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COMMENTARY. Nearly the whole contents of this section are taken from Dioscorides. (Præf.)

The account of the treatment given by Aëtius is somewhat fuller than our author’s, but not materially different.

Avicenna makes mention of the same medicines as Dioscorides, and says nothing of any other remedies.

Of the substances mentioned by our author, and the others as preservatives from poisons, some are demulcents, and may be supposed to act by obtunding the acrimony of poisons, such as figs, walnuts, and rape-seed; some are simple absorbents, such as Lemnian earth, which probably resembled red ochre, and was also emetic: some are stimulants, such as rue, calamint, and wine; and some are refrigerant acids, such as citrons, which may be supposed to act as analeptics and restoratives. Virgil mentions this property of the citron:

“Media fert tristes succos tardumque saporem Felicis mali: quo non præsentius ullum, Pocula si quando sævæ infecere novercæ Miscueruntque herbas, et non innoxia verba, Auxilium venit, ac membris agit atra venena.”

Georg. ii.

See in particular Simeon Seth (in voce Κιτρὰ); and Athen. (Deip. ii.) Dr. Paris states that when a narcotic poison has been ejected from the stomach, citrons or any fruit containing a vegetable acid will produce the best effects. (See Pharmacologia i, 254.)

SECT. XXVIII.—THE GENERAL TREATMENT OF THOSE WHO HAVE TAKEN ANY SORT OF DELETERIOUS SUBSTANCE.

If any persons have already taken some deadly poison with the intention of despatching themselves, such as often happens in life, or from the wicked design of others, if it be obvious to us what substance has been taken, we can straightway apply the suitable remedy, as will be described in the account of them. But if the medicine is unknown to us, we must have recourse immediately to such things as are generally applicable to those who have taken any poison whatever; for to wait until the consequent symptoms have come on, is to render the case hopeless, since owing to the remedies being too long of being applied such symptoms can hardly be removed: wherefore, without delay, we must give warm oil by itself or with water, and force them to vomit, or if oil is not at hand, butter with hot water may be given, or a decoction of mallows, or of linseed, or of spelt, or of fenugreek, or of nettle seed. For these things will not only evacuate by vomiting, but will loosen the belly and counteract the bad effects of the poisons, by blunting their acrimony; and more especially oil will do this, as you may ascertain clearly from the following consideration. For if you wish to produce ulceration of the skin by means of cantharides, quicklime, or some such acrid substance, and the body has been previously rubbed with oil, no ulcers will take place, and neither also can you astringe the body if previously rubbed with oil. Besides, vomiting is not only useful by evacuating the offending matter, but by showing the poison which had been taken from its smell, particles, or colour. For by its smell and bitterness poppy-juice is known; by their colour, ceruse and gypsum; by their coagula, milk and fresh blood; by their heavy smell and quality, the sea-hare and toad: so that by these means we are enabled to have recourse to the remedies which are suitable to each. With the oil may be mixed the decoction of mallows, or the grease of geese, or broth prepared from fat flesh or fowls, or the cinders of wood. Natron also triturated with hydromel, much old wine, and those things which are prepared from fat or butter are efficacious. Having evacuated the contents of the stomach by emetics, we must bring away whatever had passed into the intestines by a stimulant clyster. After these things, we are to give milk to drink, for whatever is noxious and deleterious will be readily changed by it. We must also give those medicines which are generally applicable to all such cases, among which are the Lemnian vermilion, southernwood, agaric, hedge-mustard, the root of eryngo, the seed of parsnip or of calamint, the Celtic nard, castor, the inner part of green fennel-giant, the flowers of nerium (called also rhododendron and rhododaphon), the juice of leeks, laserwort or the juice thereof, sagapene, opoponax, the juice and root of hog’s fennel, the long birthwort, the seed of wild rue, the leaves of that species of cestrum, called betony; of each of these a drachm may be taken in wine. The decoction of poley and liquid pitch in a linctus is also efficacious, and the aforesaid antidotes are excellent remedies, especially the theriac from vipers. But they have not the same power when taken after as before the poisonous substances, for a dose which would have been sufficient, if administered beforehand, to prevent any bad consequences, must be given in a fourfold or fivefold quantity, in order to prove effectual when administered afterwards, and that too not once, but twice a day. For such is the opinion of the celebrated Galen.

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COMMENTARY. Except the last two sentences the whole of this section is copied from Dioscorides. Celsus’ directions, so far as they go, are excellent: “Commodissimum est tamen, ubi primum sensit aliquis, protinus oleo multo epoto vomere: deinde, ubi præcordia exhausit, bibere antidotum; si id non est, vel merum vinum.” The directions given by Aëtius are to the same purpose as our author’s, but somewhat fuller. He is particularly to be commended for the precision with which he lays down the rules of treatment, when any organ happens to be affected in an especial manner. Thus, if the poison attack the bladder, he directs us to put the patient into a hip-bath of oil or water, in which fenugreek, linseed, mallows, or some such emollient herbs have been, boiled and to give him to drink the decoction of some vegetable diuretic, such as parsley, fennel, or spikenard. If the bladder be corroded he directs us to give the seed of cucumber in diluted sweet wine. In the same manner when the intestines are corroded the same seed is to be given, and all heating articles are to be abstained from. When the poison is determined to the skin, he recommends the hip-bath of oil or water, friction with warm oil, and the like, evidently with the intention of evacuating it from the pores of the skin. Food of easy digestion, soups with honey, tender fishes, and the like are to be given. When the head is particularly affected he directs us to evacuate the bowels with a clyster of linseed, marshmallows, and a decoction of the root of the wild cucumber, after which sternutatories and odoriferous things are to be applied to the nose. Like our author, he strongly commends Lemnian earth with wine as an excellent and speedy emetic. This remedy is also mentioned by Avicenna. Galen assures us that he found it an excellent emetic in various cases of poisoning. (Simpl. ix.) It consists principally of silica, alumina, and oxyde of iron.

Avicenna directs us to give immediately as an emetic, oil of sesame or olive oil, impregnated if possible with the virtues of dill, and afterwards to use demulcents, such as the decoction of linseed, melted butter and milk. These emetics are to be followed by clysters, provided the mischief has spread downwards. If the disorder continue, another emetic is to be given, and draughts of milk repeated. When, after the emetic, inflammation supervenes, he directs us to give snow-water, or oil of roses, and to promote vomiting with them. When the poison is ascertained to be of an inflammatory nature the parts affected are to be cooled with camphor, rose-water, or that of coriander; or these things are to be congealed in snow and applied over the vital organs. If the poison is ascertained to be of a sharp penetrating nature, medicines are to be given to blunt its acrimony, such as milk, almond oil, melted butter, &c. Bloodletting, if indicated, is to be performed. When the poison is known to be of a stupefying nature, garlic is to be given, or the theriac and assafœtida in undiluted wine. When it is particularly deleterious, the cure is to be effected by means of the mithridate, theriac, musk, and other aromatics. He inculcates the necessity of preventing sleep and of rousing by every possible means. The patient is to be covered with aromatic cloths, the pit of his stomach is to be rubbed, his face is to be fanned, his hair pulled, and in short, everything is to be done to prevent him from sinking into a state of stupor.

Haly Abbas recommends the same plan of treatment. When the poison is discharged he recommends citrons, plums, and the like, as restoratives. Rhases gives the following directions: First, he says, produce vomiting with oil and water; then give food of a nauseating nature to continue this operation; if the bowels are inflamed give snow-water and rose-oil, and afterwards provoke vomiting once more: administer the theriac, rub the hands and feet, and when the poison appears to have descended to the intestines give clysters. (Contin. l. c.) Rhases and other of the Arabian authorities recommend the bezoar stone as an antidote for poisons.

SECT. XXIX.—A CATALOGUE OF SIMPLE DELETERIOUS SUBSTANCES.

Of deleterious substances, the following animals are destructive: cantharis, buprestis, salamander, pine-caterpillar, the sea-hare, the toad, the mute marsh frog, and leeches when swallowed; and, of seeds, the henbane, coriander, fleawort, hemlock, and gith; of juices, meconium, opocarpasum, thapsia, elaterium, and mandragora; of roots, chamæleon, wolfsbane, thapsia, ixia, hellebore, black agaric, ephemeron, which some call colchicum, because it grows in Colchis; of trees and potherbs, smilax, which some call thymium, but the Romans called taxus, the strychnus furiosa, which is called dorycnium, the Sardoan herb, which is a species of ranunculus, horned poppy, pharicum, toxicum, wild rue, and mushrooms; of animal productions, fresh bull’s blood, coagulated milk, Heraclean honey; of metals, gypsum, ceruse, lime, arsenic, sandarach, litharge, adarce, lead, and that which is called mercury; and of domestic articles, much wine taken at a draught after the bath, or must, or cold water in like manner.

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COMMENTARY. Nicander, in his Alexipharmics, treats of the following deleterious substances:—1, Aconitum, or wolfsbane; 2, Argenti spuma, or litharge; 3, Buprestis; 4, Cantharides; 5, Ceruse, or whitelead; 6, Conium, or hemlock; 7, Coriander; 8, Dorycnium (see below); 9, Ephemeron, or meadow saffron; 10, Fungi, or poisonous mushrooms; 11, Hirudines, or leeches; 12, Hyoscyamus, or henbane; 13, Ixias, probably a species of chamæleon; 14, Coagulated milk; 15, The sea-hare; 16, Papaver, or poppy; 17, Pharicum, probably a composition from agaric (see Schneider’s note); 18, the red toad and marsh frog; 19, the salamander; 20, Bulls’ blood; 21, Taxus, or the yew-tree; 22, Toxicum, not ascertained. See Avicenna.

The lists of poisonous substances treated of by Dioscorides, Aëtius, and Actuarius are nearly the same as our author’s. Those of Nonnus and Scribonius Largus are less numerous. The Arabians treat of several substances, the nature of which it is now difficult to determine. The catalogues of Avicenna and Rhases are the fullest; those of Haly Abbas and Alsaharavius scarcely contain so many articles; all of them, however, contain several substances which are not treated of by the Greek writers on toxicology. Among these we may just mention that they treat of the gall of the viper, of the leopard, of an animal called leunza (leæna?), of the shark, and also of the extremity of the stag’s tail, and bad castor. The sweat of different animals is also included in their lists.

SECT. XXX.—ON CANTHARIDES.

The most grievous symptoms follow the administration of cantharides, for almost from the mouth to the bladder the parts are tormented with a gnawing pain. The taste resembles pitch or cedar rosin, and the patients have inflammation of the right hypochondrium, with dysuria, and frequently they pass blood by urine, and sometimes it is discharged by the intestines, as in dysentery: they fall into deliquium animi, nausea, and vertigo, and at last they become delirious. The proper remedies are vomiting with water and oil, drinking milk, taking four drachms of Cimolian earth with honied water, pine kernels, the seeds of cucumber, fat beef soup, or soup of geese or of mutton; the flesh of fowls, lambs, sheep, or pigs, being tender and fat, when boiled with linseed; much must; dr. iv of the bark of rosemary; and after the food inject by clyster the juice of rice, or of chondrus, or of spelt, or of ptisan, or of mallows, or of linseed, or of marshmallows, or of fenugreek. And sometimes having cleared out the intestine with honied water and nitre, we may then inject these things, and afterwards allay the inflammation with cataplasms of linseed and barley; for at first these things are pernicious. Then we may have recourse to baths of sweet water, and give the ointments of iris and of roses in a draught.

