some humidity by its preparation it is more hot and dry and is a Medicine most usefull in smoothing the skin and curing an impetiginous itching and other affectious of the skin as also some fistulous and malign ulcers The same quality happens to all expressed by the force of the fire from which they perpetually retain their acquired heat Olei amygdalini facultas And when Oil of Almonds is thus extracted it is onely extrinsecally applyed when without fire it is sucked up like a gratefull Lohoch to ease the asperity of the rough artery and coct and move Spittle so that it is oft given with a little Sugar to Children that are troubled with coughing or that have any distillation from the brain to the lungs without any purging Medicaments especially without anodynal Medicaments That Oils may be extracted the Fruits and Seeds should first be purged and the Apothecaries do ill that extract Oil out of Almonds before decortication The Seeds cleansed are brayed with a pestel Olea exprimendi modus after contusion they are put into a pan and set upon the fire and stirred pretty long that they may calefy then are they involved in a rough cloth and subjected to a wooden press till by valid compression the Oils be expressed Those that we would educe without the help of fire or heat must after they be bruised very small be presently put into the press that the Oil may exude by drops Petreol which is educed out of Salt-petre from whence it hath its denomination takes place amongst simple Oils But our purpose is to treat of such as are made by Art Liquidambor and Balsam also are simple Oils which distill by drops out of the incisions of forreign Trees But more of this in our Shop Some simple Oils also are distilled sometimes as well by ascent as by descent as out of Juniper Guaiacum Cloves and such like Olea educta per ascensum descensum both wood and dry Fruits which being put into a pot Oil ascends into the vessel above by virtue of the fire set under or descends into the vessel set under by virtue of the fire above Yet are not all Oils extracted by descent nor alwayes by the help of the fire for Oil may easily exude out of Tartarum and Myrrhe included in a bag and suspended in a moyst place as in a Wine-cellar Of all which manners of educing Oils more elsewhere But compound Oils wherewith the Apothecary should be especially furnished are such in which the matter of stocks fruits flowers and of any simple is infused and macerated After which the whole is insolated till the strength of the matter remain in the Oil which is afterwards expressed and reposed After this manner are made the Oil of Violets Roses St. Johns wort Water-lillies and many more which the Greeks call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Latines Unguenta and especially those which may be inspissated by the admistion of gums and odoriferous things whence they are called Myropolitans or Unguentarians who sold such Oils and Unguents as were suaveolent with whom any fragrant Oil was taken for an Unguent as Unguents for Oils We scarce approve of their opinion which call onely them simple Oils which are made of Flowers Fruits or other Simples infused macerated and insolated in Oil of Olives and those compound Oils which are cocted on a slow fire with wine water infusion or convenient decoction till almost all the admixed humour be assumed for those seem no less but rather more compound than these because not onely the total power of the things infused but a good portion of the substance in which it inheres remains with the Oil after expression in the former Hence that Oil which partakes of no excess but is temperate is such perpetually from the condition of the thing infused which if cold then is the Oil cold if hot hot if it have the power to exsiccate then will the Oil exsiccate Such Oils as are educed by expression onely Quibus vasis olea servanda or by maceration and expression together may be most safely kept if reposed in vessels of glass or clay perfectly before hardned with the valid heat of a fornace But such as are educed by distillation whether by ascent or descent which are commonly called Chymists essences must alwayes be kept in solid glass vessels with strait orifices close covered left their substance and quality being dissipable soon expire CHAP. II. Of Vnguents UNguents as Galen testifies cap. ult lib. 7. simpl med were called by the Antients Oily Medicaments confected of suaveolent spices and according to Actuarius cap. 1. lib. 5. meth are onely externally applyed and being onely spread along are thought to benefit but such parts as cannot endure other remedies such parts as Oribasius cap. 27. lib. collect saith are grieved with Cataplasms and hurt with fluent madefactions Now Unguents are of a grosser consistency than Oils and a mean betwixt Oils and Plaisters as Liniments betwix Oils and Unguents for a more liquid Unguent is called very often a Liniment Unguenta cur dicta inventa of the confection and use whereof we shall treat more at large in the fifth Chapter And because the consistency of Unguents Liniments and Sear-cloaths do not much differ they are used sometimes indistinctly for that is called a Liniment wherewith the parts to be helped are liniated that an Unguent wherewith they are anointed and that a Sear-cloth which made of Wax and Oil is applyed The Arabians under the name of Unguents oft comprehend Sear-cloaths and Plaisters and many thick Oils and the antient Greeks all well smelled Ointments so Dioscorides lib. 1. calls many sweet Oils Unguents and Hippocrates lib. 1. de medic affirms that Physicians should not onely get fame and glory of the Vulgar by the good constitutions of their bodies and decent Ornaments but by sweet Unguents that is by aromatical and suaveolent things Yet for clearer explications sake they are distinguished from one another and an Unguent properly is an Oily Medicament Unguentum quid of a middle consistency betwixt Oils and Plaisters which yet doth not still remain alike for when heat is more vehement the unctious and fat matter melts more and the Unguents become more liquid and soft and when the heat is weaker more solid and therefore Unguentarians use to put less Oil in Summer and more in Winter to their Unguents for cold inspissates a fluent Unguent as Oil it self which Galen observes cap. 1. lib. 8. comp med gener in the composition of his stomachical Sear-cloth Now that proportion of Oil must be observed in the confection of Unguents that to one ounce of Oil be mixed one dram of Powder Olei proportio in unguentorum confectione and two drams of Wax or as Galen saith cap. 2. lib. 4. comp med gener that four times as much Oil as Wax be put in the confection of Unguents and eight times as much Oil as Powder
sorts of Galangal and Ginger differ not at all And they are not excusable who usurp * Calamus Aromaticus sweet Cane and Acorus indistinctly for they differ very much as appears by their several descriptions Moreover Europe brings forth Acorus onely seldome or never any sweet Cane India produces sweet Cane never Acorus Acorus according to Galen is hot and dry in the third degree CHAP. VI. Of Calamus Aromaticus or the Aromatical Reed CAlamus Aromaticus is an Indian arundinaceous Plant whose caul is hollow like a quil easily frangible into splinters It differs much from Acorus and is not enumerated amongst the Roots but ligneous Plants which are concave and geniculated It is white within like a reed flave without its odour is most fragrant its sapour acrimoniously bitter and it is glutinous in chewing It is brought from India onely instead of whose root another aromatical one is sold in many Shops Myrepsicus which Hippocrates calls Myrepsicum that is unguentary from its suavity Some call it Babylonian Cyperus which by the more perite Herbalists is named Shop-Cane which Johannes Robinus the Kings Herbalist hath by his industry and labour transplanted in the Physicians Garden at Paris But this is not the Antients Calamus Aromaticus for this is hotter and more acrimonious having more strict and junceous leaves which are triangular the vulgar Calamus hath broader leaves But since they are similar both in form and faculty our vulgar Calamus may be rightly substituted for the rare and exotical It is hot and dry in the second degree Vires it astringes gently hath a little acrimony by the tenuity of its parts opens the passages moves flowers recreates the spirits and helps the native colour CHAP. VII Of Costus COstus is a peregrine Plant celebrated by the Antients but not accurately noted and described so that its true dignotion is not apparent to the recent All indeed say it is a root but none yet indubitably asserted of what plant or whether of one or more Yet if we believe the Antients Species as of necessity we must in such things whereof they have had perfect knowledge and which they have often used and approved there are three sorts of Costus the Arabian Indian and Syrian The Arabian is white Amarus dulcis light and suaveolent above the rest while it is fresh and new it is abundantly full and dense not carious The Indian is indeed light but black and amare the Syrian is flave tuberous to the gust acrimonious to the olfact fragrant The Arabians constitute onely two sorts thereof the amare and the sweet And Clusius thinks there is but one kinde of Costus and that it is onely called sweet in reference to the more amare and acrimonious Such a difference as this in sapour we daily experience in Plants which while fresh and new are more sweet and suave when inveterate croded with worms and corrupted more amare acrimonious and insuave The Costus now in use amongst Physicians Costus vulgaris is a root almost like Ginger within white smooth light without palely flave somewhat amare very fragrant and often so suaveolent while new that it importunately affects the head It grows in many places in India as in Guzarat and about Amadabar the most famous City of that Countrey The Greeks and Latins retain the Arabian nomenclature all calling it Cost or Gostus In Pharmacopolies some usurp a root of a certain vulgar aromatical Plant instead of Costus The errour of some Apothecaries which seems to be desumed from the sorts of Seseleon it hath some affinity with that which Matthiolus calls Ethiopicum in root leaves caul magnitude form and faculties which by some is called Pseudo-costus by others Belgian Costus and by others Shop-Costus If any one fear to substitute this for the true Costus Suecidanium let him take Angelica root in its stead Costus being subamare is somewhat astrictive being acrimonious is exceedingly calefactive and being suaveolent is refective and exhilarative CHAP. VIII Of both Beens BEn or Been Rhas par 135. de nomin Arab. is an Arabick word denoting a certain tree growing in Ethiopia like our Tamarisk whose fruit is called Abelban out of which emanates an Oil they call Muscelline which name they also give to the Plant it self as Rhasis hath it but neither he nor Avicenna do further dilucidate the Plant onely Avicenna saith The opinion of Avicen it is a ligneous lump or root which by exsiccation hath contracted wrinkles and lineations whereof there are two sorts the one white the other red both hot and dry in the second degree Elsewhere he saith that both the Beens are dry in the first degree and the red hotter than the white but we see the contrary in those two roots we celebrate in the Shops for Been for the white is sensibly calid the red more languid and ignave Serapio is no whit clearer in describing both the Plants Serapio's opinion There be saith he two sorts of Ben both about the magnitude of the root of the lesser Pastinaca and tortuous they are brought from Armenia their odour is good and both are viscid calid and humid Since then the Antients agree onely about the name of this their indigenous Plant no wonder if our Writers be silent or else enunciate few and most probable of its properties There is no Pharmacopolist but he knows the white and red roots that are celebrated for Beens but that dignotion is onely superficial and none yet have learned their true effigies The Arabians say that Ben corroborates impinguates the body Vires augments seed conduces to the palsey and performs many more commodities which we finde not in our white root and therefore Sylvius substitutes in its stead the root of Eringium I preferr ours Succidanium or the Spanish Angelica before it as more cordial Some think that Polemony is white Ben and Bistort red but that conjecture is not worth the improbation CHAP. IX Of Scecachul SCecachul I finde diversly called by the Arabians as Lochachium Lichimum and Alithimum whose seed or rather grain they call Culcul its leaf is like Albena or Julben which words Serapio confounds and uses them both for Scecachul which is a Plant by their description short stalked of a veinous and nodous root out of each of whose genicles emerge leaves like them of Balsam It emits violaceous flowers at the beginning of the Spring out of its summity to which black grains of the magnitude of Pepple follow full of sweet humidity which the Barbarians call Culcul but Rhasis saith Kilkil is more consonant to their idiom who l. 23. reconseates their qualities and saith they are hot and moyst in the second degree Serapio saith onely in the first degree Both contend that they very much excite venery for it increases sperm erects the uterus and incites to copulation Scecachul grows in umbrous places and about tree roots But
