himself Fishes 〈…〉 saith Pliny by the Root the 〈◊〉 of 〈…〉 called round Birth-wort called also the venome of the Earth This Root they bruise and mingle it with Lime and cast itin to the Sea the Fishes come to it with great delight and are presently killed and float on the waters Dioscorides saith that broad leaved Tiâ—hymal bruised and strewed in the waters kills Fish We use now 〈…〉 Roots of it and with a weight let them down to the bottom of the waters that will be infected by them and kill the Fish presently But in the Sea 〈◊〉 shall sooner kill them thus Mingle Oriental Galls two drâ—chms 〈◊〉 Cheese one ounce Bean-meal three ounces with Aqua Vitae make pelleâ—s of these as big as Chick-peason Cast them into the Sea in the morning before Sun rise after three hours come to the place again and you shall finde all those that tasted of it 〈◊〉 drunk or dead and to appear either on the top or bottom of the Sea which you shall take up with a pole and a hook fastened to it or Fish speer The Aqua Vitae is added because it soon flies to the head The Oriental Galls are poyson that astonisheth them the Bean-meal is not of great concernment This bait invites them and the Cheese smells so that they sent it at a distance CHAP. XI Of other Experiments for hunting NOw I will add some Experiments that seem to be requisite that you may use for necessity when you please To change a Dogs colour Since white Dogs are seldom fit for hunting because they are seen afar off a way is found to change his colour that will be done if you boyl quick Iâ—me with Litharge and paint 〈◊〉 Dog with it 〈…〉 him black That a Dog may not go from you Democrites saith a Dog will never 〈◊〉 from you if you smeer him with Butter from head to tail and give him Butter to â—ick Also 〈…〉 you if you have the secondine of a Bitch close in a 〈…〉 â—mell to it If you â—ould not have Your Dog to bark If you have a Bitches second Membrane or Hares hairs or Dung or Vervain about you In Nilus there is a black stone found that a Dog will not bark 〈◊〉 he see it you must also carry a Dogs Tongue undâ—â— your great 〈◊〉 within your shooe or the dry heart of a dog about you Sextus Or the hair of 〈◊〉 or the Dung Pliny Or cut off the tail of a yong 〈◊〉 and put it under 〈…〉 or 〈◊〉 the Dog a Frog to eat in a piece of meat All these things are to â—â—ep Dogs from barking Nigidius saith that Dogs will all day 〈◊〉 from him who pulls off a tâ—â—k from a Sow and carrieth it a while about him Opâ—an If of 〈…〉 you takes And wâ—â—r it 〈…〉 dogs will 〈◊〉 for sake As frighted they will flie and 〈…〉 Bark at you though they barked much before That a Dog may not run If you anoynt him with Oyl under the shoulders he cannot run To make a Hawke 〈…〉 You shall animate your Hawk against 〈◊〉 prey thaâ— he may assail and flee at great Birds When you hawk wet the Hawks meat with Wine If it be a Buzzard add a little Vinegar to it when you would have him 〈◊〉 a give him three bits of flesh wet in wine or pour Wine in at his mouth with a yong Pidgeon so let him flie To make Partridge more bold to fight Give then 〈…〉 with their meat Pliny That dung-hill 〈◊〉 fight the better Give them Garlick to eat soon before theâ— fight whence in the old Comedy a Cock ready and earnest to fight is wittily called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 fed with Garlick 〈◊〉 a Bird may not the high Take out the Feathers of 〈…〉 that make him flie upwards so he will whirl about and flie downward If you will have That a Bird shall not flie cut the upper and lower nerves of his Wings and it will not hurt him yet he cannot flie out of your Bird-cages or places you keep them in THE SIXTEENTH BOOK OF Natural Magick Wherein are handled secret and undiscovered Notes THE PROEME I Make two sorts of secret marks which they vulgarly call Syfers one of visible marks and is worthy of a treatise by it self another of secret marks whereof 〈…〉 tempted to say something in this present Volume 〈◊〉 what are the consequâ—â—â— thereof for the use of great Men and Princes that 〈…〉 than 〈…〉 man that knows the invention I shall set down plainly some examples 〈…〉 consequences of them must 〈◊〉 faithfully concealed lest by growing 〈◊〉 amongst ordinary people they be disrespecteâ—â— This is that I shall publish CHAP. I. How 〈…〉 in diver◠〈…〉 be reâ—â— THere are many anâ— almost infinit 〈◊〉 write things of necessity that the Charactâ—â— shall not 〈…〉 â—ou dip them into waters or put them neer the 〈…〉 them over 〈…〉 are read by dipping them into waters Therefore If you desire that letters not 〈…〉 are 〈◊〉 may be hiâ—â— Let Vitriol soak in boyling water when 〈…〉 strain it 〈◊〉 till the water grow clear with that liquor write 〈…〉 are dry they 〈◊〉 not 〈◊〉 Moreover grindâ— burnt straw 〈…〉 â—â—egar and 〈◊〉 will write 〈◊〉 the spaces between the foâ—â—er liâ—â—s describâ—â— large Then 〈…〉 Galls in white Wine wet a spunge in the liquor 〈◊〉 when you have need 〈…〉 and weâ— the letters so long until the native black 〈◊〉 disappear but the former colour that was not seen may 〈…〉 I will 〈◊〉 in what liquors paper must be soaked to make letters 〈◊〉 be see 〈…〉 said Dissolve Vitriol 〈…〉 then powder Galls finely and soak them inâ—â—ter let them stay there twenty four hours filtre them through 〈◊〉 cloth 〈…〉 that may make the water clear and make letters upon 〈…〉 to have concealed send it to your Friend absent when you would have 〈◊〉 appear dip them in the first liquor and the letters â—ill presenâ—â—y be seen That diâ—â—â—ng 〈◊〉 lineâ—â—â— water 〈◊〉 may appear Dissolve Alom in water and 〈…〉 linen 〈◊〉 napkins and the like for when they are dry they will 〈…〉 When you will have them visible 〈…〉 linen 〈…〉 to be darkned but only where the Alom 〈…〉 that you may read them 〈…〉 are dissolved those parts will admit water 〈◊〉 White 〈…〉 Litharge is first powdered and cast into an earthen pot that hath water and vinegar mix'd boyl it and strain it and keep it then write letters with Citron Lemons juce these are added to them when they begin to dry If you dip them in the liquor kept they will appear clearly and very white If womens brests or hands be wet in it and you sprinkle the said water upon them they will grow white as Milk Use it If at any time you want 〈◊〉 if you please A stone dipped in vinegar will shew the letters Make letters with Goats far upon a stone when they are dry they will not be seen If the stone be dipâ— into 〈◊〉 they presently