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COMMENTARY. The symptoms occasioned by taking cantharides, according to Nicander, are erosion of the whole intestinal canal, ulceration of the bladder, affection of the chest, and wild delirium. His remedies are emetics, such as fat, the oil of iris with rue, or Samian aster, laxatives, milk in clysters or taken by the mouth, and the decoction of vine-shoots with honey. Dioscorides describes the symptoms in the same terms as our author, and like him recommends emetics of oil and emollient clysters, such as the decoction of linseed or of mallows. Like our author, he disapproves of warm applications, such as cataplasms and the hot bath at the commencement, because by their heat they promote the distribution of the poison over the system; but after a time they are useful, he says, by allaying the pains and promoting the discharge of the poison by the cutaneous perspiration. His other remedies being the same as our author’s, we need not enumerate them. Galen states that the wings and feet of cantharides prove useful for removing the deleterious effects occasioned by taking their bodies. His treatment otherwise, which is borrowed from Asclepiades, is very similar to that of Dioscorides. He in particular recommends the Lemnian earth, or terra sigillata, as an emetic in this case. (De simpl. ix.) He also speaks favorably of milk. (Ib. and de antidot. ii.) He approves very much of animal and vegetable oils given in sweet wine or tepid water to produce vomiting. Galen states decidedly that the viscus upon which the action of cantharides is exerted is the bladder. (Ad Pison.) The treatment recommended by Scribonius Largus is little different. Aëtius, Oribasius, and Actuarius only copy from Dioscorides, without suggesting any improvement. Avicenna and Rhases mention that cantharides occasion inflammation of the penis and erections. They agree with the Greeks in recommending oily emetics, clysters of the same, and, what we believe is an improvement which we owe to the Arabians, injections of rose-oil into the bladder by means of a waxen tube (flexible catheter). Rhases approves of bleeding, provided it be long since the patient was bled, and violent pain be felt in the region of the thighs, that is to say, if the urinary organs are much affected. Haly Abbas mentions ardor urinæ, strangury, and bloody urine among the symptoms, and recommends oil by the mouth as an emetic and purgative, and by injection. Alsaharavius mentions swelling of the penis, bloody urine, and suppression thereof, and remarks that the same effects have been sometimes brought on by the external application of cantharides, in which case he recommends the tepid bath and emollient fomentations. His treatment is like that of his other countrymen; for example, he joins them in approving of injecting rose-oil into the bladder.

It would appear that cantharides were sometimes used by the ancients for the purpose of committing suicide. According to Cicero, it was by this means that C. Carbo destroyed himself. (Ad Familiar, ix, 21.)

Ambrose Paré, Matthiolus, and all the earlier modern writers on toxicology, follow the treatment laid down by the ancients. Notwithstanding the concurrent testimonies of all these authorities, Professor Orfila, in the last edition of his ‘Toxicologie,’ and Dr. Christison, in his late work on ‘Poisons,’ affirm “that oil is the reverse of an antidote.” Yet, in a case lately published, the free administration of olive-oil was followed by copious discharges, both upwards and downwards, of cantharides mixed with the oil. (Edinb. Med. and Surg. Journ. No. 104, p. 214.) And surely, if laxatives are to be administered at all, oily ones are to be preferred, as producing least irritation, and not being likely to be absorbed.

It can scarcely admit of dispute, that the mylabris cichorei is the same as the ancient cantharis. It is still used in Turkey and India for the composition of blistering plasters, being possessed of much the same properties as the Spanish fly.

SECT. XXXI.—ON THE BUPRESTIS.

Those who have drunk of the buprestis experience a taste resembling fetid natron, which is followed by violent pain of the stomach and bowels; there is swelling of the abdomen, resembling dropsy, and the skin of the whole body is distended, the urine also being suppressed. They are relieved by the same remedies as are given to those who have taken cantharides; but they derive benefit in particular after evacuations by vomiting and by the bowels, from taking dried figs, and drinking the decoction of them with wine or milk, or a mixture of wine and honey, and they may eat all kinds of pears, and take a woman’s milk. When the violence of the disease has subsided they may eat with advantage Theban palm-nuts boiled in wine.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. Isidorus says of the buprestis, “animal est in Italiâ parvum, simillimum scarabæo longipedi.” (Orig. xii, 8.) See also Ælian (H. A. vi, 35); Pliny (H. N. xxx. 10.) The symptoms and treatment, as described by the other authorities, are nearly the same as in our author’s description.

Among the remedies recommended by Nicander, the most efficacious are milk and emetics of tepid oil. (Alex. 360.) The Arabians do not treat of this article separately from cantharides, unless it be the stuphe of Alsaharavius. (Pract. xxx, 2, 8.)

We can have no hesitation in holding that the buprestis of the ancients was the lytta vesicatoria, or Spanish fly. See Sprengel (Comment. in Dioscor.) and Schneider (ad Nicand.)

SECT. XXXII.—ON THE SALAMANDER.

When a person has taken of salamander, inflammation of the tongue supervenes, with difficulty of speech, trembling, torpor, and ulceration. Certain parts of the body all around become livid, so that often, if the medicine remain, they mortify and drop off. In this case we should do the same things as for cantharides; but more particularly we must administer to them pine-rosin, or that of the pitch tree, or galbanum with honey, or pine-kernels with a decoction of ground-pine, or nettle-leaves boiled along with lilies in oil, the boiled eggs of land or sea tortoise, soup of frogs, having the root of eryngo boiled with them.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. The principal symptoms, as detailed by Nicander, are inflammation of the tongue, torpor, tremblings, aberration of mind, vibices, &c. He treats it like narcotic poisons, with stimulants and attenuants, such as pine-rosin, the leaves of ground-pine, nettle-seed mixed with the flour of tares, &c. Dioscorides, Avicenna, and most of the authorities direct us to treat this case of poisoning like that of cantharides; Alsaharavius recommends emetics, draughts containing pine-seed, honey, vinegar, wine, &c., with fat flesh. Oil and milk are recommended by most of the authorities.

Avicenna says the salamander is a species of lizard. Aristotle mentions the fabulous story of its being proof against fire as a circumstance which was related. Pliny (H. N. x, 67), Ælian (H. A. ii, 31), and Phile (c. 17) repeat it confidently. On the other hand, Dioscorides affirms that the story is entirely without foundation (ii, 56.)

It is the salamandra terrestris. Sprengel says it emits a cold mucus, which may extinguish a small lire. (Notæ in Dios. l. c.)

SECT. XXXIII.—ON THE PITYOCAMPA, OR PINE-CATERPILLAR.

When pine-caterpillar is drunk, there is straightway pain of the mouth and palate, strong inflammation of the tongue, pain of the stomach and intestines, with a prurient sensation of tension; and there is a fiery heat of the whole body, and anxiety. Such cases are to be relieved in like manner as those who have drunk cantharides; but in their case, instead of plain oil we may substitute the ointment of apples.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. Our author, and indeed all the others, only copy from Dioscorides.

Sprengel mentions several species of erucæ which infest pine-trees, such as the leparis monacha, lasiocampa pini, &c. (Notæ in Dioscor.) Virey remarks, that among the Romans there was an express law forbidding the administration of the hairy caterpillar of the pine, as it produces the most serious symptoms, and even loss of life, by its hairs. (Hist. des Mœurs des Anim.)

SECT. XXXIV.—ON THE SEA-HARE.

When the sea-hare has been drunk an ill-savoured taste, like that of a fetid fish, supervenes, and after a time the bowels are pained and the urine becomes obstructed, or if any is discharged it is of a purple colour. They loathe and detest all kinds of fishes, and have fetid perspirations mixed with blood. We must give them therefore asses’ milk or must frequently, or a decoction of the root and leaves of mallows, or the root of hogs-fennel triturated with wine, or dr. j. of black hellebore, or of the juice of scammony in honied water, and the warm blood of a newly-killed goose, and river-crabs alone, if they can be borne, may be given. It is a symptom of recovery when they can eat fish.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. Nicander’s description of the symptoms is like our author’s, and his remedies are hellebore, and scammony, asses’ milk, &c. Haly Abbas recommends only emetics at first, and afterwards milk. When there is continued oppression of breathing he directs us to bleed and give the syrup of poppies. (Pract. iv. 49.) Alsaharavius, like Nicander, depends principally upon drastic purgatives, such as scammony and hellebore. (See also Nonnus, 279.) Galen says it produces ulceration of the lungs. (See Ther. ad Pison. and de Med. sec. gen. i.) For an account of the lepus marinus, see Ælian (H. A. ii, 45; ix, 51; xvi, 19); Pliny (H. N. ix, 48; xxxii, 1); Dioscorides (ii, 20; vi, 34,); Philostratus (vi, 32); Phile (93). According to Schneider, it is called chat marin in France. Gorræus says it is a species of lizard, and resembles the land hare only in colour. Sprengel inclines to think that it is the aplysia depilans. See also Paris and Fonblanque (Méd. Jurisprud. ii, 141.) Rondelet refers it to the class mollusca, and gives a drawing of it. (De Piscibus, xvii.) Bellonius and Gesner give the same account of it, and all agree respecting its poisonous qualities. They describe it as being a mass of nearly unorganized flesh. Virey says it has long appendages like the ears of the hare, but which are its eyes.

SECT. XXXV.—ON THE RED TOAD OR MARSH FROG.

When the red toad or marsh frog is taken, it brings on swelling of the body, with intense paleness resembling the colour of the box-tree; and dyspnœa supervenes with fœtor of the mouth, hiccough, and sometimes an involuntary emission of semen. They are easily remedied, however, after vomiting, by taking a large draught of undiluted wine, and two drachms of the root of sweet cane, or the same dose of cyperus. We must also compel them to exercise themselves strenuously in walking and running, on account of the torpor which is upon them; and they ought to take the bath every day.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. Nicander says the bufo apricans superinduces upon the body difficulty of breathing, fetid breath, and colour like that of the thapsus; he means probably jaundice. His remedies are, the flesh of frogs boiled or roasted, pitch mixed with sweet wine and the spleen of a marsh frog. Pliny says a decoction of marsh frogs in vinegar is an effectual remedy in this case and against salamanders. (H.N. xxxii, 5.) Dioscorides recommends emetics, wine, and active exercise. Avicenna, Rhases, and Haly Abbas recommend nearly the same treatment. Haly approves of friction, especially over the stomach. (Pract. iv. 49.) See a learned dissertation on the Poisonous Ranæ in Schneider’s Notes on Nicander (Alexipharm.); see also Gorræus’ Commentary on the same. Schneider inclines to think that it must have been the bufo cornutus.

Ælian states that when the blood of the phrynus is given with wine, it proves a very fatal poison. (H. A. xvii, 12.) It would appear from two passages in the Satires of Juvenal that in his time criminal acts of poisoning were generally performed by means of this substance. (See Sat. i, 510, and vi, 659.) Paris and Fonblanque, however, deny that any species of toad is poisonous. See also Pennant, (B. Z. iii, 17.) He calls the Rana rubeta the natter-jack.

SECT. XXXVI.—ON LEECHES.

If leeches have been swallowed with water, and have stuck to a part in deglutition, you may ascertain that this has happened from the mouth of the stomach being, as it were, sucked and bitten, which is a symptom of the leeches having been swallowed. Sometimes florid blood is spit up by hawking when the leeches have fixed to the windpipe. They may be rejected by swallowing brine, or the leaves of beet with vinegar, or by drinking snow with oxycrate. Let gargles of nitre (soda) with water be used, and of copperas with vinegar. When they have stuck to the throat, put the patient into a warm hip-bath and give him cold water to hold in his mouth, and they will readily come to the cold. Some give bugs to those who have swallowed leeches. I, says Galen, by using garlic in such cases, have not stood in need of bugs.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. Nicander judiciously recommends when leeches have been swallowed to drink vinegar, to take ice or snow, sea-water, fossil salt (sal gemmæ?), or salt prepared from sea-water. Dioscorides treats the case like our author. Celsus merely says, “acetum cum sale bibendum est.” Bugs are recommended by Anatolius. (Geopon. xiii 17.)

Aaron, one of the authorities quoted by Rhases, directs us to lay the patient in the sunshine and examine his throat carefully; and if the leech can be detected to extract it with a forceps. If this cannot be effected he recommends him to gargle the throat with some bitter decoction or to swallow the same, if the leech has descended to the stomach. He also directs him to hold snow in the mouth. (Contin. vii.)