very hard onely Tinne is a little more sonore and hard then Lead Tinne is either simple pure and defaecated or impure and compounded of other Metals so made either by Nature or Art whereof there are many differences according to the nature of the ingredients and proportion of the same whose faculties respond to the mixion of those things whereof it consists Tinne is of much use to man Usus which though it be seldome used in Medicine yet it affords vessels for their repose and preservation The Alchymists make an Oyl out of Tinne for the cure of Wounds and Ulcers but I think such Medicaments as are easilier made cheaper and more efficacious are better CHAP. 4. Of Lead 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Lead is according to Alchymists both dedicated to Saturn and called Saturn and in their opinion it is generated of impure and crass Quicksilver and a little impure Sulphur and it is thought that not onely under the earth but in the open air also it augments and therefore Cardanus thinks it labefactates houses by its weight who make four differences thereof the vulgar white which many call Tinne Bisemutum yet unknown and that which is made of Stibium Pliny acknowledges onely two sorts the vulgar or black and the white who gives a twofold original to the black for saith he it is either generated in its own vein which produces nought else or it is conflated in many veins mixt with Silver The first liquor which flows in furnaces is called White-Lead or Tinne the second Silver and that which remains the Latines call Plumbago out of which Lead is elicited It is extracted also out of a certain Plumbary effoded out of Mynes which stone they call Molybdoides and the Lead thus secerned and melted is poured into water while hot till it leave its dross Morters and Pestels for Medicinal uses are made of Lead as also round Pipes or Canes for deep and internal Ulcers which are as good as golden Pipes There is also a Powder made of Lead for the exsiccation of Ulcers whereof we have elswhere made mention Galen saith Vires that Lead is refrigerative and is either solarly or mixed with other Medicament conducible to malignant cankerous and putrid Ulcers but its faculties are bettered by lotion or ustion Dioscorides teaches the manner qualities and effects of its ablution and ustion Ceruse is made of plates of Lead of which hereafter CHAP. 5. Of Brass BRass is dedicated to Venus from her Island Cyprus where it is copiously effoded and it is either of a golden colour and thence called Aurichalcum or redder and then it is called Brass absolutely This was of more use amongst the Ancients then either Gold Silver or Iron for the first money was of Brass And hence we have these occurrents Aerarium Publicum aes alienum questor erarius Their bellatory arms also were not of steel but brass as also their Statues and Temple-doors In Pharmacopolies we often meet with these terms Aes ustum fles aeris squama aeris aerugo but what every of these denotes all our Pharmaceutical lections will scarcely teach us Aes ustum or burnt Brass saith Dioscorides is made of the nails of broken ships imposed upon a crude earthen vessel a little Sulphur and as much Salt strewed under them all of them being besprinkled herewith and the vessels spirament daubed with a singular cement it is set on a furnace till they be cocted This aes ustum astringes exsiccates represses extenuates attracts purges Ulcers and brings them to a scar and emends the vices of the eyes Flos aeris or the flower of Brass is made when the Brass melted in the furnace delabes into certain receptacles through the necks of such fistuls as appertain thereunto and when cold water is infunded upon the burning Brass before it concrete into a hard mass for then this flos aeris in this sudden concretion and densation will erupt in a vapour which concreting also will fall down in small red grains like Millet which we take for flos aeris Squama aeris or the scales of Brass are made when Brass is smitten with hammers and those are the best which are excussed out of the same Brass that nails are made of those the worst which are made of vile and promiscuous or white Brass This squama eris astringes extenuates represses erodes stays arrels and brings Ulcers to scars CHAP. 6. Of Verdegrease VErdegrease is not onely of use to Painters but to Physicians also who mix it with many Medicaments for the cure of Ulcers as that Medicament which Galen calls Lite and more he describes This Verdegrease is not the flower of Brass as some think but a certain green rasure which exudes out of its plates wet with vinegar Dioscorides make two sorts hereof one the vulgar or simple Verdegrease the other worm-rust and that twofold the one fossile and the other factitious both whereof are rare for the one is either not sought or not found and the other not now made But the vulgar is copious and every-where venale which may be made many wayes but most usually thus Some sharp Vinegar must be infused into a Hogshead or other ample vessel whereon a brazen vessel must be inversly superimposed if it may be a concamerated one or if it be plain it must be so obstructed that there may not be any spiracle left after ten dayes let the cover be removed and the Verdegrease thereon eraded This way is also most usual one or more plates of brass are so suspended in a Hoshead containing Vinegar that they may not touch the Vinegar and the due dayes being expired the Verdegrease is deraded Moreover the same plates macerated in Vinegar will afford Verdegrease It is sharp Vires digestive and attractive it discusses not onely tender but hard flesh and it is not onely mordacious to the gust but to the very Ulcers If you adde a little of it to a large Searcloth the mixture will exterge without mordacity Many erre in ascribing a Sarcotical or Epulotical faculty to many Medicaments when they of themselves are not but become such by composition Galen CHAP. 7. Of Iron NOthing is more common nothing more useful and nothing more nocent then Iron for neither houses stables nor ships nor yet such things as respect mans vesture and aliment can be had or made without Iron seeing no labour is suscepted no work absolved without the adjument hereof for all Artificers need some Iron Instrument to their work All which I will not in special prosecute seeing it is notorious to every Rustick For not onely Plough-shares Saws Hatches Sickles Tongs and Needles but also Swords Spears Darts Arrows and Canon-bullets which beat down whole Cities and Fortresses killing men and perpetrating a thousand slaughters are made of Iron which Pliny not induring cries out we do not only use Iron at hand but send it to do our mischief at distance one while ejecting it
Effluvium for many abhor many meats which others take with a greedy appetite which though at first they are unlike yet after many concoctions become like and proper to our bodyes whence ariseth a great similitude betwixt the thing nourishing and that which is nourished which scarce can be defined and why this man is more delighted with this meat and that with another The eating of fish and flesh is familiar to our whole Nation yet have we known many faith Amatus Lucianus who altogether abstained from eating of flesh and others Historia notatu dign to whom not onely the eating but also the very smell of Cheese was as poyson Another have we known a Spaniard by Nation who never tasted of Fish but when he was invited by his Friend once to a Supper and had eaten Eggs with which the ashes of dryed Fish was cunningly mixed he fell into such a pain and anguish by vomiting that he was almost killed thereby The same famous Author also saw another a Venetian Monk in whom the smell of Roses would cause Madness which also I have observed in a Noble Lady And Julius Scaliger in a learned Cardinal as he affirms in his Exercises against Cardan viz. Exercit 153. part 10. where he commemorates a certain woman of excellent virtue and beauty named Francis who could by no means be perswaded before she was fourteen years of age to eat Flesh He affirms also that one of his Children as much abhorred Cabbages as himself did the Cressons As also a maid in the City Mediolim dyed with a draught of Cassia fistula for every mans peculiar appetite is proper to himself and many eschew Wint as Poyson others adore it as their God Moreover this inexplicable occult faculty is observed in the food of other Animals For who by reason can declare why the Ostrich delights in Iron why the Hart desires Serpents the Bear Ants the Ass Ferula Some Animals live onely by fishing others by hunting others by Corn others by the natural increase of Plants The Mallet devours the bird Hirron the Beaver little Fishes the Hawk the Eagle and Fox are nourished and fed upon little Birds the Hen the Partridge and the Horse on Corn the Oxe Deer and Hart on little Plants or their tender parts And why these do delight and grow fat rather with that Aliment than this and those rather with this than that cannot easily be explained by reason For the Vulture will sooner perish with Faraine than touch Wheat the Pheasant rather dye than eat by stealth CHAP. IX Of the faculty of purging Medicaments whence it proceeds and how it operates THE disquisition of the faculty of purging Medicaments hath been the exercise of many ingenious men and yet nevertheless as many men as have endeavoured after its knowledge so many several opinions have they left to us their Posterity The Alcumists not without some pains endeavour to demonstrate that it proceeds from the saltness of the Compounds for they lay down this for a general Axiom that all Salts are purgative Others maintain that this faculty is altogether occult not apparently explicable by reason There are others who judge that it arises from the special temperament of the mixture or compound Others look upon it as a fifth quality Mesue would have its original in Heaven and calls it a Heavenly Faculty A purgative Medicine saith he is not such from its temperament not as a Contrary acting upon its Contrary not as a Simile attracting its Simile nor as a heavy matter driving the humour downwards nor as a light substance driving it upwards but it hath this faculty alotted from above acting by a Divine power This Celestial Faculty is also by some Medicks Fernel and Philosophers Scaliger called an Occult Faculty sometimes also the property of the matter alone sometimes the internal principle of every thing The divers denominations of this quality sometimes an unknown cause a super-elementary virtue a property of the whole substance and by some a fifth quality so that one and the same thing hath divers denominations But because that this purgative virtue according to Philosophers of best note must needs be deduced from the Stars Mesue calls it most properly Celestial but he aims amiss in judging that it draws out humours not as a simile attracting its simile contrary to the Antients opinions reason and experience For Hippocrates declares lib. de nat human that purgative Medicaments have a certain congruity with the humours A Medicine sayes he when it is assumed into the body first attracts whatsoever is consonant and most like to its nature in the body and afterwards draws down and purges away the rest Which he proves clearly by this elegant comparison As seeds and plants sown and eradicated in the ground attract to themselves whatever in the earth is congruent to their nature whether sharp or pleasant bitter or salt or whatsoever else they primarily or chiefly allure as having propinquity with their essence Galen demonstrates this more clearly illustrating it with many evidences lib. 1. de nat facult cap. 23. lib. 3. de simplic lib. de Ther. writing in express words that the operations are effected and perfected by the property of the qualities which are in the substances therefore some purgative Medicaments if perchance they be frustrated of their acquired purgation do not hurt the body as some foolishly have imagined but become nutrimental others are turned into corruption and poyson yet a poysonous virtue is not alwayes mixed with them Wherefore they do not alwayes hurt when they do not purge but they concoct and produce such humous as they should have educed which never happens to stronger Medicaments Therefore purgative Medicaments by a certain similitude and congruity to the substance attract and educe humours and by the same principle that the Loadstone attracts Iron and Amber Straw not Iron the Loadstone or Straw Amber for although there be a great similitude betwixt the Loadstone and the Iron yet every simile is not the same neither is the Loadstone Iron nor the Iron a Loadstone yet the thing attracting should be more potent than the thing attracted and therefore the Iron as weaker is drawn and draweth not Objectio Since Traction comes by the similitude of the substance why doth not one Loadstone attract another and one piece of Iron another Responsio I answer One and the same thing doth not draw the same but such things as have an affinity and similitude with them so Agarick draws flegm Rhabarb choler Senna melancholy because there is betwixt them a certain conjugal quality or rather a convenience or similitude which conformity is not altogether manifest for Rhabarb differs much from choler Agarick from flegm and Senna from melancholy Although all Catharticks do attract humours Quae purgant trahendo yet some of them do purge more especially by attraction to wit such as are of a more potent force and have an excrementious humour saith