Avicenna recommends nearly the same plan of treatment, and, like our author, mentions the following device in order to get a leech extracted that is fixed in the gullet. The patient is to go into a hot bath and hold cold water in his mouth, which will have the effect of attracting the leech towards it. (iii, 9, 5.)

When a leech has fastened in the throat of a beast of burden and cannot be got at by the hand, Columella directs hot oil to be poured in by means of a pipe, or if it has passed into the stomach, it is to be killed with hot vinegar. (vi, 18.) The vapour from pounded bugs was also a popular remedy in such cases. (Ibid. and Geopon. xiii, 17.)

SECT. XXXVII.—ON THE CHAMÆLEON.

When one has taken the black chamæleon intense gnawing and pain supervene, and tremors with disturbance of the whole body; then convulsions attack, with pituitous and frothy vomiting, and in some cases hiccough with loss of speech, and distortion of the countenance. A fatty decoction of wheat taken hot will be applicable in such cases, and a sweet watery wine also hot, vomits, drinking of milk, emollient clysters, and fomentations by cataplasms. To that kind which occasions suffocation and lividity, a draught of wormwood or of natron with oxymel or of radishes will be proper, and also fomentations to the hypochondrium.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. Dioscorides and Aëtius give a similar account of the treatment and symptoms. On the chamæleon, see Apuleius (de Herb. 109.) The black chamæleon treated of in this section is the carthamus corymbosus. It is quite a different plant from the white chamæleon which is treated of in the 46th section.

SECT. XXXVIII.—ON HENBANE.

Hyoscyamos when drunk or eaten brings on disorder of mind like that of persons in intoxication; but is easily cured, being remedied by copious draughts of honied water and milk, especially that of asses or, if not, of that of goats or cows, and of the decoction of dried figs. Pine kernels are also serviceable in such cases, and the seed of cucumber taken with must, and salt wine with fresh axunge and must, and nettle-seed in like manner, or natron with water will be proper, also succory, mustard, cresses, radishes, onions, and garlic, each of these being taken with wine. They must then be made to remain in a state of rest in order that, like those who have drunk wine, they may digest what they have taken.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. The description of the symptoms in Nicander’s Alexipharmics is imperfect owing to an hiatus in the text. His remedies are milk, fenugreek, nettle-seed, succory, cresses, mustard, the heads of garlic, &c.

This section is taken from Dioscorides. Celsus recommends hot water and milk, especially that of asses.

The description of the symptoms, as given by Aëtius, is somewhat fuller than our author’s, but not otherwise different. He and Scribonius Largus mention lividity of the members. Alsaharavius says, it induces sleep, stupor, and coldness of the extremities. Avicenna and Haly Abbas recommend the theriac and antidote of Mithridates. Rhases speaks highly of milk. (Contin. ult.)

The general remedies which they all recommend are emetics, vinegar, milk, sweet wine, and at last, vegetable stimulants, such as mustard and onions, and the theriac.

See an account of the different varieties of henbane known to the ancients in Dioscor. (iv, 64.); Galen (Med. Simpl. viii); Pliny (H. N. xxv, 4); and in Schulze (Toxicol. vet. 20.) See also the Seventh Book of this work.

The Arabians, in this place, treat of another narcotic to which they give the name of Derufitum or Darfion. See Avicenna (iv, 6, 1, 4); Rhases (xxxix.)

SECT. XXXIX.—ON CORIANDER.

Coriander from its smell cannot be mistaken. When drunk it renders the voice thick, and brings on madness like that from intoxication. Wherefore those who have taken it talk obscenely, and the smell of the coriander is perceptible from the whole body. They are relieved after the removal of the poison by common oil or that of iris (as mentioned above), by undiluted wine with wormwood and drank by itself; by eggs emptied into one vessel and triturated with brine and swallowed; and brine also may be drunk, and salt broth from a hen or a goose, and sweet wine taken with lye.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. According to Nicander, the symptoms are violent delirium, and great derangement of the mind, as in intoxication. His remedies are principally emetics and wine, the intention of giving which is quite obvious. Dioscorides gives nearly the same account of the symptoms and treatment. Galen (de Simp. Med. viii) attacks Dioscorides in the most unmeasured terms for saying that the action of coriander is frigorific, while, on the contrary, he maintains that it is calefacient. Avicenna combats the reasoning of Galen and agrees with Dioscorides; as do Apuleius among the Latins, and Alsaharavius and Rhases among the Arabians. Pseudo-Macer calls it a cold austere medicine.

With regard to the treatment, the Arabians recommend oily emetics, with soda, pepper, salt, strong wine, &c. Avicenna (iii, 6, 2, 8); Rhases (Cont. xxi); Alsaharavius (Pract. xxx. 2.)

Schulze is satisfied that the corion or coriandrum of the ancients was the same as our coriander. He appears, however, to have rather overrated its deleterious properties. It is only in particular states of the body that it proves at all injurious. (Toxicol. vet. vii.) Sprengel also is satisfied as to the identity of the ancient and modern coriander. (Comment. in Dios.)

SECT. XL.—ON PSYLLIUM OR FLEAWORT.

Fleawort when drunk occasions coldness of the whole body and torpor, with relaxation and lowness of spirits, which are relieved by the same remedies as those given to persons who have drunk coriander.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. All the authorities agree in representing its effects as being similar to those produced by coriander. They treat the case then upon general principles with wine, pepper, and other such stimulants.

Schulze finds some difficulty in acknowledging that the plantago psyllium, L. is the true psyllium of the ancients, and yet he admits that no other plant has so good a claim to be identified with it. We see no grounds for scepticism on this point.

SECT. XLI.—ON CONIUM OR HEMLOCK.

Hemlock, when drunk, brings on vertigo and dimness of vision, so that the person can no longer see even to a small distance; there is hiccough, disorder of the mind, and coldness of the extremities, and at last he is suffocated in convulsions, the breath in the arteria aspera being stopped. At first, therefore, as in other cases of poisoning, we must bring it up by vomiting, and afterwards, by means of an injection, evacuate whatever part had passed into the intestines; and then, as our great remedy, we have recourse to undiluted wine, giving it at intervals, during which we must administer the milk of cows or of asses, or wormwood with pepper, wine, and castor; and rue and mint, with wine, and a dram of cardamom or of storax; or of pepper, with nettle-seeds in wine; or the tender leaves of bay tree; and in like manner laserwort, or the juice thereof, with common wine or must; and sweet wine drunk alone answers well.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. Theophrastus seems to have been acquainted with the sedative properties of hemlock, for he recommends pepper and rosemary as antidotes to it. (H. P. ix, 24); and Athen. (Deip. ii, 73.) The operation of this poison in the case of Socrates is well described by Plato in his ‘Phædo.’ Socrates, after swallowing the poisoned cup, walked about for a short time as he was directed by the executioner: when he felt a sense of heaviness in his limbs he lay down on his back; his feet and legs first lost their sensibility, and became stiff and cold; and this state gradually extended upwards to the heart, when he died convulsed.

The symptoms, according to Nicander, are dimness of sight, vertigo, a sense of suffocation, coldness of the extremities, impeded respiration, and death. His remedies are emetics of oil, or undiluted wine, clysters of the same, and undiluted wine taken by the mouth, with pepper, nettle, assafœtida, and the like. Dioscorides, and all the other authorities, recommend much the same treatment. Pliny and Aëtius mention lividity, after death, as a symptom of poisoning by cicuta.

Theophrastus (H. P. vi, 2) and Pliny (H. N. xxv, 95) have described the conium. Schulze is satisfied that it is the conium maculatum, L., and in this opinion we fully agree with him. He adds, that the ancients have made no mention of the cicuta virosa.

Dioscorides and most of the others enumerate convulsions among the symptoms. It will be remarked, that in the abstract given above of the symptoms of poisoning by hemlock in the case of Socrates, we have stated that the great philosopher died convulsed. This we think the true interpretation of the term used by Plato (ἐκινήθη), although it has not been so understood by most of his interpreters. Dioscorides, in another place, states somnolency, coma, stertor, lividity, torpor, coldness, stupor, insensibility, and pruritus of the whole body, as the common symptoms of poisoning by opium, mandragora, or conium.

Schulze ranks, among ancient mistakes, the assertion of Galen, that narcotic substances may, in some instances, become digested and prove nutritive. But Dr. Christison says, that both vegetable and animal poisons may become digested, of which he gives an interesting example with regard to opium (On Poisons, p. 52.)

SECT. XLII.—ON THE JUICE OF THE POPPY.

When one has drunk of the juice of the poppy drowsiness comes on, with coldness and intense itching, so that often when the medicine takes effect such an itching comes on that the person is roused from sleep thereby. The smell of the medicine too is emitted from the whole body. The remedies in such cases, after rejecting the substance taken by vomiting with oil, and evacuating downwards by a stimulant clyster, are oxymel drank with salts, or honey with warm rose-oil, and much undiluted wine with wormwood and cinnamon, and warm vinegar by itself, and natron with water, and marjoram with lye, the seed of rue and pepper given with castor, and oxymel, savory, or the decoction of marjoram with wine. We must also rouse by aromatics, put the person into a hot bath, and foment on account of the pruritus which supervenes; and after the bath we may use fat broths, with wine or must. Marrow also drunk with oil is useful.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. According to Nicander, the symptoms of poisoning by poppy-juice are coldness of the extremities, eyes fixed, heaviness of the eyelids, profuse and fetid perspiration, paleness, swelling of the lip, relaxation of the under jaw, slow respiration, cold breath, and the usual precursors of dissolution, namely, distortion of the nostrils, lividity of the nails, and hollow eyes. His remedies are emetics, such as the oil of iris or of roses, wine and honey; hot drink and rousing the patient by cries, striking his body in different places, and wrapping it in cloths smeared with oil and hot wine, and the hot bath as a restorative.

The symptoms mentioned by Dioscorides are lethargy, violent pruritus, and the perspiration smelling of opium. His remedies are the same as those of our author, namely, emetics at first, then clysters, and afterwards wine and vinegar, with various stimulant and strong-scented things; such as pepper, cinnamon, castor, marjoram, &c. The patient is to be roused as directed by Nicander; and baths and fomentations are to be used to relieve the pruritus.

Galen relates the case of a person reduced to the last stage of coldness, whom he saved by administering freely a strong, light-coloured, and fragrant wine. Yet, he remarks correctly, a small quantity of weak wine operates unfavorably by promoting the distribution of the poison over the system. He, in particular, recommends vomiting at first with wine and oil, and afterwards strong clysters.

Aëtius mentions, among the symptoms, violent pruritus and convulsions. None of the other Greek writers mention convulsions, but, among the Arabians, Avicenna, Rhases, and Alsaharavius, have mentioned them. Modern experience has determined that they are an occasional, but not a frequent symptom produced by the immoderate administration of opium.

Scribonius Largus directs us, after repeated vomiting, to apply embrocations of vinegar and roses to the head, to rub the feet, and to put sinapisms to them and the thighs. Simeon Seth strongly recommends vinegar.

Haly Abbas and Alsaharavius, and, in short, all the Arabians recommend nearly the same treatment; namely, emetics of oil and water, or oil and wine, hot clysters, acrid and strong-scented things, such as castor, assafœtida, savin, &c., and the warm bath, friction, sternutatories, and every means calculated to arouse, and to prevent sleep.

Serapion, Rhases, Avicenna, Haly Abbas, and Alsaharavius, agree in stating that the smallest dose of opium which will prove destructive to human life is two drachms. Modern authors are not agreed as to the smallest quantity which may prove fatal, but surely, as Dr. Christison remarks, Dr. Paris has fixed the minimum dose too low, when he affirms that four grains may be sufficient to produce this effect. On the other hand, we should think that a smaller dose than that mentioned by the Arabians might be sufficient to destroy life. Perhaps the ancient opium may have been weaker than that now in use.

It is worthy of remark, that most of the ancient authorities recommend vinegar in cases of poisoning by opium, but we are inclined to think that none of them administered it at the commencement, nor until the poison had been removed from the bowels. This practice agrees very well with the rule of treatment laid down by Orfila, Paris, and Christison, who state that vinegar is prejudicial, if given at first, by favouring the solution of the poison, but proves useful afterwards by acting as a restorative to the system.

None of the ancient authorities recommend venesection.

In another work we have thus explained the ancient theory of the action of opium upon the human frame. “In order to understand properly the ideas entertained by the ancients respecting the modus operandi of opium, it will be necessary to say a few words in explanation of their opinions upon certain points of physiology. Aristotle taught that the prime cause of all the operations of life is mind, and that the prime instrument by which it performs them is heat, which, therefore, he denominates the co-cause (συνάιτιον). He illustrates his meaning by comparing the mind to the artificer, and heat to the wimble or saw by which he performs his work. Having remarked, no doubt, that the heart is the warmest part of the body, he appears to have considered it as the spring which turns the whole machinery of the animal frame, the brain and nerves deriving their origin and influence from it. (I need scarcely mention how well these ideas accord with the ingenious hypothesis lately advanced by M. Serres.) Many facts, indeed, seem to point out the supreme importance of the heart. It is, as the ancients remarked, the primum movens et ultimum moriens; and, along with its accessory organ, the lungs, it is evidently the part which, in the higher classes of animals, renders them independent of the many variations of heat and cold to which they are subjected. It is this wonderful organ which, under the guidance of the principle of life, preserves the heat of the body unaltered in all the different gradations of temperature, from more than 100 degrees above the boiling, to as many below the freezing point of the thermometer. It seems, in fact, a real Prometheus that steals the fire from heaven. The connexion between heat and the vital actions is very apparent also in the inferior animals, who are not provided with such an apparatus for preserving an equability of temperature. Thus the zoophyta, insecta, et vermes, with the loss of heat, lose also sensibility and muscular energy, which they recover again when their heat is restored. In this case it is evident that heat is the cause (or at least the co-cause) of the vital actions, and not the vital actions of heat. It has always appeared to me a striking fact, illustrative of the great influence of heat over the vital actions, that the strength of all animals is, bulk to bulk, proportionate to the degree of their animal heat.

“This doctrine of the supreme authority of the heart, as being the focus of heat, thus maintained by Aristotle, was eagerly defended by the great Arabian commentator, Averrhoes, and by his countryman, Avenzoar, who keenly attacked Galen for having questioned its truth, and taught, as they represent, that the brain is the leading organ in the animal frame. After having, however, carefully ransacked every part of Galen’s works, in which I could suppose it likely to meet with any allusion to this doctrine, I am led to believe that these Arabians, in the heat of controversy, have misrepresented the real opinion of their master’s rival. Galen appears decidedly to have maintained with Hippocrates—‘that there is in the body no one beginning, but that all parts are alike, beginning and end: for a circle has no beginning.’ Agreeably to this idea, Galen remarks, that the brain cannot properly be said to derive its powers from the heart, since an animal will run, breathe, and cry after its heart has been taken out; nor can the heart be said properly to derive its powers from the brain, since it will palpitate and contract, after all communication with the brain is cut off, nay, after it has been removed from the body. In so far, then, the functions of the brain and the heart are independent of one another. But the brain is dependent upon the heart and its appendages for vital heat, without which it would be unable to continue its functions; and the heart, on the other hand, is dependent upon the brain for imparting nervous influence to the respiratory organs, without which it could not preserve its vital heat unaltered. Hence the mutual connexion and sympathy of important organs—a doctrine much insisted upon by ancient authors, and which bears some resemblance to the theory lately advanced by Mr. Morgan and Dr. Addison.

“We shall now have no difficulty in understanding the ideas of the ancients regarding the operation of opium. Galen and Avicenna believed that the poison exerts its primary influence upon the heart, and impairs its vital heat. Of course they considered its operation on the brain as secondary. They called the action of narcotics frigorific or congealing, no doubt because they remarked that it was attended with a diminution of vital heat, and to this they attributed the loss of sensibility and muscular energy. I leave it to the reader to judge whether this theory or the modification of it lately proposed by Messrs. Morgan and Addison be the more plausible.” (Edinburgh Medical and Surgical Journal, No. 103.)

But although the ancient physiologists maintained that the prime organs of the animal frame suffer sympathetically in cases of poisoning, they did not hold, it will be remarked, that all poisons exert their primary action on the nervous system. This is the hypothesis lately advocated by Messrs. Morgan and Addison, but which is, in fact, only a revival of that maintained by Schulze in his ‘Toxicologia Veterum.’ He thus states his theory of the action of poisons,—“Omnia symptomata et lethales venenorum effectus hoc unum quam luculentissimè demonstrant, ab omnibus venenis nervos ipsos graviter affligi. Nervea igitur vis seu vitalis, a veneni stimulis commota, aut majori impetu agit, aut prævalente veneni vehementia prorsus silet, nexusque omnes sensorii communis cum reliquis nervis turbantur, vitâ animali aut graviter periclitante, aut prorsus interiturâ.” (Toxic. Vet. vii.) Dr. Mead also, in his last edition of his work on Poisons, advocates this hypothesis.

It appears to us, however, that this theory, although very simple and plausible, is somewhat too exclusive. And that there are other modes by which poisons operate than through the brain and nerves appears to be demonstrated by the fact now clearly established, that poisons act upon vegetables as well as upon animals. (V. Annales de Chimie, t. xxix.) Now as vegetables are possessed of neither sensibility nor motion, it seems preposterous to suppose that they have any nervous system.

Perhaps, then, we cannot do better than revert to the old doctrine delivered by Alsaharavius. Sometimes, he says, poisons act upon the heart, and thereby prove instantly fatal; sometimes upon the liver, producing jaundice and phthisis; sometimes upon the brain, when they occasion delirium; and sometimes their action is local, giving rise to corruption and lividity of the part. (Pract. xxx. 2, 18.)

That the primary action of narcotics is upon the heart appears to us, upon the whole, the most probable theory hitherto advanced upon the subject.

SECT. XLIII—ON THE JUICE OF THE CARPESIA.

When the juice of carpesia is drunk it brings on heavy sleep and acute suffocation. These are relieved by the same remedies as those given to persons who have drunk hemlock.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. This section is taken, almost word for word, from Dioscorides. Matthiolus confesses that he was quite unable to determine what substance it was. (Comment. in Dioscor. vi, 13.) It is doubtful whether the καρπήσιον of Galen and the κάρπασον of Dioscorides be the same substance, and whether either be the same as the ὀποκάρπασον. Sprengel can arrive at no certain conclusion respecting it. Valerius Cordus supposed it to be the piper longum.

SECT. XLIV.—ON MANDRAGORA OR MANDRAKE.

When mandragora has been drunk, stupor immediately comes on, with loss of strength, and a strong inclination to sleep, so that the affection differs in nothing from that which is called lethargy. Before any of these symptoms come on, vomiting will be proper in this case; and afterwards honied water, or natron and wormwood with must, or taken in a dulcified wine, embrocations to the head with rose-oil and vinegar, rousing by shaking the body, and by strong-smelling things, pepper, mustard, castor, and rue pounded with vinegar, liquid pitch, and the wicks of lamps lighted and extinguished, will be proper. When they are difficult to rouse we may also apply sternutatories, and have recourse to the general remedies in such cases.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. Our author, as usual, follows Dioscorides. Matthiolus, by the way, in his commentary, questions the propriety of applying rose-oil and vinegar to the head, as these things are of a cold nature, whereas stimulants and calefacients are indicated. Perhaps these things, when poured from a height upon the head, might prove restorative and stimulant. The other Greek authorities however, as, for example, Aëtius and Actuarius, approve of the practice. Alsaharavius recommends emetics, and also directs us to pour vinegar and rose-oil on the head, and to take vinegar in which hyssop and the like have been boiled.

Rhases recommends vomiting by means of water, honey, and fossil salt; after which sweet wine is to be given, and vinegar and rose-oil poured upon the head; castor, pepper, and rue are to be administered, along with sternutatories. He mentions, however, that he knew an old medical man who cured a young woman, who had fallen into a state of syncope, with flushing of the face, after swallowing the apples of mandragora, by the affusion of snow-water on her head. Avicenna properly directs everything to be done to prevent sleep.

Schulze is satisfied that it is the atropa mandragora of Linnæus. There seems no doubt, however, that the mandragora of Theophrastus is the atropa belladonna; while the mandragora mas of Dioscorides is the mandragora vernalis, Bertol.; and the M. femina of the same, the mandragora autumnalis.

Theophrastus, Dioscorides, Galen, Athenæus, Aëtius, Suidas, Hesychius, Apuleius, Pollux, and Frontinus, have made mention of the hypnotic property of mandragora. It is singular that it should now have fallen into neglect. It appears to have been used as a medicine in the days of Shakespeare. Iago says:

“Not poppy nor mandragora Nor all the drowsy syrups of the world, Shall ever medicine thee to that sweet sleep Which thou owed’st yesterday.”

Othello.

We will have occasion to treat of it in the Seventh Book.

SECT. XLV.—ON ACONITUM OR WOLFSBANE.

Wolfsbane immediately after being drunk occasions a sensation of sweetness on the tongue, with a little astringency; vertigo supervenes, more especially when the person attempts to rise up, and it brings on a watering of the eyes; there is heaviness of the chest and abdomen, with eructation of much flatus. In these cases the medicine must be brought up by vomits, and the contents of the bowels evacuated by a clyster. We must also give draughts from marjoram and rue, or from horehound with wine, or from wormwood, or from rocket, or from southernwood, or mezereon, or ground-pine. Opobalsam, too, taken to the amount of one drachm, with wine, will likewise answer with them; also the rennet of a kid, or of a hare, or of a fawn, with vinegar, and the dross of iron, or iron itself, or gold, or silver, may be dissolved in wine, and the liquid taken, and lye with wine, and the broth of a boiled cock, or the broth of fat flesh taken with wine. The ground-pine, which is said to be a specific in Heraclea of Pontus, where wolfsbane grows, is called holocleron, but ionia in Athens, and sideritis in Eubœa.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. The symptoms, as described by Nicander, are astringency of the lips, palate, and gums, gnawing pains at the stomach, singultus, flatulence, running from the eyes, double vision, as from intoxication. His remedies seem to have been principally emetics and calefacients. Thus he recommends a handful of quicklime to be drunk with a hemina of wine, also southernwood, spurge, ground-pine, marjoram, opobalsam, the metallic preparations mentioned by our author, and the like. The accounts of the treatment given by Dioscorides, Aëtius, and Actuarius agree exactly with our author’s. Avicenna, Rhases, and Haly Abbas, in like manner, recommend emetics, clysters, and calefacient medicines internally.

Diogenes Laertius states, upon the authority of Eumelus the historian, that Aristotle the philosopher despatched himself with a draught of aconite. (Vita Aristot.) Pliny relates that this poison proves fatal when applied to the genital organs of women. (H. N. xxvii, 2.)

The ancients have described several varieties of aconite. See Theophrastus (H. P. ix, 19); Pliny (H. N. xxv, 75); Schulze (Toxicol, vet.); Schneider (in Nicand. Alexiphar.); and Sprengel (Rei. Herb. Hist.) These modern authors in general are disposed to think that it was the iris tuberosa. Sprengel, however, in the notes to his edition of Dioscorides, is decided that the second species of Dioscorides (Mat. Med. iv, 78) is the aconitum napellus; but respecting the first species, he is in great doubts. All agree that the aconitum of Theophrastus is different from the A. of Dioscorides and the other toxicologists. We may be permitted to add, that the symptoms of poisoning by aconitum, as given by Nicander, agree so well with those reported lately of cases of poisoning by the aconitum napellus, that we cannot doubt their identity.