crass and frigid humours CHAP. IX Of Polypody POlypody is so tearmed because many knots and tubercles like the Fishes called Polypi grow on its roots It is also called Dentropteris or tree fern because it grows on trees and sometimes on umbrous stones mossy walls and such humid places It is an herb without stalk flower and seed consisting onely of a root and leaves like masculine fern but lesser and maculated on the under side with yellow spots It s root is hirsute and long about the crassitude of a little finger extending it self obliquely and exasperated with many lumps within it is porraceous and virid like a Pastick nut its sapour is very sweet subamare austere and somewhat aromatical but it doth not much affect the tongue It doth not calefy in the third degree as Mesue thought but it 's probable that it exsiccates in the second it deterges digests and ficcates crass and viscid humours educes melancholick and viscid flegm and that even from the articles if it be copiously assumed It sustains much coction and is seldome given alone but mixed with other purgatives which may adauge its imbecil purgative faculty The broth of an old Cock the decoction of Bete or Mallows much augment its purgative faculty It helps also some affections when it is externally applyed Diosc c. 188. l. 4. CHAP. X. Of Carthamus Bastard or Spanish Saffron AS the nomenclature of Cartham denotes this herb to be purgative so doth Enicus shew it spinous For Cartham is a Plant which as to its faculty is subductive and to its cognation of the sorts of Carduus It assurges on a stalk two cubits high and more which is strait hard ligneous and towards the top ramous Its leaves are long broad from the middle to the stalk acuminated towards the top and aculeated in their ambient The extremities of the branches produce some round heads about the magnitude of Olives obduced with many spinous skins which emit Saffron-colour'd flowers so like them of Crocus that most perspicacious eyes may be deceived in them hence the Vulgar call it the wild Crocus To these succeed long smooth white angulous and splendent seeds effigiated like them of Heliotrope whose cortex is hard and medulla or pith white fat and sweet Cartham is by the Seplasiaries called wild Crocus by the Medicks Cnicum whereof there are two sorts the one sative or vulgar the other wild whereof Theophrastus makes two sorts also the one with a strait caul which women use for distaffs which according to Ruellius c. 155. l. 3. is a kinde of thistle and wild Cartham the other lower grosser and more hirsute which they call Carduus Benedictus of which elsewhere Carthamus seed is purgative Vires for its very pith solely assumed is flegmagogous and mixed with other Medicaments expurges lent and frigid humours but that it calefies not in the third degree sense demonstrates contrary to Galen's opinion CHAP. XI Of Wallwort or Dwarf-Elder WAllwort and Elder are so similar Ebulus that they seem to differ solely in magnitude whence Dioscorides calls them both Elders the one the Arboreous Elder the other the Dwarf-Elder Elder grows into a tall tree sometimes whose boughs and bole are hollow medullous and round like reeds first green then cineritious ligneous and hard Sambucus its leaves are like them of a Wallnut tree but graveolent and in their ambient frequently incided Its flowers are many small white and elegantly composed into heads whose consequents are turgent berries of a sanguineous colour The Elder germinates first of wild trees and is last denudated of its leaves But Wall-wort or Dwarf-Elder is more herbaceous and low whose stalk is neither ligneous nor perpetual but annually tabefying and dying It grows best in moyst and fat soyls especially if they be incultivated Its leaves are ample and incided about Its flowers composed into heads are numerous white odorate not fetid Its fruits like Elders are small round black and pregnant with juice and seed Its roots are crass long and carnous out of its fruits in Autumn they get small seeds which they keep in their Pharmacopolies Both its roots and seeds are hydragogous and very apertive and therefore usefull in hydroptical and watry diseases CHAP. XII Of Esula or Devils milk THere are seven sorts of Tithymals enumerated amongst the lacteous Plants whereunto Esulae are congenerate Esula for they are all lacteous and purge flegm with griping and molestation yet Esula is by the Rusticks taken for Rhabarb and so frequently used to the valitude of many and the death of more It is called Esula or Caula by the Arabians Alsebran by Diascorides Peplus by the Shopmen Esula rotunda because its small leaves are orbiculated It grows in vineyards hedge sides and many incultivated places Another Plant which Dioscorides calls Peplion and Peplis and some water Plantain hath much cognation and the same virtues with this Esula The round and lesser Esula is better than the greater which hath leaves like Tithymal Esula is hot Vires sharp and ulcerative violently educing flegm its substance being tenuious is igneous sharp incisive tenuative fusive apertive and siccative Besides flegm it draws also choler from the junctures It s ferity is castigated by infusion in vinegar as we have shewed in Officina c. 8. l. 2. or by admistion of some cordials or roberatives CHAP. XIII Of Hermodactyls HErmodactyls Hermodactylus and Colchian Ephemora are bulbous Plants similar in form in faculties dissimilar for * Quick-fading flower Ephemerum is strangulative in one day suffocating the assumer and no way subducing the belly in purging whereas Hermodactyls are no way perilous and yet expurge orderly flegm from the junctures There is also indigenous Ephemerum which some call wild Leeks or meadow Cracus whose leaves are but three or four long broad smooth The difference between Hermodactyls and Ephemerum and fat ones whose flowers are in colour and form like them of Crocus issuing out at the same time to wit in Autumn It s root is like an Onion it grows in meadows and moyst places it is by some erroneously usurped for Hermodactyle for this being exsiccated is flaccid feeble and not at all purgative nor yet pernicious as the Colchian Ephemerum which is strangulative whereas Hermodactyle is exotical and not flaccid as this but hard compact and easily pulverable which educes humours from the remote parts and junctures of the assumer Now one sort of Ephemerum is lethal and strangulative to wit the Colchian another not strangulative to wit our indigenous one a third purgative and safe to wit the Syrian which in Pharmacopolies is called Hermodactyla Hermodactyle calefies and siccates in the beginning of the second degree Vires yet with such excrementitious flatulent and nauseative humidity that it makes the ventricle aversant to it especially then when the commoved humours with one conflux come upon it It draws flegm and other viscid humours even from the
it Anemone The third hath pedal geniculated hoary hispid and graveolent surcles with leafs like Chervil red flowers and capitls rostrated like Storks The whole plant is red whence it was of old called Rubel now Rubertian sometimes Robertian or herb Robert The fourth hath lacinated red leafs purpureous flowers and heads rostrated as the former The fifth is called Ranunculus because it bears leafs like frogs its flowers are patulous and subcaeruleous its heads like the former it is twofold the one greater whose flowers are caeruleous the other lesser whose flowers are red The sixth expands slender lanuginous branches small and laciniated leafs purpureous flowers to which the Stork bills succeed There is also a tuberous Storks bill so called from its crasse nodose and tuberous root it luxuriates with many round surcles leafs like Anemone much laciniated red patulous fair flowers on the tops of its caulicles like little Roses Besides these others are by some enumerated as the montanous Storks bill the Ladies Comb the Doves foot and another which for its suaveolence is called sweet Storks bill which growes copiously in many places in Normandy especially in maritimous tracts some call it the herb Camphorata but they erre for Camphorata is of the family of Ground-pines but I find Southernwood called Camphorata by many for it smells like Camphire For defect of Camphorata suaveolent Storks bill may be substituted in the confection of the unguent Martiatum if both be wanting the first sort of Storks bill may be desumed All of them are indued with the same faculty Vires the Moscative is calefactive nerval and discussive the Rupertian detersive and accommodate to Ulcers CHAP. LXII Of Doronicum or Leopards Bane THat which Mesue calls Doronici Actuarius Carnabadium and it is likely that which Paulus calls Memirem and Matthiolus falsly Aconitum Padalianche we call vulgar Roman Doronicum whereof that Matthiolus might give his opinion he experienced his upon a dogg which by that means dyed I besides the authority of grave men can oppose him by experience for I gave a great quantity thereof to a dogg which he eat up without harm yea it is daily usurped successeful in decoctions and cordiall Electuaries besides the famous Doctor Conradus Gesnerus asserts that he hath often assumed Doronicums root condited and drunk two dragms of its powder in water yea that he had frequently and successefully prescribed it either solitary or mixed with other medicaments to his patients And though we grant to Matthiolus that Doronicum kills dogs it does not thence follow that it is lethall to men for both are not of the same nature nor yet live of the same aliment thus Aloes kills Foxes not men Nux vomica kills Cats and many Birds which is to us a solutiferous medicament Doronicum then must not be disapproved of as poyson since many commend it if not for an aromatical yet for an alexiterial simple And therefore Mesueus uses it in the Electuary de Gemmis because there is some theriacality in it Avicen Tract 2. de med cord Doronicum is a small plant with slender cauls soft and long leafs like Plantain somewhat flave and hirsute like Mouse-ears whose ambitient is rotund somewhat laciniated and a little acuminated its roots are small rotund and orbicular growing more angust towards their extreams like the body and tail of a Snake their colour is white sapour dulcoamare and somewhat astrictive its flowers are luteous and radiate like Oxe eye Some make but three varieties of Doronicum which seem solely to discrepate in magnitude Clusius enumerates seven amongst which Damasonion which most call Alisma is comprehended and Classicall Authors affirm that the root of Damasonion may well be substituted for the root of common Doronicum in the confection of the Electuary de gemmis and other cordiall compounds for it is commended against poysons whether ingested or inflicted by Dioscorides C. 69. L. 3. whereby it seems more convenient for these concoctions then Doronicum of whose faculties some doubt others speak little Now Damasonium is very Doronicum in effigies bearing leafs like Plantain but more angust lacinious and conveyed downwards with a slender simple caul of more then a cubits heighth a pale flower slender acrimonious and odorate roots which are good against poysons Doronicum is hot and dry almost in the third degree Vires it discusses flatuosity is good against palpitation and conduces to such as are venenately and pestilentiously diseased or bitten by Serpents CHAP. LXIII Of Cardus Benedictus ATractylis which is a kind of bastard Saffron is twofold the one whereof hath a streight Caul and is thence called recticaul the other emits procumbent surcles and is thence called Straticaul and by a more usuall name Carduus Benedictus it is a plant well known to all its Cauls are round obsequious brachiated and decumbent its leafs laciniated on both sides and spinose the summities of its surcles emit little heads stipated with spinose and pungent leafs whence it is called Acanacia which heads are lanuginous and turgid with long dusky and bearded seed the flower is pallid its root which is small in respect of the numerosity of its branches and leafs is white and divided into fibres Carduus Benedictus being exceedingly amare Vires calefies roborates the heart and vital parts moves sudour resists poysons conduces against pestilentious diseases mitigates the dolours of the Reins and sides kills Worms and prevails against the bitings of Serpents CHAP. LXIV Of Cardiobotanum or Cardiaca or Motherwort MYrepsus in the confecture of his unguent Martiatum puts Cardiobotanum Nic. Praepositus Carducellum but what either of them are we cannot easily define Many use white Chamaeleon for Carducellum and Carduus Benedictus for Cardiobotanum others use Cardiaca or Agripalma which we call Motherwort It is called Cardiaca from its effect for it is thought that it conduces in heart affections but it is strange that so insuave an odour should laetificate the heart which delights so much in suaveolents Cardiaca or Agripalma for so it is often named is a cubital plant seldom lower often taller bearing quadrangular hard and crasse cauls of a blackish red colour its leafs are broad obscurely green like nettle leafs laciniated and divided with deep incisures its flowers small purpureously white verticulately circumcinging its furcles and emerging out of its caulicles It growes in incultivated strong and rough places some call it Melissa others Syteritis Herculana It is hot and dry in the second degree it absterges expurges kills belly-Worms Vires liberates from obstructions helps in Convulsions and cures the affections of the heart yet its foetour portends it to be no whit cordial CHAP. LXV Of Black Chamaeleon Thistle THere are almost innumerable varieties of Thistles to whose family both the white and black Chamaeleon are referred the white hath no caul but from the midst of its broad long procumbent leafs emits a head covered with prickles some take it for Carducellum but
so much called medicall Apples from Medus as from their medicall qualityes for their odour pill flesh pulpe succe grains and all are eximiously medicinall here of there are three differences the first is called a Limmon which is turbinated with an oblong effigies is colorated herbaceously and turgid with a more acid acerb and frigid succe corticated with a thinner pill and not so amare as an Orenge the second is the more vulgar Citron very like the former but its colour is more luteous its pill more crasse rugous and caperated and it selfe more crasse odorate medicative and convenient for antidotes the third is greatest called Pom-Citron orbiculated like a melon with a thick carnous pill somtimes aequalling a mans nayle in crassitude with a concolorated superficies which we call Poncerium Citroniatum Assyrian Apple and Adams Apple all which names seem to be deflected from the Tree and as they are alike in Idea so also in facultyes As them of the third sort which we call Ponoeria superate the rest in magnitude so doth the first which we call Lina in parvity for it scarce aequalises an egge in magnitude yea most of that sort when they have attained their perfect growth are no whit crasser then Apricocks some whereof are oblong others short and rotund all suaveolent vestited with a thin cortex salurated with much succe of a dulco-acid and gratefull sapour they are very copious and eximious in Italy especially in the fields near Luca. The Trees from which they are collected are perpetually virid Laurifolious and alwayes pomiferous for some are just erupting others more adult others almost mature and other deciduous at all times on the same Tree All Limmons and Citrons refrigerate arceate putretude recreate the heart and resist Poysons which Athenaeus proves by an admirable History of two sentenced offenders who by the command of the Aegyptian King according to their Lawes were to be exposed a prey to Asps each of them in their journey received a Citron of an huckster which condoled their condition they are it who thereupon felt no pain when they were bitt by those cruell Serpents which the judge admired and seeking the cause found that each of them had eaten a Citron the next day he commanded a Citron to be given to one of them and not to the other they were againe lead to their punnishment he that had eaten the Citron felt no molestation the other being all over livid with biteings dyed CHAP. IIII. Of Orenges AUrenges or aureous Apples so called from their colour grow upon a Tree very like the Limmon-Tree in effigies for their colours odours flowers and leafes are the same only they differ a little in that part next the peduncle which in the Orenge is as it were pinnated and double they are dilutely green odorate and concolorate with the Limmon-Trees fruits the Tree whereon they grow is tall ramous perpetually virid and daily pomiferous some growing other falling and others ripening it beares flowers al the year which are white elegant suaveolent and more fragrant in Summer then other times some whereof adhaere to a nodose pedicle and are faecund others are enodous and sterile Aqua Naphae so much celebrated for its suavity and fragrance is distilled from these which Matrons and delicate Courtiers wash their faces hair and hands with Great plenty of Orenges are carried from Spain Italy and France into other regions some whereof are sweet and ingratefull or at least not pleasant to the gust others acid jucund cordiall and gratefull to the palate all round nitent of a Golden colour or very flave whence they are often called Golden Apples The sweet ones are temperate the acid ones refrigerate arceate putretude resist Poysons and corroborate Vires their pills are acrimonious amare and hot which for their gracious odour are used in sawces condited in Sugar it emends the breath of ones mouth CHAP. V. Of Pomegranates THis Tree commonly called Granate and its fruit Pomegranate derives its denomination either from the multitude of graines wherewith it is referted or else from the region of Granata where it fruticates copiously it delights in hot aire and dry ground its leafes are like myrtle leafes which fall off annually its flower is red oblong jucund of aspect and resembles a cup in effigies the vulgar call it Balaustium though that name in Dioscorides his opinion may rather be deduced to the wild ones There are two sorts of Pomegranate-Trees the one wild which is florigerous but withall infrugiferous the other domesticall whereof there are three differences one beares acid Pomegranates another sweet ones and the third dulco-acid ones all of them are angulous and crasse referted with many graines demerged in much juice It s cortex is called Malicore and by some Sedion it is viridly flave like vitriol whereof according to Alcumists it participates its flower is oblong purpureous and fait which Pliny calls Balaustians The whole Pomegranate is astrictive and refrigerative but its succe is indued with the best facultyes which recreates the heart allayes the heat of the stomack and cures the Cholerick passion sweet Pomegranates molest the stomack CHAP. VI. Of Quinces QUinces grow upon a Tree which they call Cotonea or Catonea from M. Cato but the Graecians long agoe called it Cydonea from Cydon a Town in Crete where it was first found but I should rather believe that its name Colonea was given to it because of its tomentitious cortex resembling Cotten for these Apples are vested with a certain dawen like Cotten dawen The Tree from which they are excerped is commonly low assurgeing like a shrub vested with a sharp and gapeing Barke produceing things like scales its boughs are many short tortuous and cineritious its leafes subrotund mucronated green above white beneath soft and lanuginous its flowers albid somwhat purpureous and quinquefolious its fruits crasse very flave tomentitious and odorate emitting an odour jucund to some ingratefull to others its sapour is alike to all flesh luteous succe austere its seed as in other Apples is included in membranes and reconded as it were in Caskets The Quince-Tree is fruitfull in every place but most in hot regions cultivated places and Garden sides for then its fruits will be more and aureous some whereof are rounder shorter lesser and nearer the figure of vulgar Apples which are called Quinces absolutely others greater crasser longer turbinated and more like Peares vulgarly called Coignacea which are not so good as the former Some also are more candid others strutheous all more luteous and almost aureous whence they are called Chrysomels or Golden Apples such as are more lanuginous and by their fragrancy affect the heads of some men make very many eustomachicall medicaments as conserves waters and syrups of Quinces whereof there is much use both in health and sicknesse Quinces can searce be eaten crude when cocted they are more gratefull to the palate Vires they roborate the ventricle allay vomiting
lachrimously whence it is often called Tears Liquor if this Liquor be oleaginous and liquid we call it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Rosine if more terrene aqueous and concrete in the Trunks of Trees Resina Gummi we call it Gum if it be partly terrene and aqueous partly oleaginous and fatt participating both of the nature of Gum and Rosine then we call it Gummy Rosine Now Gum that I may use the exoticall Idiome Commi Gummi quid is a coagulated Lachryma or tear concreted in the Trunks of those Trees that produce it Gal. C. 40. L. de simp whose substance is more aqueous as that of Rosine is more oleaginous Gums therefore should be admixed most to aqueous seldome to oleaginous medicaments Rosine in the contrary easily takes flame but Gumme cracks in the fire for though it come hott from stillation yet is it presently coagulated in the air and becomes aqueous and hence Arostotle makes it to crack upon burning coles But since it is of many kinds according to the different nature of the Trees that produce it for some Gums are coagulated hard like a stone others softer some more pellucid or flave others more obscure or pallid some flowing from peregrine others from indigenous Trees I shall first treat of that which comes out of the spine Acacia and is nominated Gumme simply CHAP. III. Of Gum-Arabick GUmme is an Arabick word and when it is put absolutely it must be understood of Gum-Arabick which Galen calls Thebane some Babylonian and others Acanthine Gumme Nomina Acacia Gummi flua It flowes from a certain arbuscle which Dioscorides calls Acacia whereof he constitutes two sorts the first assurging with a direct and lignous caule armed on every side with hard spines vested with long leafes which look as if they were constituted of many small leafes cohaereing together white flowers short codds Species like Lupines a glabre and splendent seed which Matthiolus depinges ill The other Acacia growes in Cappadocia and Pontus which is lesser slenderer and lower then the other whose leafes are like Rue and virgults aculeated out of which a succe is educed which retaines the name of its Arbuscle Acacia because of whose rarity we substitute the succe of the wild Plum-Tree out of which laudable Gum flowes forth at first pellucid as glasse sincere and contracted into the species of a vermicle afterwards white sordid resinous and uselesse It is efficacious in spissating and refrigerating Vires it is commodiously mixed with ocular and arteriall medicaments it obstructs the pores of the skin is represses prociduous eyes that it may be more easily pulverated it must be verberated in a hot mortar with a hot Pestell CHAP. IIII. Of Gumme Tragacanth GUm-Tragacanth is pellucid white sweet light and sincere which flowes from the vulnerated root of a certain Plant of the same name this root adhaeres to the surface of the Earth and emitts low and rigid surcles whereon are many and slender leafes which cover white straight and firm spines this arbuscle which the Greeks call Tragacantha and the Latines Spina herci growes in Crete and many places in Asia which emitts its succe spontaneously and without incisure as Theophrastus asserts contrary to Dioscorides who saith that this Plant hath no need of vulneration which though it be exoticall and seldome seen by our herbalists yet I saw it cicurated and florid in the Garden of Jo. Gonnerius that perite Physitian yet it s coagulated succe which the Gentiles call Tragacanthum and the Apothecaryes Dragaganthum is sufficiently known to all it cannot be easily laevigated unlesse the Morter and pestle be hot It s use is commended to ocular medicaments in a liniment with Honey or Sugar Vires it emends the roughnesse of the artery coughs retusenesse of voice and other defluxions CHAP. V. Of Gum Ammoniacum THis Gum is called Ammoniack because it distills upon the Sands neare Jupiter Ammons Oracle but from what Plant is uncertain Pliny saith it flowes from a Tree they call Metopion Dioscorides sayes it emanates both from a shrub they call Agasyllis and from a ferulaceous Plant but the ferulaceous Plants can scarce be called fruticall Galen asserts that it is the Tears of Ferula from which is collected both a sincere dense Gumme conspurcated with no sordidity and coacted into small glebes as also an impure and inquinated one which Dioscorides call Phyrama who calls the other Thrausma That is good which is inquinated with no sandy terrene nor extraneous matter effigiated like masculine frankincense graveolent and amare the Apothecaryes call it corruptly Gum Armoniack it may be dissolved in Water Vinegar or White-Wine It is so efficacious a mollitive that it dissolves the stoney disease of the Junctures and discusses other tubercles it cures indurated Milts Vires and in drink liberates from obstructions it moves urine and flowers and extrudes stones CHAP. VI. Of Lacca and Cancamum WHat Lacca and what Cancamum are whether they be both one or distinct and what each of them is doeth not appeare by the writings of Authours Serapio Paulus and Matthiolus believe that Lacca is that which Dioscorides calls Cancamum Brasavolus Garcias ab horto and Clusius think it is a distinct thing who being desirous to find out the truth have lustrated various tracts of the world and think that Lacca is not only distinct from Cancamum but also unknown for seeing it is only used for perfumes and we have many more fragrant and suaveolent Thymiamata it hath not been so diligently sought after moreover being exoticall the Tree from which it delabes growing as it is thought in Arabia our Merchants have not deigned it worth the search and portage however it is a kind of Gum of a virous sapour sweet odour and rare use Now Lacca is destitute of both these qualityes frequently invented neither the Arabian Chermes nor the succe of Sorbe-Tree nor Medlar-Tree nor yet like Myrrhe as Avicenna writes who it may be knew it not but if Garcias de horto may be credited it is a kind of Favago and concreted liquor on the boughs of a vast Tree coacted by the sucking and help of winged Ants. And this Tree growes not in Arabia but in India especially in the province of Pegu where Lacca is called Trec as also in Bengala and Malavar where it is called Loc and Lac. Garcias indeavours to establish and confirme this opinion by reason and much History striving also to prove out of Amatus Lusitanus that Cancamum is an Aroma otherwise called Anyme whereof he constitutes two varietyes the one white which also according to Brissotus a Physician of Paris is Dioscorides his Cancamum and the other somwhat black which myrrhe or rather Mynea or Amynea Thus the obscurity of the thing Vires drives us to the affinity of names there to investigate the truth but if I may speak freely I think that Anyme or Amynea as some will have it