SECT. XLVI.—ON IXIA.

Ixia, which is also called ulophonon, when drunk has some resemblance both in taste and smell to basil-royal. It brings on strong inflammation of the tongue, and disorder of the mind; it suppresses all the secretions, occasioning borborygmi and rumbling, with deliquium animi; but there are no alvine evacuations. After the greater part of the poison has been brought up by vomiting, or evacuated by the bowels, they will experience relief from drinking the decoction of wormwood, with much wine, vinegar, or oxymel, or the seed of wild rue, or the root of laserwort, and in the like manner the decoction of tragoriganum with some of the aforementioned, or with milk; or of turpentine, of nard, of castor, of laserwort, of each an obolus in wine. The fruit also of the walnut triturated with wine will be proper; or of rosin, of castor, and of rue, of each dr. j; and in like manner of mezereon, dr. ij; of the juice of thapsia, dr. ij, with honied water; and hot vinegar may be drunk by itself.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. Nicander’s description of the symptoms is very similar to that given by our author, and his treatment seems to have been conducted upon the same principles; namely, by administering emetics and purgatives at first, and, afterwards, discutient and detergent medicines, to overcome the viscid nature of the poison. Our author’s plan of treatment differs in no material respect from that recommended by Dioscorides, Aëtius, Actuarius, Avicenna, and Alsaharavius. Avicenna described it by the name of aldabach; Alsaharavius, by those of alfos, aldolia, i. e. arbor risi.

Apuleius make ixias, ulophonon, chamæleon, ocymoides, and various cardui synonymes (109.) The ixias, according to Gorræus, is a species of chamæleon, but what species cannot be determined. (See, also, Schneider’s note on Nicander.) Matthiolus calls it a glutinous substance, found in the root of the chamæleon, or carline thistle. Schulze is decided that it was a species of carlina (Toxicol. vet., 22.) See Harduin’s note on Pliny (H. N. xxii, 21.) After mature consideration, we have no difficulty in referring it to the carlina acaulis, or carline thistle.

SECT. XLVII.—ON EPHEMERON, OR MEADOW SAFFRON.

When one swallows ephemeron (which some call colchicum, because it grows in Colchis, or bulbus silvestris), pruritus takes place over the whole body, as if stung by nettle or squill; there is a gnawing pain within, and great heat of the stomach, with considerable heaviness; but when the affection gains strength, blood is discharged from the bowels, mixed with the scrapings thereof. The same remedies are to be applied as to those who have drunk salamander, in vomits and clysters. But before the medicine gain ground we must give a decoction of oak-leaves, or of acorns, or of the rind of pomegranate, or of wild thyme with milk, or the juice of bloodwort, or of vine-tops, or of brambles, or of the medulla of fennel-giant, or of myrtle berries, with wine; and when levigated myrtles themselves are pounded and macerated in water, the liquor thereof may be taken with advantage. And, in like manner, the middle pellicle of the chesnuts, called Sardian, may be taken with the aforesaid juices, and marjoram may be drunk with lye. Those affected are manifestly relieved by drinking hot cow’s milk, and retaining it in the mouth, so that they who have plenty of it do not stand in need of any other remedy.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. Our author’s detail of the symptoms is taken entirely from Nicander, and his treatment also is mostly derived from the same source. They seem to have depended principally upon vegetable astringents, such as oak-bark, pomegranate-rind, and chesnuts, for checking the hypercatharsis. Pliny, like our author, strongly commends milk (H. N. xxvii, 33.) Dioscorides recommends emetics, clysters, vegetable astringents, and demulcents. Alsaharavius says, that hermodactylus occasions pruritus of the whole body, swelling of the palate, pains of the stomach, and the like. He recommends emetics, clysters, cows’ milk, and vegetable astringents, such as acorns with wine. This, it will be remarked, is similar to the account which the Greeks give of the symptoms and treatment of ephemeron, which is undoubtedly the colchicum autumnale; and this circumstance tends strongly to prove the identity of the ephemeron and the hermodactylus. We agree with Schulze, Prosper Alpinus, and Humelbergius, that they were unquestionably the same plant, notwithstanding that Sprengel, Matthiolus, and Dr. Murray are of a different opinion. Dr. Paris considers that there is no doubt of their identity. (See a learned dissertation on the Ephemeron in a note by Schneider, on Nicander’s Alexipharmics.) We shall only further add, in this place, that the learned Ardoyn, in his elaborate work on Poisons, contends, that there is no doubt of the identity of the colchicum and the hermodactylus. We, in fact, are surprised that this should have been ever questioned.

SECT. XLVIII.—ON THE SMILAX OR YEW.

The tree called smilax is named thymium by some, and taxus by the Romans. When drunk it brings on coldness of the whole body, suffocation, and speedy death; the remedies for which are all those things which are given to those who have drunk of hemlock.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. The description of the symptoms and the plan of treatment are borrowed from Nicander, or, rather, copied direct from Dioscorides.

Different opinions have been entertained respecting the poisonous nature of the yew. Haller, Bulliard, and others, deny that it is poisonous; while Berkley, Ray, Matthiolus, and others, affirm that it is. Orfila holds it to be a narcotic poison (chap. iv, cl. 4.) We have known instances of its proving fatal to cattle. The newspapers lately contained a melancholy case of a boy poisoned by yew-berries at Winchester. Matthiolus is not pleased with Dioscorides for making it to be a frigorific medicine; but Orfila, it appears, gives it the same character; that is to say, he holds it to be narcotic. Virgil alludes to its poisonous qualities:

Sic tua Cyrnæas fugiant examina taxos.

See, also, Theophrastus (H. P. i, 5, and iii, 9); and Schulze (Tox. vet. 17).

SECT. XLIX.—ON THE STRYCHNOS FURIOSA, CALLED DORYCNIUM, BY SOME.

When one drinks of dorycnium, which some call strychnos furiosa, there follows a sensation, as it were, of milk to the taste; constant hiccough, watering of the tongue, and frequent ejection of blood; and there are mucous discharges by the bowels, as in dysenterical cases. They are to be remedied before any of these symptoms supervene, by those things which are taken for ephemeron, I mean emetics and clysters, and whatever else can evacuate the substance which had been taken. Honied water is a particularly good remedy; or the milk of asses or of goats and sweet wine, in a tepid state, may be drunk with a small quantity of anise. Bitter almonds also are proper, the boiled breasts of fowls, all the shell-fish eaten raw and boiled, crabs and crawfish, and the broth of them when drunk.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. Our author’s detail of symptoms is taken mostly from Nicander, or, perhaps, direct from Dioscorides. The poet’s plan of treatment seems to have been much the same as that of Paulus. He omits, indeed, to make mention of emetics and purgatives as being general remedies in all cases of poisoning; but he recommends milk, must, and the crustacea, such as the pinna, echinus, &c. The other authorities supply nothing additional. Avicenna treats of it under the name of uva vulpis stupefactiva mala; he copies from Dioscorides (iv, 6; i, 7.)

There is considerable difficulty about the nature of the dorycnium. Our author, Aëtius and Apuleius, make it to be the same as the strychnos furiosa, which is generally held to be either the solanum sodomeum, or the atropa belladonna. On this subject, see Galen (de Med. sec. loc. x, 3); Pliny (H. N. xxi, 105); Apuleius (de Herb., 22). Schulze affirms, that none of the ancient poisons is so little known as the dorycnium. He is undecided as to its nature, except that it belonged to the diadelphous or leguminous plants, and he is inclined to think that it was an astragalus. (Toxicol. Veterum, 2.) Sprengel inclines either to the convolvulus cneorus, L., or the con. dorycnium, L. But as far as we can see, the most probable conjecture that can be made regarding it is, that it was either the solanum sodomeum, or atropa belladonna.

SECT. L.—ON THE SARDONIAN HERB.

The herb called the Sardonian is a species of ranunculus, when drunk, or eaten, it brings on disorder of the intellect, and convulsions with contraction of the lips, so as to exhibit the appearance of laughter. From this affection that ill-omened expression, the Sardonian laugh, took its rise. In these cases, therefore, after vomiting, it will be proper to give honied water and milk, with embrocations and lubrications of the whole body, by calefacient remedies; and to have recourse to hot-baths of hot oil and water, and to anoint properly and rub them after the baths; and, upon the whole, to conduct the treatment as for convulsions.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. Dioscorides and our author are perfectly agreed as to the symptoms and treatment. Aëtius recommends, likewise, castor with sweet wine. Solinus, like our author, says that it brings on contractions of the muscles, and the risus Sardonicus. Avicenna acknowledges his ignorance of the nature and proper treatment of this herb, but supposes that it belongs to the class of acute poisons. There seems, however, no reason to doubt that it was a species of ranunculus. Schulze makes it the ranunculus sceleratus, L., which bears the English name of celery-leaved crowfoot; and we are clearly of the same opinion, although Avicenna seems to make a distinction between the Sardonian herb and the kebekengi, or apium risus, which is the βατράχιον of Dioscorides. See Alsaharavius (Pract. xxx, i, 39.)

SECT. LI.—ON THE HORNED POPPY.

Seeing that the species of poppy called the horned, when eaten or drunk, brings on the same symptoms as the juice of poppy, it is to be treated by the same remedies.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. Miller says that the glaucium is called horned poppy because it is a species of poppy having husks resembling horns. See some account of it in Apuleius (53.) Schulze remarks that Dioscorides has described several varieties of the poppy. 1, Papaver hortense; 2, P. opiiferum; 3, P. agreste; 4, P. rhæas; 5, P. ceratites sive corniculatum; 6, Hypecoum. The fifth of these, or horned poppy, is the glaucium luteum, Scop. Dioscorides gives a distinct description, but treats of it as a medicine rather than as a poison. (M. M. iv, 66.) None of the Arabians treat of it separate from opium.

SECT. LII.—ON PHARICUM.

The substance called pharicum in taste completely resembles nard, and when drunk it brings on paralysis, with disorder of the mind and convulsion. After evacuation by vomiting, we must give the patient to drink, along with wine, some wormwood, cinnamon, myrrh, or Celtic nard (which some call saliunca), or of spikenard, dr. ij, or two oboli of myrrh mixed with must or iris, and the flower of saffron with wine. The head is to be shaven, and a cataplasm consisting of barley-flour, with levigated rue and vinegar, is to be applied.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. Nicander, like our author, compares its taste to that of spikenard, and says that it proves fatal in one day, inducing delirium. He recommends the same internal medicines, and also makes mention of applying a stimulant cataplasm to the head, evidently with a view of relieving the phrenitis. The other authorities recommend similar treatment.

There is great disagreement among the ancient writers on toxicology respecting the nature of the pharicum. (See the notes of Gorræus and Schneider on Nicander.) The former remarks that many suppose it a species of nard. Dioscorides (Præf. vi) and Galen (Antidot. ii) make it to be a herb. Scribonius Largus, and Hesychius consider it to have been a compound medicine. After balancing all the statements Schneider comes to the conclusion, that most probably it was a composition from agaric. Schulze is wholly undecided as to its nature. (Toxic. Vet. 21.) Sprengel, in like manner, can come to no certain conclusion respecting it. (Notæ in Dioscor. l. c.)

SECT. LIII.—ON TOXICUM.