Myrrhe and Cancamum are three distinct things and that that which the shopmen call Lacca is that same which the ancients called Cancanum who being ignorant of some words depromed from the Barberians believed such things as they heard though never so slackly and so by calling Cancamum Lacca left this liberty of discussing to the ensuing posterity Some maintaine this opinion saying that there are three sorts of Lacca one is Dioscorides his Cancamum which scarce any ever saw the second common Lacca the third factitious which Dyers use whereof there are more differences which for brevitys sake I omit The vulgar Lacca is hard pellucid and yellow like Myrrhe circularly involving the surcles of an exoticall Tree which is not I think elicited elaborated and cohibited to the boughs of that Tree by the sucking and labour of Indian Ants as Garcias affirmes but exudes and concretes spontaneously like other Gummes and Teares for these animalls labouring for victualls in Summer against Winter do not expose their panifice to the injuryes of the aire and Heavens on boughs but recond it in Caves and Holes and few I hope will believe that Indian Ants will labour in vain for Lacca and not congest and coact it for meat but desert it That which is brought to us circumvests the sticks of the Tree is hard and pellucid easily dissolvable in water and this ingredes the trochisckes of Carabe and Dialacca and not the factitious Lacca as some perperously imagine It is not so much celebrated for medicinall as other mechanicall uses Vires as to the makeing of sealing Wax and infecting such tinctures as are put upon ligneous vessells and adorning other colours for it makes them shine elegantly CHAP. VII Of Dragons-Blood THe pervestigation of Dragons-Blood hath exercised many wits for some following the erroneous opinion of Pliny think that it is the Blood of a Dragon animate smitten by an Elephant which errour Solinus doth not only embrace but holds that Cinnabaris is that same which Apothecaryes call Dragons-Blood Serapio writes that it is the succe of a certaine Plant which he calls Sydrichis and Egilos which our Herbalists think is the fourth species of Wall-sage some ignorant Apothecaryes are imposed upon by circulators and buy a kind of businesse tincted with red Earth and the juice of Madder and such things convolved into lumps for Dragons-Blood Brassavolus foolishly constitutes three sorts of Dragons-Blood the first factitious of pseudobole the second the lacrymae of a certaine Tree the third Gumme But as the adulterate is no species of Dragons-Blood so neither can there be two sorts the one a Lacryma the other a Gumme of the same Tree for all Gumms lacrymously distilling from any Tree are called generally lacrymae Aloysius Cadamustus a noble Venetian expresses its Originall better There is saith he in an Island called Pontus Sanctus which is one of the Canaryes Dragons-Blood which is the Lachryma of a certaine Tree which at a certaine season the incolists fauclate out of which incisions the next yeare Gumme will emanate which they coct in kettles and defaecate making thereof Dragons-Blood That Tree beares fruits like Cherryes in March which are of an eximious sapour and Venetian colour Nic. Monardus seems to assent to this opinion and asserts that Dragons-Blood is the lachryma of some Tree and not the Goare of any animall for saith he a few dayes agoe a Carthaginian Bishop brought hither from the continent of the new World some of the fruit of that Tree which emitts that Lacryma we call Dragons-Blood The fruit is very admirable for the skin wherewith it is covered being taken away a little Dragon appeares of such artificiall yet naturall fabricature that the most perite artist cannot better ingrave it in Marble it is conspicuous with an oblong neck a gaping mouth an aculeated back-bone a long tayle and feet From this fruit both the Tree and its Lacryma derived their names that is best which is brought from Carthage The Tree is tall with a thin barke and easily vulnerable whose name being unknown to the ancients they wrote no certainty of the nature and originall of its Lacryma Clusius saw the Tree and described it accurately Dragons-Blood then is the name both of an exoticall Tree and the hard purpureous Gumme concreted on its boughs It is collective and agglutinatory and therefore fitt to conjoyn wounds and astringe and roborate laxe parts Vires it may easily be dissolved in water CHAP. VIII Of Asa foetida MAny following the opinion of the ancients constitute two sorts of Asa one sweet and odorate and the other Faetid and stinking the later they say is the Arabian Altit the former the Apothecaryes Belzoni and both come out of Laser or Laserpitium but what sweet Asa is cannot yet be determined Nay I think it is more ignore to this latter age then Asa foetida was to the ancients of which they never make mention that I know of but now it is so frequent in Pharmacopolyes that it offends every youngsters nose in growes on a ferulaceous Plant as Belzoin doth of a tall one which I never find called Asa But as the sapour odour and Originall of each of them is different so is their nomenclative Now Asa foetida is the excrement Asa quid or Gumme of Laser or Laserpitium which Dioscorides calls Stilphion Avicenna Altit or Antit the Indians Anjuden and the Apothecaryes Assa but more properly Asa as if they should say Laser for Laser is a Lacryma Laserpitium a Plant out of which this Laser or Asa is elicited not Assa which according to Rhasis is an hearb that some call Hyssope others Thyme Now Laserpitium is a serulaceous Plant with an annuall Caule which they call Maspetum leafes like Apium but flave broad and foliaceous seed and a black crasse long and cubitall root Garcias indeed doth boldly pronounce Asa a Lacryma of Laserpitium but exhibites a jejune description thereof speaking only a little of its leafes which he saith are like Hasse leafes This Plant doth peculiarly avoid all cultivated places and therefore by culture absolutely deviates and degenerates as naturally despiseing culture according to Theophrastus to whom ferocity is vernacular I find each part of this Plant designed by a speciall nomenclature for some call its root Magudaris it s Caule Silphion its leafes Mospetum its feed Folium for saith Theophrastus that folium is feed but Magydaris differs from Laserpitium now whether it be a part of the same Plant or another Plant allyed hereunto it matters not for Asa is the Lacryma or Gumme of Laserpitium which is either taken from its root or from its caule Theophrastus calls that of the root Radicarium and the other Scaparium It growes in Armenia Media Lybia and Syris whence it is somtimes called the Lybian somtimes the Median and Syrian succe They called it of old the Cyrenian succe because it grew copiously and well in the Cyrenian feilds but
that name is now almost abrogated for the Barbarians out of some hatred conceived against the Cyrenians eradicated and extirpated all their Laserpitium as Strabo denotes The Syrian Laser is best after the Cyrenian and the Median after the Syrian There are two sorts of Asa the one pure sincere and transparent the other turbid and impure wherewith bran or Sagapene is mixed whole halite and stinking odour it well resembles Hence the Germans call it the Devills dung both of them are very odorate but graveolent so that I cannot easily assent to their opinion who think that one sort of Asa is sweet for neither the odour of the one nor of the other can be tolerated without loathsomnesse whence I admite that Garcias should say that no simple medicament in all India should be more in use then Asa foetida both in medicines and also in meats The Indians are wont to mix it with their Pot-hearbs in their pottage having first rubbed their kettles therewith useing no other condiment to any meat but take it to recall their appetite when they nauseate any thing If this be not a fable Asa must either not stink in India or the Indians must have brasen throats as the Proverb goes this Asa is so ingratefull to us both in odour and sapour that we can easily pardon Matthaeus Sylvaticus who reposed it amongst Poysons yet Dioscorides commends it for meat Who enumerated so many and so great faculties Vires wherewith it is indued that he was able to move loathsomnesse The more recent hold it very efficacious but only to a few affections who never use it save against the ascent and aberration of the uterus and some other diseases appertaining to women CHAP. IX Of Sagapene or Serapine SAgapene by Apothecaryes Serapinum is a concrete liquour flowing out of the sauciated root of a ferulaceous Plant in Media whose description Dioscorides omitted because perhaps he had not so much knowledge of the Plant as of the succe which Plant I neither yet saw nor read designed by any authour for being exoticall it is either not cicurable or if cicurated sterile without sucee and marcid It s concrete succe therefore is only brought us the best whereof is translucid yellow white within acrimonious graveolent and crasse in substance Sagapene calefyes in the third degree siccates in the second purges crasse Phlegme and other viscid humours as Mesue attests yet its purgative faculty is in some very ignave in others potent for either drunk or used by way of suppository it evokes flowers kills the young cures the dolour and praefocation of the uterus resolves attenuates dissipates moves and solves CHAP. X. Of Galbanum GAlbanum is also the concrete succe of a Syrian Ferula copiously growing in the Mountain Amanus which succe some call Metopium Dioscorides knowing this Gummeous succe better then the Plant left nothing in writing of its dignotion but as the ferulae are well known so also are their liquors and succes and that not only by their consistency but colour odour sapour and facultyes for Galbanum in aspect repraesents Asa in odour Opopanax The best is cartilaginous syncere like Gumme Ammoniack not lignous in which there is some ferula seed graveolent not very humid nor squalid this as all other Gummes may be easily dissolved in water Vinegar or Wine It is excalefactive extractive discussive it accelerates flowers deliverance in Child-bearing either by admotion or suffumigatiō dissolved with Vinegar and mixed with a little nitre it deleats pimples it discusses boyles and lumps on the junctures Vires it is adverse to Poysons and drives away Serpents CHAP. XI Of Opopanax THat Opopanax is the succe of Panax both its name demonstrates and Dioscorides affirmes but seeing there are many sorts of Panax it is not apparent out of which of them it emerges Mesue saies it flowes from the ferulaceous Panax Dioscorides from th◠Heraclean and some say from the Chironian Panax Dodoneus tells us that it distills from a peregrine Panax to wit the Syrian Panax which hath ample sharpe hirsute long and broad leafes a geniculated and ferulaceous Caule of three or four cubits heighth supernally disterminated into many boughs with luteous flowers erupting out of ample umbells after which broad plain and subflave seeds do emerge its root is whitish long succulent and odorate a Gummeous succe flowes out of its Caule vulnerated especially towards the root in summer which Pliny and many more call Opopanax which is laudable for many uses as the nomenclature of the Plant from which it flowes demonstrates for Panax or Panaces denotes the abigation of all dolours and the remedy of all diseases hence many Pseudomedicks call some medicaments which are more perilous then the diseases Panaceous remedyes thus did a lying drunken vain salacious Pseudomedick deceive many Country and credulous persons while he lived Opopanax is a kind of Gumme easily dissolvable by water it excalefyes in the third degree siccates in the second mollifyes digests Vires attenuates dissipates flatuosity leniates and expurges that which is very amate white within or somwhat yellow fatt tender friable easily liquestible and graveolent is good the black and soft is not good CHAP. XII Of Sarcocolla SArcocolla is both the name of a peregrine Plant and a Gumme flowing out of it it growes in Persia it is fruticous and spinose with nodose boughs appressed to the Tree which sauciated and somtimes spontaneously lacrymates a kind of Frankincense like Powder of a yellowish colour and amare sapour It calefyes in the second degree siccates not so much it cocts deterges carnifyes and glutinates whence it is called Sarcocolla Vires for it heales wounds wonderfully for it doth by a proper faculty expurge them from filth repleate them with flesh and obduce them to a skarre The Arabians say that Sarcocolla doth not only subduce the belly but educe crasse and viscid humours from places much dissited as from the cavityes of the Articles but reason and their effects seem to refragate this it doth indeed with much efficacy conglutinate wounds inhibite the fluxions of the eyes and digest but not so much as Galbanum if it be five dayes macerated in Asses milke in a glasse-vessell and the milk daily changed it will exceedingly help such as have pearls or dimme and clowdy eyes CHAP. XIII Of Gumme of Jvy THe trunk of the greater Ivy vulnerated and somtimes spontaneously elacrymates a certain Gummeous succe of an aureous colour graveolent and sharpe to the gust which they call Ivy-Gumme Now Ivy is a Scansory Tree which circumvests walls and vicine Plants which it kills with its multifarious convolutions and virour Wherof there are two prime kinds the one greater which erects it selfe on high the other lesser which creeps along the ground with slender and obsequious branches neither beareing flower nor fruit There are three varietyes of the greater Ivy one is called white Ivy because it beares