The toxicum seems to be so called because the barbarians anointed their darts (τοξεύματα) with it. When a person has drunk of it, inflammation of the lips and tongue comes on, also irrestrainable madness leading to various fantasies, so that in the treatment of them they are difficult to cure, and it is rare that any of those who have drunk of it can be saved. However, they are to be forcibly bound with ligatures, and compelled to drink sweet wine with rose-oil, and to vomit. Turnip seed, also, drunk with wine will be proper for them, and the root of cinquefoil, the blood of a he or she-goat when taken, oak bark, that of the beech or ilex triturated with milk; also quinces when eaten, or triturated with pennyroyal and drunk in water; and ammomum, and the fruit of balsam with wine. But if any escape the danger they remain for a long time confined to bed, and when they get out of it they spend the rest of their lives in a state of timidity.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. The symptoms detailed by Nicander are much the same as those enumerated by our author, namely, swelling of the mouth and throat, with violent internal pains. His remedies likewise are much the same, namely, forcing the patient, after he is well secured, to drink wine until he vomit, and making him take bruised apples, rose-oil, oil of iris, &c. He says, that certain savage nations upon the Euphrates poisoned their arrows with it, which rendered their wounds immedicable, occasioning lividity and putrefaction. Dioscorides, Aëtius, Actuarius, and, in short, all the ancient authorities, copy his account.

It is very difficult to determine the nature of the toxicum. Theophrastus describes a species of calamus by the name of toxicus. (H. P. iii, 12.) Avicenna, however, admits that he was wholly unacquainted with its nature. (iv, 6; i, 29.) Some have supposed, with considerable probability, that it was a preparation from the rhus toxicodendron. Schulze is only decided that it was a vegetable poison. (Tox. Vet. 19.) But it even seems doubtful whether it was a simple or compound medicine, and whether of an animal or vegetable nature. (See Schneider’s note on Nicander’s Alexiph. 248.) Sprengel inclines to the opinion that it was collected from the venom of serpents. (Notæ in Dioscor.) All, however, is mere conjecture on this subject.

SECT. LIV.—ON MUSHROOMS.

Of mushrooms, some prove deleterious from their general nature, and some by the quantity taken. They all bring on suffocation resembling choking. The general remedy which is to be instantly applied is to compel the persons affected to vomit by means of oil. They are also wonderfully relieved by drinking of the lye from vine-shoots, or from the wood of the wild pear with oxycrate, salts, or natron. And wild pears or their leaves, if boiled with mushrooms, take away their suffocative quality, and if eaten they prove beneficial. Hen’s dung, drunk in oxycrate, proves beneficial to them; likewise a drachm of birthwort, or of wormwood with wine, and honey when licked or drunk with water; and baum with natron, or the root and fruit of all-heal with wine, the burnt lees of wine with water, and copperas with vinegar, radish, mustard, or cresses when eaten. And since certain mushrooms having been tasted of by venomous animals occasion not only suffocation but also ulceration of the intestines, we must give in such cases plenty of wormwood, and the decoction of figs, and of marjoram, and honied water. Emetics, the hot hip-bath, and raw barley-flour when applied to the hypochondria, will also be proper.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. Nicander mentions suffocation as the common effect of taking mushrooms. His remedies are radishes, rue, the flowers of copper, natron, mustard, lixivial ashes, &c. Our author copies from Aëtius. Simeon Seth recommends honey with tepid water, and a moderate quantity of natron. Ruffus (ap. Oribas. Med. Collect, viii, 24) recommends clysters of natron, wormwood, the juice of radish, and the decoction of rue. Dioscorides recommends emetics of oil, natron, &c., and afterwards vinegar and stimulant decoctions. Avicenna’s remedies are nearly the same as those of our author. Alsaharavius directs us to give at first emetics, and then calefacients, such as pepper, cumin, wine, and, if necessary, the theriac. Haly Abbas, in like manner, recommends emetics, and then wine with honey, the theriac, &c. The symptoms, he says, are cold sweats, faintings, and embarrassment of breathing. All the ancient authors affirm that mushrooms act upon the organs of respiration, and we remark that a sense of suffocation is generally mentioned in the cases reported by modern writers.

For a full report of fungi, or mushrooms, see Dioscor. (iv, 53); Pliny (H. N. xxii, 46); Schulze (Tox. Vet. 14); Sprengel (Comment. in Dioscor.); Schweighaeuser (in Athen. Deipnos. ii, 59); Schneider (ad Nicand. Alex. 521). Diphilus, as quoted by Athenæus, states that all mushrooms which are black, livid, and hard, or which grow hard after being boiled, are of a deleterious nature. He recommends us to give mulse, oxymel, natron, and vinegar, so as to produce vomiting.

Dioscorides gives the following characters of poisonous fungi: Such as grow near rusty nails, or putrid rags of cloth, or near the lodging-place of reptiles, or by trees which have bad fruits, are deleterious; such have a glutinous coagulum (membrane adhering to the cap?) and when gathered soon become putrid and melt away. (M. M. iv, 83). According to Sprengel, these characters are not universally applicable (l. c.); but considering the experience which the ancients had in the use of these articles, they are no doubt generally so. The amanita muscaria, the agaricus necator, and many other species, may be set down as belonging to the ancient list of poisonous mushrooms.—Schulze, who appears to have paid great attention to the subject, enumerates the poisonous mushrooms of the ancients as follows:—1, Agaricus muscarius; 2, Agaricus piperatus; 3, Agaricus emeticus; 4, Boletus versicolor; 5, Boletus laricis. (Toxic. Vet. xiii, 5.)

SECT. LV.—ON BULLS’ BLOOD.

The blood of a newly-killed bull brings on dyspnœa and suffocation, obstructing the passages about the tonsils and the parts concerned in deglutition with violent spasms; the tongue, in such cases, is also found red; the teeth are stained, and there are clots between them. In this case we must avoid giving a vomit, because the grumous blood will be more firmly fastened in the stomach by being raised upwards with the contractions. We must give those things which are calculated to dissolve the coagulated blood and loosen the belly; green figs, therefore, are to be administered when filled with juice, along with oxycrate and natron. All kinds of rennet are also proper with vinegar, and the root of laserwort, with its juice in like manner; also cabbage seed, the lye of figs, and the leaves of fleabane with pepper, and the juice of bramble with vinegar. The bowels are also to be evacuated. Those who are going to recover have fetid and bloody discharges by the anus. Cataplasms, made of barley-flour with honey, are also to be applied to the regions of the stomach and bowels.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. Bulls’ blood being exceedingly viscid and indigestible might prove deleterious by becoming quickly coagulated in the stomach: we do not find any mention of it, however, in modern works on toxicology. Themistocles is said to have despatched himself with it. Nicander makes no mention of emetics, and Dioscorides, like our author, condemns the use of them. Nicander recommends almost the same identical remedies as our author. It will be remarked that they are all of a penetrating, attenuant, and solvent nature, such as wild figs, natron, laserwort, the rennets of certain animals, &c. Galen mentions the pernicious effects of coagulated blood in the stomach, and recommends hot vinegar for it. (De Al. boni et mali succi.) Ruffus (ap. Oribas. Med. Collect. viii, 24) recommends clysters composed of natron, vinegar, the decoction of cabbage, and of its seed, with vinegar.

The Arabians treat the case in a similar manner. Alsaharavius directs us to give vinegar, natron, wine, and the like, also diuretics, but he forbids the use of emetics.

Sprengel inclines to believe that bulls’ blood may prove deleterious, if allowed to remain long in the stomach, by evolving azotic gas. He therefore approves of the hot vinegar recommended by Galen. (Comment. in Dios. 25.) Ardoyn states that a large quantity of bulls’ blood taken into the stomach may produce suffocation by stopping the action of the diaphragm. (De Venen. iv, 23.)

SECT. LVI.—ON COAGULATED MILK.

Those who take a large draught of milk containing rennet, experience a great feeling of suffocation from its becoming coagulated. In treating them, we may give as an antidote rennet with vinegar, compelling them often to drink of it; also the dried leaves of calamint, and its juice in like manner, or the roots of laserwort, or its juice with oxycrate, thyme with wine, and the lye used by bonnet-makers; but nothing saltish must be given, for thereby the milk becomes more firmly coagulated and is converted into cheese. Neither must we make them vomit, for thereby the coagula being lodged in the stomach will produce suffocation.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. Gorræus, in his notes on Nicander, remarks that milk only proves prejudicial when taken in great quantity, immediately after the rennet has been added to it, and before it has curdled. See also Matthiolus and Ardoyn (de Venenis). Nicander recommends the same remedies as our author, namely, such as are of a cutting and attenuant nature, as rennet, vinegar, wine, lasewort, &c. Dioscorides forbids all saltish things. Ruffus (ap. Oribas. Med. Col. viii, 24) recommends a clyster of vinegar and natron, or asses’ milk with much salt. Celsus says, with his accustomed brevity, “Si lac intus coit, aut passum, aut coagulum, aut cum aceto laser.” See also Galen (l. c.) Haly Abbas, Rhases, Avicenna and Alsaharavius also recommend rennet with pepper, assafœtida, vinegar, &c. For bad milk which has spoiled on the stomach, all the Arabian authorities concur in recommending first an emetic of hydromel, and afterwards wine with pepper.

Sprengel accounts for the deleterious effects of curdled milk in the same manner as he does for those of bulls’ blood, and remarks, that the acid contained in the rennet of certain animals especially of hares, is well calculated for dissolving and evacuating the coagulum (Comment. in Dioscor. l. c.)

The Arabian authorities treat, among the deleterious substances, of flesh and fish which have been cooked and hung up in a wet place until they have become unwholesome. When eaten in this state, Rhases says they bring on violent vomiting and purging, and may prove fatal unless the proper remedies are applied. For these symptoms he recommends repeated emetics and then purgatives; after which wine and pepper is to be given; and, in the end, the remedies for poisonous mushrooms. (Ad Mansor. viii, 27, 28.) See also Alsaharavius (Pract. xxx, 2, 15); Haly Abbas (Pract. iv.) Haly Abbas recommends vomiting by means of tepid water, oxymel, and salt.

They treat, in like manner, of rancid fruits; which they state act as poisons when eaten in large quantity. For the cure of these they recommend emetics, the rob of bitter grapes, and medicines to whet the appetite. Rhases (ad Mansor. viii, 30); Avicenna (iv. 6; i, 30.)

Avenzoar relates, at considerable length, the history of a case in which delirium and other bad symptoms had been brought on and kept up by drinking out of a cup which had been poisoned with some putrid meat. (i, 9, 9.)

SECT. LVII.—ON HERACLEAN HONEY.

Those who eat or drink the honey formed in Heraclea, of Pontus, experience the same symptoms as they who have drunk of wolfsbane, and the same remedies will be applicable. They are readily relieved by drinking frequently of mulse, having the leaves of rue mixed with it.

* * * * *

COMMENTARY. This section is taken from Dioscorides.

Avicenna makes mention of a poisonous kind of honey produced in Arabia, for which he applies much the same remedies as those recommended by our author. (iv, 6; i, 32.)

The effects of Pontic honey in occasioning madness is mentioned in the ‘Anabasis’ of Xenophon (iv, 8.) The same character of it is given by Aristotle, Pliny, Diodorus Siculus, and Ælian. Tournefort confirms the ancient accounts of its inebriating effects. See Sprengel (ad Dioscor. ii, 103.)

SECT. LVIII.—ON GYPSUM.

Gypsum, when drunk, produces suffocation, by being converted into stone; hence we must transfer the remedies applicable to those who have taken mushrooms, giving them in this case, and substituting the decoction of mallows for oil; for being of a fatty nature it lubricates the parts, and prevents them from being injured by the stony hardness of the gypsum. Oil, also, in honied water is proper; and the decoction of figs, and the lye of figs, or of the ashes of vine-shoots with much wine, and marjoram, or thyme with lye or vinegar. Clysters are also to be administered, consisting of must and the decoction of mallows.

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COMMENTARY. Our author copies closely from Dioscorides.