All Bitumen is not solid and hard but some there is perpetually liquid and fluid called Naphta which is the colature of Babylonian Bitumen white of colour and most capacious of fire for there is so much cognation betwixt this and fire that it will presently leap into it when near it There is also black Bitumen As the true and native Bitumen of Judaea and Sodome come not to us in whose stead we use Pissaphaltus or factitious Bitumen made of Petreol Pitch and other things so neither the true Naphta in whose stead we assume a certain liquor that falls from the fields near Modena which they call Petreol as if it were Oyl educed out of a Rock for both have the same cansistency colour and vertue But Pissaphaltus is the commixion of Pitch and Bitumen as its name designs which some use for Mumy of which hereafter All Bitumen discusses mollifies glutinates defends from inflammation by obfaction suffumigation or imposition emends the Proptosis and strangulation of the Uterus but our Bitumen is seldome right Naphta extenuates incides digests penetrates absumes frigid and crasse humours in all parts of the body and cures the resolution of the Nerves Palsey and diseases in the arteries from a cold cause Some yet recenseate more bitumens as that furfurous pinguetude which some call Whales-sperm Sperma Caeti quid others White-Amber and many The flower of the Sea for it is collected on the Sea whose fat spume or innatant flower it is Many think it is Dioscorides his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 CHAP. 9. Of Sulphur SUlphur is either native and fossile called Brimstone and Quick-sulphur or factitious the native is naturally generated of a certain fat portion of earth much whereof is in Lipara Melos and such places where the factitious is made the splendent pellucid and not saxous is best whose colour without is subcincritious within subluteous Many Mountains are very sulphureous as Aetna which eructates perpetual flames The factitious is made of some fat Glebes which are effoded out of sulphureous Mynes The manner of its confection I leave to such Rusticks as are exercised therein the green and fat is best Sulphur hath much cognation with fire for if it be cast upon coals it will burn and not be extinguished till all its oleous and fat substance be absumed All Sulphur is not alike in colour for some is green some more luteous some cineritious and some pallid or lucid Whence we may gather That it is of more sorts then two Pliny also enumerates four some whereof are harder others fatter and others more inflammal That Sulphur whereof Alchymists tell many vain and ridiculous stories is not common Sulphur yet it is mixed though they assert that it is a principle of mixture But no more of that in this place There is a certain fat liquor very efficacious Oleum Sulphuris educed out of Sulphur yet such as may not be used imperitely lest it do more harm then good There is a powder also made of Sulphur against the vices of the Lungs whose event demonstrates its excellency That Medicament which Mesue calls Diasulphur is hence denominated Sulphur califies cocts resolves cures Coughs Vires and difficulty of breathing taken in an Egge or burned and its smoke catched moves spittle mixed with butter or swines-grease it mitigates and kills the itch erupting on the whole body and mixed with Turpentine it cures Tetters rough nails and scabs CHAP. 10. Of Amber-grise AMber-grise which was unknown to the Ancients is neither the seed of Balena nor excrement of any other Whale nor yet the dung of any Birds educated in the Isle Maldina with odoriferous herbs which dung is by the sea wash'd of those Rocks as some somniate nor yet any kinde of maritimous Mushrome eradicated by the Sea as many have asserted nor yet any thing made of Ladanum Aloes wood Storax and Civer as Fuschius credited but a certain kinde of Bitumen by storms driven from the Fountains and Chanels of the Sea to the shore where exposed to the air it speedily condenses as many things do which while they are in the water are soft and tender but eructed become dry and hard as Amber Perhaps as it is storied a great quantity of Amber-grise hath been found in a Whales belly but whilest she was alive she had got it and ingested it in the Sea for it is absurd to think that Amber should be the Whales excrement when the best Amber devoured by a Whale loses its bonity and suavity Which Simeon Sethi smelled well enough who asserting that Amber is a kinde of Bitumen flowing out of some Fountains saith That that which is devoured by fishes is the worst that can be Garcias ab Horto seems to assert That it is a kinde of odorate earth seeing there was not onely a fragment of three thousand pounds weight of Amber found in the earth but whole Islands of pure Amber and he proves the probability hereof from the infinite varieties of earth in colour and qualities and seeing in this general acception Bitumen may be called a kinde of Earth I do nor impugn the verisimilitude of his assertion especially finding it called Precious Earth Thus have I briefly related the whole history of Amber for I will neither undertake neither will my short annotations bear the discussion of such opinions as have been published about Amber That Amber which is most odorate devoid of filth perforated with a needle emits much fat succe that which is cineritious and not black is good that which is black or very candid is not good It calefies Vires resolves recreates the heart brain and principal parts refreshes the spirits cureth swoundings erects the strength exhilarates the mind and cures palpitation CHAP. 11. Of yellow Amber or Electrum ORange-coloured Amber is variously denominated the Greeks call it Electrum the Persians and Mauritanians Charabe that is catch-straw the Germans Glesum that is Glasse because it is splendent the Romans Succinum because it is the product of succe or Sea-bitumen concreted but not the succe of Pine or black Poplar as many have asserted for it is found in the deeps and upon Sea-shores concreted of the fat juyce of the Sea and Earth This matter whilest lent viscid and fat before it be obdurated and dryed catches and detains many Flies Gnats Ants and such like Insects which dye dry and odorate together with the Amber This Amber is either white or flave the white which is more odorate and lighter is good so also is the flave if pellucid and such as may be made by attrition to smell like Rosemary and attract chaff or straw It s Powder given in convenient liquor cohibits the flux of blood roborates the bowels and is good against the white fluor of the womb one dragm thereof taken in a soft Egge will stay the flux of Sperm and will help such as are tabid infested with hardness of intestines difficulty of breathing and long Coughs
CHAP. 12. Of Coral COral is from its effigies hardness and native soyl frequently and not improperly called Lithodendron as if it were a Stone-tree and sometimes a Sea-shrub for Macer saith it seems to be the bough of some arbuscle for it grows in the Tyrrhenian and Sicilian Seas assurging and emitting branches like a little Tree Hence some repose it amongst shrubs others amongst stones and others amongst Bitumens but it is really none of all these but something of each It is threefold one sort is red another white and another black the first as it is of a more jucund aspect so more medicinal and more apt for Bracelets and other Ornaments The white as it is more spongious so more light and refrigerative the black is most rarely seen lesse medicinal and expetible red is the best which is alwayes understood when Coral is prescribed absolutely There is another sort of Coral of a mixed colour which is not so good the red that is best should be of a florid colour odorate like Alga ramous like a shrub very frangible not rough nor hollow or chanelled All Coral refrigerates dryes and bindes Vires it cohibits the immoderate flux of fluors and blood it cures the Dysentery represses the flux of mans sperm and the white fluors of a womans Uterus It helps such as are anhelant infested with the Epilepsie Spleenatick and heart-dolours for it roborates the brain diminishes the spleen and exhilarates the heart Alchymists extract a red oyl out of Coral which is very useful in staying blood and roborating the members of which elswhere CHAP. 13. Of Auripigmentum AUripigment Arrhenick or Arsenick Sandaracha and Risagalum differ not save in name onely All are effoded out of the same pit all are septical and acrimonious with extreme calour dissolving destroying and preying upon the principles of life Some of the later Writers call three things Arsenick for they denominate Auripigment Yellow Arsenick Sandarax Red Arsenick and Risagalum VVhite Arsenick Auripigment and Sandarax are of the same Metals and seem onely to differ in more or less coction and therefore they are both often mixed in the same glebe There are two sorts of Auripigment one of a golden colour 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which Galen calls Crustosum which may be clefted into scales mixed with no matter The other pale effigiated like an acorn which is affine to Sandaracha Sandaracha hath not onely affinity with Arsenick from its native soyl but nature also for it is onely Arsenick well cocted for that by ustion will become Sandaracha as Ceruse will Sandyx which they call Painters-red Pliny makes mention of another sort of Sandaracha which he refers to ceraginous honey They erre shamefully that deceived through the affinity of the words take the Arabians Sandarax which is Junipers Gumme for Sandaracha which is a Mineral for Sandarax and Sandaracha differ much in nature faculties and original for the one is pale light and grateful to nature the other red heavy and deletery Few things are spoken and that but by few concerning Risagalum insomuch that we can scarce from their dignments know what it is Bern Dessennius calls it factitious white and crystalline Arsenick But perhaps the ancients did more wisely in its disquisition not to detect such mortal lethal poyson Sylvius saith it is found in the same pits with Arsenick which some call Auripigment All Arsenick is erosive Vires malign an enemy to all internal parts and to the radical moisture and innate heat and therefore it is ill advice of Nic. Alexand. to describe it for an ingredient in the great Athanasia for by permixion with other Medicaments it doth not depose its ferity It is indeed sometimes mixed with extraneous Medicaments but in very small quantity and onely then when some superfluous flesh is to be eroded For the spirit of Arsenick which consists in salt as the Alchymists speak is very bad and cannot either by its fixation or extraction be so deleated as to be securely introsumed into the body CHAP. 14. Of Cinnabaris or Vermillion DIoscorides his Cinnabaris which is the succe of a certain tree growing in Africa which is usurped for Dragons-blood differs much from the Cinnabaris so called by later writers which is a Mineral whereof there are two sorts the one native the other artificial The native is also twofold the one whereof is effoded out of certain silver Mynes as those in Hydria which seems to be a purpureous glebe referted with Quicksilver out of which it frequently issues spontaneously the other is found in the Veins of silver Mynes and is the Minium secundum of which hereafter There is also an artificial Cinnabaris made of Sulphur and Quicksilver coacted by the fire which Brasavolus calls Cynaprium to distinguish it from the native Cinnabaris which with Dioscorides he holds to be the lacryma of an Aphrican-tree But indeed Cinnabaris Cynaprium and Vermillion or Red-Lead are all one especially with the later writers who adducing them all to the test of reason found them not to differ and those that pertinaciously contend for their difference exhibiting an accurate description of each do at last conclude them one for the variety of names do often so obscure the thing that he may be excused who thinks Cinnabaris Cynaprium Milton and Vermillion to discrepate Cinnabaris then is of four sorts the first is Dioscorides his Cinnabaris which is the succe of an Aphrican-tree called Dragon the second is a Mineral shining with much rubour and not very ponderous which is found in silver Mynes the third is factitious of fulphur and quicksilver ponderous and intermixed with red and argenteous lines the fourth is found in silver Mynes and kept in shops in form of a powder very nitently red which some call Cinnabaris some Milton some Minium the shop-men Vermillion and some Sandix Now Sandix is burnt Ceruss which for its eximious redness Serapio calls Vermillion from which opinion the later writers dissent not But that purpureous powder which Apothecaries keep for Vermilsion is by Fliny called the second Minium which is found in silver Mynes acquiring that fair rubetude by artificial and reiterated washing so that according to Pliny one Minium is differenced from another onely by washing and art yet the first Minium or Mineral Cinnabaris which emits much quicksilver by the fire needs no such washing the second or vulgar which is called Red-lead is red in the fire but eructates little or no quicksilver and is seldom used in Medicine Cinnabaris being referted with much Mercury participates of the same saculties which being notorious to the very Barbers and pore-blinde is often by Circulators usurped to the cure of the French disease who make such foolish attempts thereof as they bring many into the Palsey more to death CHAP. 15. Of Quicksilver MErcury or Quicksilver is the prime idol of the Alchymists which they pronounce the principle of things and sperm of Metals and indeed so true each