Rhases and Avicenna treat this case upon much the same principles as the Greeks, only they give scammony freely at first, and if dysentery supervene they recommend the remedies suitable for it. Aëtius, Dioscorides, and the other Greek authors, although they approve of clysters, say nothing about drastic purgatives. Avicenna says, gypsum in its action resembles ceruse, but is even more powerful than it in inducing strangulation. Haly Abbas says, gypsum occasions colic and ileus with dryness of the mouth, suffocation, difficulty of making urine, and so forth. He directs clysters at first, and afterwards an electuary of pepper and mustard to be given. Alsaharavius forbids emetics, recommends water mixed with honey, and olive-oil for drink, also emollient clysters, and sweet wine.

For an account of gypsum, see Pliny (H. N. xxxvi, 59) and Theophrastus (de Lapidibus.) Isidorus gives the following description of it:—“Gypsi plura genera: omnium autem optimum, lapis specularis: est enim signis ædificiorum, et coronis gratissimus.” (Orig. xvi, 3.) The gypsum speculare was evidently selenite, or crystallized sulphate of lime. See Matthiolus (Com. in Dioscor.)

Dr. Kidd gives the following account of the varieties of the ancient gypsum:—“It was, by the general description of it, an earthy compound of lime; but the ancient naturalists seem to apply it to sulphate of lime, the gypsum of the present day, and sometimes to a calcined carbonate of lime, or quicklime, which they called calx.” (Mineral. b. i, p. 70).

Sir John Hill gives a full account of the ancient gypsums in his notes on Theophrastus (de Lapidibus.) “Gypsum,” he says, “is nothing more than a selenite less elegant than the rhomboidal or plated kinds.” There can be no doubt that the γυψος διαφάνης of Philoponus (Com. in Aristot. de Anima. ii) was pure selenite. It is singular that our recent authorities on toxicology have not included gypsum in the list of poisonous substances which they treat of, although there is good reason to believe that the powder, if given in any great quantity, is highly deleterious. We know for certain that gypsum, or stucco, is often used for poisoning rats and mice. It is further deserving of remark that all the earlier modern authorities on medicine, down at least to the middle of the 16th century, treat of gypsum as an active poison. All the ancient authorities, it will be seen, represent it in this light. Pliny makes mention of a case of suicide committed by means of gypsum (H. N. xxxvi, 24.)

SECT. LIX.—ON CERUSE.

Ceruse, owing to its colour, cannot be mistaken, and when taken voluntarily it whitens the palate, tongue, and the intervals between the teeth. It also brings on hiccup and cough, dryness of the tongue, and coldness of the extremities, with disorder of the intellect and difficulty of moving. In this case it will be proper to give honied water or the decoction of figs, or of mallows, or hot milk, or sesame triturated with wine, or the lye of vine-shoots, or the oil of marjoram, or of iris; also the bones of peaches, with a decoction of barley or frankincense, or the gum of prunes, or the juice of the elm which is contained in its follicles, along with tepid water; but let them immediately vomit. The juice of thapsia will also be proper for them, or three oboli of the juice of scammony, when drunk with honied water.

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COMMENTARY. Nicander compares the colour of ceruse to frothy milk. The symptoms of poisoning by it are constriction of the palate and gums, asperity of the tongue, singultus, a dry cough, nausea, heaviness of the head, unnatural vision, and torpor. His remedies are emetics of oil, thin milk, decoctions of mallows, sesame triturated with wine, prunes or elms, which are to be given partly as emetics, and partly with the intention of their being digested; for which purpose the patient is to be put into the warm bath. See the Paraphrase of Eutecnius; also Dioscorides, Aëtius, Avicenna, and Rhases, who recommend similar treatment. Aëtius, like our author, directs us to give scammony, evidently to counteract its astringency. Alsaharavius recommends emetics of the decoction of figs with mead or common oil, the infusion of wormwood as a diuretic, scammony with hydromel, and hot milk. Rhases recommends emetics of the decoctions of figs and oil, with drastic purgatives and diuretics. (Ad Mansor. viii, and Contin. xx, 2.) Avicenna’s principles of treatment are quite similar, that is to say, he trusts to emetics, diuretics, and clysters, and prevents the patient from sleeping. (iv, 6, 1.) Haly Abbas recommends an emetic consisting of honey with hot water, vinegar and salt; he also gives diuretics, such as the infusion of parsley, fennel, anise, and southernwood. (Pract. iv.)

Dr. Alston says, “our white lead is certainly the ψιμύθιον of Dioscorides and the cerussa of Pliny.” It was prepared by exposing the carbonate of lead to the vapours of vinegar. See Milligan (Ad Cels. p. 112.)

SECT. LX.—ON LIME, SANDARACH, AND ARSENIC.

Lime, sandarach, and arsenic, when taken in a draught, bring on pains of the stomach and bowels, with violent corrosion. Wherefore we must administer all things of a diluent and solvent nature, such things as will produce ready vomiting and lubricate the bowels, as the juice of the marsh or common mallows, and a decoction of linseed, or of spelt, or of rice, copious draughts of milk and honied water, broths which are fatty and contain wholesome juices.

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COMMENTARY. Nicander has not treated of poisoning by these substances. Dioscorides, Aëtius, and Actuarius give almost the same account of the symptoms and treatment as our author. Their remedies are emetics, lubricants, and laxatives. The Arabians copy their descriptions and follow their treatment. Thus Alsaharavius directs these cases to be treated by giving emetics of oily and fatty things, emollient clysters, and unctuous articles, to prevent ulceration of the intestines. Avicenna orders, in the first place, an emetic of warm water and oil, then emollient decoctions, such as those of linseed and mallows, and fat broths and milk. The cough is to be soothed by demulcents. (iv, 6, 1.) Rhases states that quicklime and arsenic occasion putrefaction of the intestines. (Cont. xxxvii. tr. 1.) Galen, however, has stated that arsenic is not, properly speaking, a septic, but a strong caustic. (De Simp. 1.)

However meagre this account of these important medicines may appear, it will be seen, upon reference to the standard works on toxicology, that the treatment at the present day scarcely differs, in any one point, from the ancient mode of practice. Emetics, demulcents, consisting of decoctions of emollient herbs, or copious draughts of milk, laxatives and clysters, form the present practice.

The ancient arsenicum, or auripigmentum, was orpiment; the sandarach was realgar, or the orange-red sulphuret. Our oxide of arsenic is a factitious substance, prepared by sublimation from cobalt: it is much more deleterious than auripigmentum or orpiment. Servitor and Avicenna have described the factitious arsenic, or oxide of arsenic of the moderns. The Arabian chemist Geber treats largely and ingeniously of orpiment, which he holds to be closely allied to sulphur. He also speaks of sublimed arsenic. (iii. 29.)

SECT. LXI.—ON LITHARGE.

Litharge, when drunk, brings on heaviness of the stomach and bowels, with intense tormina; sometimes by its weight it wounds the intestines, occasions retention of urine and swelling of the body, which becomes of a leaden hue, and assumes an unseemly appearance. In such cases it will be proper, after vomiting, to give the seed of the wild clary (horminum) to drink with wine, three oboli of myrrh, wormwood, parsley-seed, pepper, the flower of privet with wine, and the dried dung of wild pigeons, with nard and wine.

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COMMENTARY. The symptoms which Nicander mentions as being superinduced by litharge are borborygmi, pains resembling those of ileus, retention of urine, and discoloration of the skin. His remedies are carminatives, warm stimulants, and diuretics, such as myrrh, clary, St. John’s-wort, hyssop, pepper, hedge mustard taken in wine, the green shoots of privet, and the fruit of pomegranate. Scribonius Largus recommends emetics and calefacient medicines, such as pepper, myrrh, parsley. The Arabians, namely, Rhases, Avicenna, and Alsaharavius, concur in recommending emetics, drastic purgatives, and calefacient medicines.

The ancient litharge was prepared like the modern. It is a semi-vitrified peroxide of lead.

SECT. LXII.—ON LEAD.

When a person has drunk the shavings of lead or its soil, he experiences the same symptoms as those from litharge, and is to be treated in the same manner.

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COMMENTARY. We need scarcely say that litharge is now ascertained to be a preparation of lead. (See the preceding section.) Most of the ancient authorities state, like our author, that the symptoms and treatment of poisoning by lead and litharge are exactly the same. It appears singular that it should be asserted in some modern works on the materia medica that the ancients were unacquainted with the deleterious properties of lead. Galen even mentions that water conveyed in leaden pipes sometimes proves deleterious by occasioning dysentery. (Med. sec. loc. vii.) Aëtius makes the same observation. (xi, 45.) Palladius, the writer on agriculture, speaks of it in the following terms: “Ultima ratio est, plumbeis fistulis ducere, quæ aquas noxias reddunt; nam cerusa plumbo creatur attrito, quæ corporibus nocet humanis.” (ix, 11.) Vitruvius also mentions that water impregnated with lead is deleterious. (Arch. viii.) Pliny notices the deleterious effects of the exhalations from lead mines. (H. N. xxxiv, 50.)

The Greek writers on toxicology do not treat of copper as a poison; but the Arabians have done so in brief terms, all agreeing in recommending the same treatment as in cases of poisoning with arsenic. (See Avicenna, Rhases, Haly Abbas, and Alsaharavius.) These authorities, likewise, lay down in very succinct terms the treatment of poisoning by iron, which they direct to be conducted upon general principles. They in particular recommend laxative and demulcent medicines. (See Avicenna iv, 6, 18.) As a slight novelty in their practice we may mention that he recommends the affusion of vinegar with oil of roses, violets, &c., upon the head. Averrhoes recommends from ⅓ to 1 dr. of balsam. (Coll. v.)

SECT. LXIII.—ON MERCURY.

Mercury, when swallowed, brings on the same symptoms as litharge, and the same remedies are to be used in this case. A copious draught of milk seems to be beneficial, and vomiting ought to be produced.

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COMMENTARY. Dioscorides, Galen, and Aëtius give the same imperfect account of this important medicine and poison as our author gives, and supply no additional information of any importance. The Arabians were better acquainted with its properties, having ascertained that it might be taken in its metallic state with impunity. Rhases says, “I do not think that any great harm will result from drinking mercury when it is pure, unless it be pains in the stomach and intestines. It afterwards passes out in its natural state, especially if the person who swallowed it moves about. I gave a draught of it to an ape, nor did I perceive any inconvenience arise from it, except, as I have mentioned, that it appeared to be pained in its belly, for it often bit it with its mouth, and grasped it with its hands.” (Ad Mansor. viii, 42.)

Haly Abbas gives a similar account. Mercury, he says, in its natural state, is not poisonous, and merely occasions some tormina in the belly; but when killed (oxydised?) it is deleterious, and is to be remedied by giving emetics of oil and dill, and afterwards oily clysters, &c. (Pract. iv, 53.) See a similar account in Avicenna (iv, 6, 1, 2.) Mercury that has been killed, or sublimed, that is to say attenuated, produces, he says, grave symptoms, such as pain of the bowels, a bloody flux, retention of urine, and so forth. He recommends, after vomiting, myrrh in wine, with honied water, &c.

Serapion mentions that fumigations with mercury are very prejudicial by superinducing nervous affections and paralysis. (De Simpl. 385.) Alsaharavius is, we believe, the only ancient author who has mentioned that rubbing the body with mercury occasions swelling of the mouth, tongue, and throat, with erosion of those parts. He directs us to wash or gargle with the decoction of dill, camomile, or mint. (Pract. xxx, 3.) Pliny mentions milk as a remedy against gypsum, ceruse, sulphur, and mercury. (H. N. xxviii.)

Not having access to the unpublished MSS. of the ancient ‘Scriptores Chemici,’ we cannot pretend to determine whether or not they had acquired any considerable skill in analysing and detecting poisonous substances. See an interesting account of these mss. in Fabricii ‘Bibliotheca Græca,’ xiii, p. 747. Consult also Vossius ‘De Naturâ Artium,’ v. 9; Sir William Drummond’s Papers in the ‘Classical Journal’ on the Literature of the Ancient Egyptians; and Doutens ‘Dec. de Modern.’ p. 176. The only original work on the chemistry of the ancients which we have read with any attention is the ‘Chemia’ of Geber, which contains much curious information regarding the metals, although nothing that suits our present purpose.