in plains and valleys feed not upon so salutary plants as those that inhabit excelse plants and therefore their stones are not so efficacious All of them are much commended against the bitings of venenate beasts Vires for their powder assumed or adhibited cures wounds inflicted by Scorpions Vipers or other Serpents and insperged on the same Animals makes them torpid and innocuous It is storyed that the King of Corduba was freed from a very pernicious poyson by the use of this stone and therefore some think Bezaar is rightly deduced from Bel in Hebrew which signifies Lord and Zaar poyson calling it the Lord of Poysons It conduces upon the same account to all venenate and contagious diseases as the Pestilences Morbils small-Pox and the like it cures also swoundings long sorrows hysterical passions and many other malign affections of which see N. Monard Christoph a Costa and Clusius CHAP. 23. Of Margarites and Unions MArgarites are taken out of certain Shell-fishes living in the Indian sea very like Oysters which if they be small they keep the name Margarites if greater they are called Unions for they are found severally in several Shell-fishes whence the Poet Unde dictus ob hoc quod ab uno nascitur unus Nec duo vel pluris unquam simul inveniantur Yet Aelianus contradicts this opinion teaching from experience that many Unions are generated and found in one Shell-fish according to the abundance of the fishes excrementitious matter which is pure and lucid they are not therefore called Unions because one onely is found in one Shell-fish but because two are never found conjoyned in the same Those that are white round ponderous and smooth such as Queens weare about their necks are best Many Shell-fishes generate Margarites but the best are exotical which are found in the Persian Sea in the East whence they are called Oriental Pearls and in the tracts of Chyna and many parts of India where the Incolists call these Margaritiferous Shell-fishes Berbert and some Barbarians Cheripe others Chanquo which is the Mother of Pearl This great Shell-fish is spiss moderately hollow like a comb but not toothed on both sides but onely on one not striated without but plain and something flave smooth splendent and argenteous within it is generated in its flesh as lumps in hogs flesh stones in the bladder or other places for I saw a man who avoided many stones by stool each one whereof in magnitude equalized a Chesnut or Acorn Fernelius found three stones in the Liver of the dissected carcase of a Noble-man who in his life-time spitted up some like Margarites But to my purpose these Shell-fishes exposed to the air or assayed with a knife open and the Margarites are found together with their flesh which indeed are neither bones nor part of the piscicle but something excrementitious splendent and concrete like the shells wherewith they are tected which are outwardly scabre and impolite but within smooth and fair so that the true Mother of Pearls is never naturally but alwayes artificially polished Those Margarites are greater which are taken from the greater Conchae and in the deeper sea They are so much sought after by women that no one though of mean fortune thinks she is sufficiently adorned till she carry Pearls about her neck But their use is chiefly Medicinal for all both Ancients and latter writers aver That Margarites are very cordial and exhilarate the heart Alchymists dissolve them and get thence liquor of Pearls whereof they predicate many but ridiculous things I knew a very crafty Empyrical Chirurgeon in Paris who required six Peices for the adhibition of two Swallows to his Patient Vires and when all admired he should ask so unreasonably I should saith he have demanded much more because I fed these Animals a whole Month with the liquor of Pearls You may read at large of Margarites and the Fishes wherein they are generated their nature dignity duration and vertues in Rondeletius Lib. 1. de testaceis Cap. 51. CHAP. 24. De Umbilicis Marinis Of the Sea-Navel THe Sea-Navel is either a whole piscicle whereof Rondeletius makes mention or a part bone or regument of some greater fish the former is a turbinated and small Shell-fish so like a Navel that none that see it can chuse but so name it The other Umbilike is all osseous which is either a shell or the bone of another fish for many fishes have certain bones given them by Nature either for the insertion of their fins whereby they defend their lives or for the confirmation and motion of their bodies Thus Sepia is founded upon its bone thus the Slaits back is armed with many pricks which by light cocture may be easily sojoyned from its body whose officles if you take away their prickles do well represent the Sea-Navel We therefore suspect with Berv. Dessennius that Sea-Umbilikes are desumed from Sea-Animals and cast on the shore with other stones and yet they are not of the same kinde with stones Some call them Sea-Gems but their faculties are not so eximious as that they should be reposed among Gems Their form is well known their colour is in some white in some red they are frequently sold in France CHAP. 25. Of the Dental THe Dental is a certain small Shell-fish oblong white sharp without very smooth within hollow like a little tube and acuminated on one side like a Dogs tooth whence it is called a Dental for it is a shell like a tooth wherein a vernicle is procreated which is oblong and slender answerable to the cavity of the shell which goes out of its domicil sometimes to draw water and seek victuals Both it and its tube grow as a restaceous Cane upon a Rock or an old shell It is indued with the same vertue with the Seas Umbilike and other testaceous piscicles and may as well ingrede the composition of the Citrian Unguent as the former CHAP. 26. Of the Antal THere is another Sea Shell-fish called an Antal whose use in Medicine is very frequent if we make the Citrian unguent It is a testaceous tube bred in the Sea of a little fingers length striated without smooth and hollow within out of whose cavity a small piscicle is educed This seems to be the fish which Athenaeus calls Solen for that is of the kinde of long Shell-fishes with a double shell smooth slender and hollow like a reed and open at both ends Pliny calls it a Dactyl or a Digit because it equalizes a finger in longitude or as some say resembles a mans nail However the Antal we use is very well known and vulgar neither should we lose any precious Medicament if it were absent for we can substitute in its stead any shell that is white and striated which strangers bring from the Sea near that famous Mount which is sacred to St. Michael for all of them are of an equal vertue as to the confecture of the said unguent whereunto also another accedes not
easily known by name some call it Amentum others Amiantus for it is yet doubted whether Amentum be that stone Amiantus which is of a whitish green and by many called Scissile-Alome from which it differs much For Scissile-Alome is manifestly astrictive and being injected upon coals burns but plumeous Alome is acrimonious safe from flame and well termed Amiantus or Amentum or Amiantum which the Citrian Unguent admits of but I dare not assert this for certain seeing Amentum is a barbarous word well understood by none as it appears by the opinions of such Authors as have written of it for Theophrastus will have it the name of a tree Matthaeus Sylvaticus burnt glass Manlius burnt lime some Suet or the fat of glass others Talkum or the specular glass which is indeed very convenient for this Unguent as also plumbeous Alome which Apothecaries by good reason use for Amentum or Amiantus There is also much mention in shops of Bizantian Blatta which is a cover very like that wherewith the Purple-fish is tected yet this similitude is onely as to their substance and faculties and not as to their forms for the tegument of the Purple-worm is round according to Rondeletius and this Blatta long and strict found in nardiferous lakes and thence suaveolent for these worms eat Spikenard and this Blatta is called the odorate Nayl for it smells somewhat like a Beaver But I will not longer insist upon its description because it ingredes no Medicament in our Shop CHAP. 27. Of Tortoises TOrtoises are either aquatical living in the Sea or sweet-watel or amphibious living partly on the land and partly on the water whence Pliny comprehending them all in a quaternal number calls them either Marine or Fluvial Terrestrial or Palustrian A Tortoise is a candated Animal with four feet squamous ingrateful to the sight whose shell is of an oval form long broad hollow within and without extuberant like a Buckler under which it sometimes hides its head tail feet and all and sometimes it puts them out even at pleasure This alone of squamous Animals according to Aristotle hath Reins and a Bladder it layes Egges with hard shells of two colours which it reconds in a Ditch excavated like a hogshead and covers them with the earth which it makes even and so sits upon it till its young ones be excluded Solinus saith That in the Indian Sea there are Tortoises of so great a magnitude that their shells open at the bottom and joyned at the top make so large houses for the vulgar Indians that a numerous family may dwell therein Yea some use them in stead of Boats wherein they sayl from one Isle to another in the Red-Sea With the Troglodites they are cornigerous but less then the Indian Tortoises are of much use Vires both in Cibaries and Medicine for their decoction helps such as are consumed and attenuated and therefore they usefully ingrede the confecture of the resumptive Syrupe Many delight in their flesh but it is such a deformed Animal in head tail feet form colour and spots resembling the Serpentine kinde that nature seems to note it as offensive and unwholesome which they also confess who love it but that its dressing and condiments make it less noxious for else it were horrid CHAP. 28. Of Frogs MYropolists use whole Frogs in the composition of Vigonius his salve which the Author described for the cure of a disease proper to his own Nation Sylvius also saith Their decoction will ease the Tooth-ache if the mouth be washed therewith their ashes with Pitch according to Dioscorides or rather with Honey according to Pliny will bring again fallen hairs The Emplaisters wherewith they are mixed are thence siccative and discussive especially in the dolours of the junctures They are Antidotal against Serpentine poysons according to Dioscorides if they be decocted eaten with Salt and Oyl and their broth supped But all Frogs are not edible whereof there are many varieties for some delight solely in water and live there ordinarily others on the dry soyl others also are amphibious living equally on the water and earth Some of the watery Frogs live in Fenny and muddy places and are pernicious acceding near the nature of Toads others live in limpid and fountain water and are wholesome and reposed among Cibaries Some of those that feed on dry soyls live amongst reeds others amongst bryars and thorns the former which are least of all are called Calamitae and the latter Rubetae by the Latines by the Greeks Phrynoi which are as pernicious as the Palustrian Frogs those they call Dryophites which climb up Oaks and live in or about them and the Diopetes which fall with storms and warm showers out of the air are no better then the rest All of them are mute in winter except the watery Frogs which at the end of Winter and beginning of the Spring begin to croak to wit when Tadpoles are procreated in putrid waters which some falsly call Frogs-sperm or Frogs-egges Arist Hence many have derided the Medicament of a certain Alchymist who prescribes the water of Frogs-sperm to the Pimples and swellings of the face eyes and the whole body whereas he might hunt exenterate dissect exhaust and search the seminals of all the Frogs in France and never get so much sperm as would wet the bottome of his Metal-pan Experience also shews and learned Rondeletius hath averred That Tadpoles come of Mud and turn not into Frogs All Frogs besides the watery ones are pernicious and malign as also those of them also that are maculated with black spots like Toads of whose nature they participate and those that use them for meat are infected with a plumbeous colour Wherefore they should not be taken save for Physick for they putrifie the body Yet some put Palustrian Frogs others Rubetae to the confection of Jo. de Vigo his salve but I think amphibious Frogs are better For the Rubetae which live among bryars thorns and dry soyls being venenate and acrimonious impart a certain quality to the Medicament whereby it vellicates the skin and raises lumps and the water are not so efficacious therefore those that live partly in water and partly on the land must be elected as best CHAP. 29. Of Crab-fishes THere are innumerable varieties of shelled fishes some whereof have long bodies as Locusts and Lobsters others round as all the troop of Sea-Crabs and fresh-water Crabs whereof there are fewer varieties As some of Sea-Crabs are greater as those we call Maeae and Paguri and others lesser which we call Pinnophylaces so some of the fresh-water Crab-fishes are great broad-footed like the Sea-Crabs but greater others little ones which we use in Meats and Medicaments as by Avicenna's counsel to refresh such as labour in the Hectick Feaver and such as are bitten by mad Dogs as also to ingrede some mundificative Unguents Rondeletius hath largely described the whole kinde of Crabs Lib. 18. de Piscibus Lib. particulari de