SECT. LXIV.—ON WHITE HELLEBORE, THAPSIA, ELATERIUM, BLACK AGARIC, WILD RUE, GITH, AND THE DOWN OF THE CACTOS.

We must be guarded in the administration of certain medicinal substances, which often occasion as great danger as poisons themselves. Such are the following, namely, white hellebore, thapsia, elaterium, and the black agaric, for these bring on either suffocation or hypercatharsis, in which cases we may cure the suffocation in the way described for mushrooms, and such like substances, and stop the hypercatharsis by such things are as calculated to suppress immoderate discharges. Likewise certain substances which might seem not injurious to any considerable degree, will sometimes occasion dangerous symptoms, and should not be neglected. Such are the wild rue, gith, and the fresh poppy, which are the flowers of the thorn called cactos. In such cases the administration of a vomit alone relieves those who have taken them.

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COMMENTARY. This section is taken from Dioscorides. Of the pappus Actuarius says, like our author, that it is the flower of the thorn called cactos, and that vomiting relieves those who have taken it. (Meth. Med. v, 12.) See Avicenna (iv, 6, 1); and Rhases (ad Mansor. viii, 49.) Alsaharavius directs us in the case of hellebore to clear the stomach by emetics, and to apply cooling plasters of citrons, apples, and roses. For the wild rue he recommends emetics of oil, emollient clysters, and the ashes of vine tops taken with water and vinegar.

In the Seventh Book we shall have occasion to state the opinions which have been entertained respecting the helleborus albus of the ancients. Schulze is very undecided. (Toxic. vet. iv.) The thapsia he makes to be the same as the T. fœtida of Linnæus. Theophrastus has described it (H. P. ix, 23). Pliny says it occasions swelling of the body, with erysipelas. (N. H. xiii, 43.)

We shall treat of the elaterium also in the Seventh Book. Hippocrates uses the word as a general term for all drastic purgatives, but by Dioscorides, and the subsequent writers on the materia medica, it is applied to the fæcula of the momordica elaterium.

The agaricus muscarius is a well-known poisonous mushroom. Schulze properly remarks that its effects are narcotic; and Dr. Christison places it in the class of narcotico-acrid poisons. See sec. liv.

Schulze is much inclined to believe that the πήγανον ἄγριον here treated of is the peganum harmala of Linnæus, a plant intermediate between the ruta and melanthium. He is also disposed to think that the melanthium of the ancients was the nigella sativa, L. We are inclined to adopt this opinion from the text of Avicenna. (iv, 6, 1, 16.) Sprengel agrees with Anguillara and Dalechampius in opinion that the cactos was the cynara cardunculus, L., or cardoon artichoke, a variety of the C. scolymus. (Comment. in Dioscor.) Schweighaeuser inclines to the opinion of Villebrun, the French translator of Athenæus, who makes it to be the C. sylvestris latifolia, which he says grows commonly in Sicily at the present day. (In Deipnos. ii, 83.)

Under this head we may notice the treatment of poisoning by gum euphorbium, and the spurges, of which no mention is made by the Greek authorities on toxicology. For the Arabians, see Avicenna (iv, 6, 1, 4, 5); Rhases (Contin. xx, 2; ad Mansor. viii, 48); Alsaharavius (Pract. xxx, 1, 19.) The symptoms as given by them all are, violent pain and heat in the primæ viæ, with bloody discharges, and death, unless timely relief be given. Their remedies are immediate vomiting with hot water and oil, then administering demulcents, barley-water, and in the end, the theriac. Galen and Haly Abbas, in their treatises on the Theriac, recommend it in this case of poisoning.

The mezereon is not noticed by the Greeks or Romans either as a poison nor as a medicinal substance. The Arabians treat of it under both these heads. See Avicenna (iv, 6, 1); Rhases (ad Mansor. viii, 53.) The symptoms as given by them are violent vomiting and purging, for which they recommend sweet milk, butter, juleps, in the first place, and in extreme cases the theriac and sealed earth. The Arabian authorities confound their mezereon with the chamæleon of the Greeks, treated of in the thirty-seventh section of this book. The dende of Avicenna and Serapion was the strychnos colubrinus, according to Sprengel. (R. H. H. i, 250.)

Rhases classes the nux vomica along with the articles treated of in this section. He recommends us in all these cases to give warm water to promote the vomiting, and render it easier, and if violent convulsions come on, he directs the patient to be put into a warm bath, and anointed with hot oils. (Ad Mansor. viii, 49.) Serapion treats of it in his Materia Medica (163.) The Arabians also treat of the methel-nut.

We are unable to determine satisfactorily the nature of the condisi, which is treated of by the Arabians, under the present head. See Rhases (ad Mansor. viii, 49); Avicenna (iv, 6, 1, 16.) Alsaharavius calls it cundes. The symptoms, he says, are dryness of the nose, throat, and palate, sneezing, muttering delirium, pain of the stomach, and, unless speedy relief be brought, death. (Pract. xxx, 1, 24.) Ardoyn mentions that some referred it to the struthium; but the above characters do not at all apply to the soapwort (saponaria officinalis, L.), which is the στρόυθιον of Theophrastus and Dioscorides. See further Sprengel (Comment. in Dioscor. i, 192.)

The sow-bread (cyclamen Europæum) is also treated of by the Arabians under this head. See Avicenna (iv, 6, 1, 16); Rhases (ad Mansor. viii, 59); Alsaharavius (Pract. xxx, 1, 24.) The symptoms, according to Alsaharavius, are swelling of the throat, and strong pain of the bowels. The sow-bread is treated of as an article of the Materia Medica by Dioscorides (ii, 193.)

Dioscorides (M. M. iv, 82) does not reckon the oleander (nerium oleander, L.) destructive to man, but the Arabians rank it among the deleterious substances, of a heating and desiccant nature; and recommend for it emetics, with the decoction of fenugreek, figs with honey, and the like. See Avicenna (iv, 6, 18); Alsaharavius (Pract. xxx, 1, 27); Rhases (ad Mansor. viii, 36.)

The anacardium, or Malacca bean, is treated of as a poison by Rhases (Contin. xx, 2; ad Mansor. viii, 35); Avicenna (iv, 6, 1, 9); Alsaharavius (Pract. xxx, 1, 42); Haly Abbas (Pract. iv, 50.) They all describe it as an irritant poison, and recommend emetics of animal and vegetable oils, with demulcents, to obviate the bad effects of it.

The apocynum, although not treated of by the ancient authorities on toxicology, is described as a deleterious substance by Dioscorides (Mat. Med. iv, 81); by Galen (De Simpl.); and by Pliny (H. N. xxv, 83.) It appears to be the periploca Græca, L.

Dioscorides and Pliny likewise reckon saffron, or the crocus sativus, a deleterious plant. Its deleterious action is very weak.

The atramentum sutorium, which was a solution of vitriol, was used as a poison. See Cicero (ad Familiar. ix, 21.)

SECT. LXV.—ON DOMESTIC ARTICLES, SUCH AS WINE AND COLD WATER.

Cold water when drunk in a great quantity, and much undiluted sweet wine, more especially after the bath, running, or violent exercises, bring on suffocation and pains. In such cases, venesection quickly had recourse to, and evacuation by clysters, remove the impending danger.

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COMMENTARY. Galen says, “Some by taking an immoderate draught of cold water have been instantly seized with dyspnœa, convulsions, and tremors; in a word, their whole nervous system has become affected.” (Meth. Med. ix, 5.)

Dioscorides, Aëtius, and Actuarius concur in recommending the same mode of treatment as our author. The Arabians, however, treat those who have taken a draught of cold water unseasonably in a very different manner from the Greeks. Thus Rhases and Avicenna recommend undiluted wine internally, and the application of a plaster over the liver. The difference between the practice of the Greeks and Arabians may be thus accounted for. A large draught of cold drink may either threaten to prove fatal at once by producing a violent impression upon the nerves of the stomach, or it may superinduce symptoms resembling those of gastritis. In the former case the practice of the Arabians may seem most proper in order to support the heat and powers of the system, whereas that of the Greeks will be indicated when inflammatory symptoms have come on; and, indeed, even the Arabians bled under these circumstances. (Avicenna, iv, 61, 31.) For an immoderate draught of pure wine which has been taken unseasonably, the Arabian authorities concur with the Greek in recommending immediate evacuation of the stomach and venesection, to which they add cold water or whey, with troches of camphor. See in particular Avicenna (iv, 6, 1, 31.)

APPENDIX TO BOOK V.

As no better opportunity is likely to occur, we shall in this place give a short notice of two subjects connected with medical practice, which are entirely omitted by our author.

ON FEIGNED DISEASES, AND THE DETECTION OF THEM.

Galen, we believe, is the only ancient author who has treated professedly of the detection of simulated diseases. He begins his short treatise on this head with remarking, that persons feign diseases from various motives, and that it is expected the physicians should detect such impostures. That, for example, inflammation, erysipelas, and œdema, when produced artificially, ought to be distinguished from the same diseases when they originate in constitutional causes. He adds, that hæmoptysis, hæmatemesis, and bloody discharges from the bowels, are often simulated. Hæmoptysis is simulated by opening a vein in the gums, and sucking blood from it while one affects to cough. Others, he says, affect dementia, fatuity, and insanity, all which cases the vulgar expect that the physician should detect. Inward pain, such as that of colic, he had often known to be simulated, and relates briefly an interesting case in point. He remarks, that experience and natural sagacity will enable a man to expose all impositions of this nature. He gives a very interesting account of the manner in which he detected the nature of a swelling at the knee, that had been produced intentionally by the juice of thapsia (thapsia garganica, deadly carrot?) Feigned inward pains, he remarks, may often be distinguished from the real by the aversion which the malingerer discovers to swallow medicines, which he would be anxious to have given him if he were actually in acute pain; and adds, that the state of the pulse, and the other symptoms of intestinal diseases, will assist in making the detection. (Quomodo coarg. sint qui fing. se Ægrot. t. iii, 388, ed. Basil.)

ON PROFESSIONAL IMPOSTORS.

Rhases has an interesting chapter on this head. The frauds of impostors, he says, are more numerous than could be contained in his whole work. Some of them, he adds, pretend to be able to cure epilepsy, and having made a crucial incision in the back part of the head, they extract from the wound something which they hold in their hands, and thus impose upon people. Others, in like manner, cause it to be believed that they extract a small lizard by the nostrils. Some of these characters, he says, make it be believed that they remove films from the eye, by secretly introducing a small membrane into the eye, and taking it out again. Others manage to create a belief that they suck water from the ear with a reed. Others also make it be believed that they extract worms from the ears or teeth. Others practice a trick by which they obtain the credit of extracting the ranula below the tongue. Why should I mention those, he adds, who introduce pieces of bone into wounds and ulcers, and afterwards extract them? He says, it is not uncommon for these impostors to sound a man for the stone, pretend to find one, perform the operation, and exhibit a calculus which they themselves had introduced secretly into the incision. Others pretend to cure piles, make incisions about the anus, and form ulcers there which did not exist before. Certain of them affect by scarifications and other means to suck the vitreous humour from the hip-joint, while they exhibit something of the kind which they themselves have introduced. There are some who undertake to collect all the infirmities of the body into one spot, and then extract them; for this pretended object they raise an itching and violent heat in some place by means of alkekengi (winter cherry); and having accomplished this they exact a fee for removing the uneasiness from the spot, which they do by anointing it with oil. There are others who will make a man believe that he has swallowed hairs, glass, or the like; and then tickling his throat with a feather, and making him vomit, they exhibit the substance in question as if it had been brought up. Thus, he adds, they often do much mischief, and sometimes are guilty of culpable homicide. He concludes by warning sensible people to be upon their guard against such wretches. (Ad Mansor. vii. 27.)