Ash shose that are found in Corn are versicolorate and have transverse lines in their wings with an oblong body and are very good But they will be more fit for use if they be injected into an earthen vessel whose orifice is covered with a rare linen cloth and turned downwards that by the halite of sharp vinegar they may be exanimated then dryed reposed in wooden boxes glass or earthen vessels and kept for the space of two years They are mixed but in small quantity to Medicaments that provoke Urine by Galens advise who would have them injected whole but the later Writers would have their legs and wings abscinded and abjected When a Noble Matron of Paris was holden with a continual Feaver accompanied with the heat of the Reins and other grievous symptomes and had committed the care of her cure to Mr. Martin a learned and perite Parisian Medick by the perswasion of some she call'd one Rivierius a courtly Medick who feeling her pulse said If she had called him a little sooner he would have applyed a dragm of French flies to the region most affected and have presently restored her to sanity so he left the Matron grieved and her ordinary Medick astonished at his humour manners words and actions who was so far from adhibiting such a company of these flies that he applyed not one and yet restored her to health for this flie being most dry and light it is credible one weighing not above a grain what were it less then carnifice to adhibite sixty of them which weigh but a dragm to the aesture of the Reins But take this obiter not because I am incensed against the man but that I might shew that these flies are very noxious to the Bladder Reins and other parts by inducing inflammations yet very good mixed with other Medicaments in a small quantity CHAP. 35. Of Ants. PHarmacopolies are not destitute of Ants which afford an oyle commended to many received uses for it califies the generative parts being too frigid and reduces them to a better state Ants are the most laborious and officious of insects which exercise their labours not onely on the day but on the night also in full Moon alwayes treading the same pathes bringing cibaries to their Cells and reconding them for the insuing year They hunt not after smaller animalls like Cobs but degust them when dead congest grains and bear their burthens in their mouthes Ants are either winged whose infusion yeilds the said oyle or wingless which are frequently found in dry and incultivated places sick Bears seek sanity from them There is in some regions in India where Gold is effoded a kinde of Ants equalizing Foxes in magnitude I finde also some equitant ones and others that fly the light but the Apothecary never uses such CHAP. 36. Of the Silk-worm THat glory is now given to Silk which was given to fine linen wherewith the Ancient Kings were invested and as we read in Luke 10. A certain rich man arrayed This flax was a kinde of tenuious line next in dignity to Asbestinum whereof most subtile vestments were made with which women were most delighted which according to Pliny grew neer Elis in Achaia according to Pollux in India and Aegypt and Pausanias in Greece on a tree not unlike our Poplar with willowish leaves but whether its plant be a tree or an herb it is altogether unknown to us It bears not onely leaves but line also which the People of Seres Scytia and Asiatica perite in spining draw out into small threads and make it into vestments for rich men and that which the Serians work is called Silk Asbestus is either a certain stone of a ferreous colour in the Mountains of Arcadia which being once accended can never be extinguished or else flax whereof Napkins are made that will take flame and not burn away like plumbeous Lead But we have no such by ssigerous plant nor vestments made of their Down but onely Bombycina which as Byssina of old is now called Silk which is as good for dignity in the same uses and besides accommodated to Medicinal exhibitions for Apothecaries following the Arabians dictate have an opinion of Silk Vires that it will purge blood roborate the vital faculties recreate the heart illustrate the spirits refresh all faculties and help all the spirits These are the eximious Encomia wherewith the Barbarians nobilitate the excrement of their virulent Insect But seeing any one may Philosophize and propose his opinion in the matter in hand I profess I think Silk is of small use in Medicine for it is the dry inodorate exuicous recrement of an imperfect Animal affine to Cob-webs but inept and ineffectual in mans cure It may be that that Byssinum which the latter writers call fine flax is indued with eximious faculties but no such being now fonnd nor brought to us our Pharmacopolists cannot speak of it unless they speak in their dreams And I wonder upon what reason they give crude Silk to the sick when it is tincted with Scarlet it is indeed vertuous but it borrows that faculty from its infection and therefore I had rather prescribe the dying grains alone then frustraneously spend their succe in dying Silk But let perite Medicks who have onely reason for their Law be Judges in the case These Silk-worms are little Animals excluded from small round and blackish seeds called by some egges cherished with a moderate calour animated and at first formed into Minute-worms which educated on the leaves and boughs of the Mulberry-tree after a while spin their slender webs or Silken threads whereof precious cloth is abundantly woven When they are more adult they make of themselves hoods and domicils for themselves and there in a short time they transmute themselves into white Butterflies which produce seeds or small eggs whereof other worms of the same kinde are generated But these being known to Women and Children need no further description Some Medicks use the Galls of many Animals the Liver and intestines of Wolves the brains of Sparrows the testicles of Cocks and Asells which are found under water-vessels but these not ingreding the compositions in our Shop belong not to us Thus I have in three Books by Gods auxiliation briefly and clearly composed all Medicinal matter to whom be Honour Glory and Praise now and Ever Finis Libri Tertii THE Pharmaceutrical Shop Divided into TWO PARTS The first whereof Treats Of INTERNAL and the second of EXTERNAL MEDICAMENTS By the AUTHOR JOANNES RENODAEVS Physician in PARIS ENGLISHED By RICHARD TOMLINSON APOTHECARY LONDON Printed by J. Streater and J. Cottrel 1657. To his Honoured Learned and Vertuous FRIEND WILLIAM WITHEINGS Esq Worthy Sir THe manifold Testimonies of your reall favours calls for a perpetual Commemoration and what requital can be returned but a bare demonstration where ability cannot correspond or aspire to the dignity of that Desert couched within the verge of that manifestation of affection so amply discovered And
of Wine and Honey is called Oinomel Oinomel it is sometimes confected of two parts of old Wine and one of Honey and sometimes of five parts of new Wine and one of Honey which when cold is reposed into Hogs-heads Oribasius C. 25. L. 5. Collectorum Simple and vulgar Hydromel is prepared just as Melicratum so that they differ onely in name not in substance yet Galen saith Melicratum or Mede should be made of rain-water and Hydromel of fountain-water Apomeli is made also after the like manner for according to Galen it may be made of rain or any water so it be pure and Honey expressed from the comb which must be so long cocted together till spume cease to exurge which must be taken off as soon as it emerges for so it will depose its acrimony The Ancients called it syrupe of Honey-combs Philagrius gives a better description to a better Apomelie thus Let some Combs full of the best Honey be strongly pressed betwixt ones hands and let a portion of the honey expressed be injected into four times as much pure water and let the Honey-Combs be also immerged and washed in the water that they may depose all their Honey then let the water be strained then cocted over a luculent fire and well despumed let it then be taken off and frigefie and let what-ever swims upon be abjected then boyl it again and despume it which iterate thrice and when it is at last frigefied and purged from its excrements inject this Apomeli into an Earthen or Wooden Vessel Aqueous Hydromel is scarce ever preserved in shops but presently made when use calls for it but the vinous is often confected by the Medicks advice and kept in Citizens houses as some Nectar more precious then Malmsey for it potently cocts frigid humours moves expectoration roborates the stomack hinders crudities helps concoction moves appetite discusses flatuosity mitigates cholical dolours moves urine and very much profits cold constitutions The English were wont to make a more composititious vinous Hydromel which they called Metegla Metegla which received less of Honey but more Aromata and Leaven which is thus confected â„ž of the best and most refined Honey lb x. of the clearest spring-water lb lx boyl them together till a third part be consumed Metheaglen casting away the spume as it rises and when it begins to grow cold put it into a convenient vessel in which hang a nodule of Leaven â„¥ iij. adding Cinamon Grains Pepper Ginger Cloves bruised of eachÊ’ j. set it in a place where the sun may * For 40 days come then preserve it in a Wine-Cellar for future use This kind of potion is most pleasent it will often keep two years in sapour and faculties it responds to Malmsey SECT IV. Of Succes dulcorated with Honey PHarmacopolies preserve some Honeys made of the infusions of Plants or of their succes compounded with Honey which from their confistence and Honey some call Syrupes of Honey but we rather from their succes which ingrede their confecture and Honey call them Melleous succes for whether the extracted succes of Plants be adjoyned to Honey or the Plants themselves be macerated in Honey their succes are alwayes mixed with Honey whence the whole mixture is rightly called A Melleous succe CHAP. 1. Mel Rosatum Lat. Rhodomeli Graec. Geleniabin Arab. or Honey of Roses â„ž Red Roses a little dryed in the shade lb ij Honey neither too old nor too new lb vj. mingle them and boyl them upon a gentle fire in a Pipkin to a good consistence and so preserve it for future use The COMMENTARY All do not prepare honey of Roses alike but many despising the descriptions of Mesue and Nic. Praepositus one while make it with fire onely another while by insolation another while by both and sometimes by none of them but onely by maceration some inject the whole Roses into the honey others bray them first some use onely the succe others both the succe and other Roses the most usual preparation is after the manner we have tradited wherein the Roses a little dryed must be macerated in honey then elixated a little afterwards exposed to the Sun and moved every third day that they may be hot on every side Whilest they are thus made and not strained they are called Honey of Rose-leaves if they be calified and strained as they are usually before they be used they are then called Honey of strained Roses and especially that that results from brayed Roses and Honey That which is made of two parts of the succe of exungated Roses and one of Honey cocted together to the absumption of the fourth part whose spume must be diligently extracted in boyling is called The liquid distrained Honey of Roses Honey of Roses cohibits hot fluxes Vires whether assumed or applied it helps deterges and roborates the stomack CHAP. 2. Mel Violatum or Honey of Violets â„ž of the fresh flowers of Violets lb j. the best Honey lb iij. mingle them in a convenient vessel with a narrow orifice insolate it and keep it for use The COMMENTARY Some to the confection of this honey bray the Violets others mix them whole being small flowers with hot honey in an carthen glazened pot then they expose the pot to the Sun for fifteen dayes each other day agitating the mixture with a rudicle then they repose it and when use calls for it mix it with a little water elixate it a little strain it and thus they get special honey of Violets others do otherwise and in Mesue's opinion it may be made like honey of Roses well but the Violets should be a little dryed or at least deprived of all acquisititious humidity and the honey should be used neither too new nor too old Honey of Violets is commended to pectoral affections it mitigates absterges refrigerates and roborates and therefore it is usefully mixed with many Glysters and Gargarisms and adhibited to deterge Ulcers CHAP. 3. Mel Anthosatum or Honey of Rosemary â„ž of the flowers of Rosemary lb j. Honey well despumed lb iij. mingle them in a Jarre-glass and set it in the Sun which after a convenient insolation preserve for future use The COMMENTARY This of Rosemary is made like them of Violets and Roses Some commend the oldest honey but I like the honey of a middle age because it is neither too dilute nor too crass This is called Mel Anthosatum because the flowers of Rosemary are for their dignity and praecellence called Anthos or flowers And seeing Rosemary flourishes twice in a year once in the Spring and once in Autumn honey of Rosemary-flowers may also be confected twice annually at the aforesaid times when its flower is fresh and fragrant for when it is dry it is almost inodorate and useless It is cephalical and nerval Vires it is a special ingredient in Glysters prescribed to the Lethargie Apoplexy and affections of the head it corrects the parts distempered