experiments prove false because that which we work by happily hath lost his vertue being kept too long But there are certain peculiar times to gather them in which the vulgar sort observeth not wherein the heavenly constellations bestow upon them some singular vertue proceeding from the most excellent nature and quality of the stars in which times if they be gathered they are exceedingly operative But there can be no set and just time assigned by reason of the divers situations of divers places in respect of the Sun for as the Sun-beams come neerer or further off so the earth fructifies sooner or later yet we will give some general observations Roots are to be gathered betwixt the old Moon and the new for then the moisture is fallen into the lower parts and that in the Evening for then the Sun hath driven in the moisture and by the stalk it is conveyed down into the root The time serves well to gather them when their wrinkles be filled out with moisture and they chap because they have so much juice as if they were about to break in pieces Leaves are then to be gathered as soon as they have opened themselves out of the sprigs and that in the morning about Sun-rising for then they are moister then in the evening the Suns heat having drunk up their moisture all day long Flowers are then to be gathered when they begin to seed while their juice is in them and before they wax limber Stalks are then to be gathered when the flower is withered for then especially are they profitable And seeds must be then gatherâ—d when they are so ripe that they are ready to fall There are some more peculiar observations Hot and slender herbs should be gathered when Mars and the Sun are Lords of the celestial houses moist herbs when the Moon is Lord but you must take heed that you gather them not in the falling houses thereof These things well observed in gathering plants will make them very profitable for Physical uses CHAP. XVI That the Countries and places where Simples grow are chiefly to be considered MAny are deceived in plants and metals and such like because they use them that come next hand never heeding the situation of the place where they grow But he that will work soundly must well consider both the aspect of the heavens and the proper nature and situation of the place for the place works diversly in the plants according to his own divers temperatures and sometimes causeth such an alteration in the vertues of them that many not onely young Magicians but good Physitians and Philosophers too have been deceived in searching them out Plato makes mention hereof God saith he hath furnished the places of the earth with divers vertues that they might have divers operations into plants and other things according to their kind And so Porphyry saith that the place is a principle of a generation as a father is Theophrastus would have Hemlock gathered and fetch'd from Susa because Thrasias was of opinion that there it might safely be taken and in other very cold places for whereas in Athens the juice of it is poison odious amongst the Athenians because it is given to kill men in common executions and Socrates there taking it died presently yet here it is taken without danger and beasts feed upon it The herb called Bears-foot that which grows on the Hill Oeta and Parnassus is very excellent but elsewhere of small force therefore Hippocrates when he would cure Democritus he caused it to be fetch'd from the Hills And in Achaia especially about Cabynia there is a kind of Vine as Theophrastus saith the wine whereof causeth untimely births and if the dogs eat the grapes they will bring forth abortives and yet in the taste neither the wine nor the grape differ from other wines and grapes He saith also that those Physicall drugs which grow in Euboea neer unto Aege are good but neer to Telethrium which is a shadowed and waterish place they are much worse and drier In Persia there grows a deadly tree whose apples are poison and present death therefore there it is used for a punishment but being brought over to the Kings into Egypt they become wholesome apples to eat and lose their harmfulnesse as Columella writes Dioscorides saith That the drugs which grow in steep places cold and dry and open to the winde are most forcible but they that grow in dark and waterish and calm places are lesse operative Wherefore if we find any difference in such things by reason of the places where they grow that they have not their right force we must seek them out there where the place gives them their due vertue CHAP. XVII Certain properties of Places and Fountains which are commodious for this work DIfference of places works much in the different effects of things For the place of the waters and also of the earth hath many miraculous vertues which a Magician must needs be well acquainted with for oft-times we see that some things are strangely operative onely by reason of the situation of the place the disposition of the Air and the force of the Sun as it cometh nearer or further off If one ground did not differ from another then we should have odoriferous reeds rushes grasse frankincense peper and myrth not only in Syria and Arabia but in all other Countries also Likewise many properties are derived out of Waters and Fountains which otherwise could not be made but that the waterish humor in the earth conveys his scent and such like properties into the root of that which there groweth and so nourisheth up that matter which springs out and causeth such fruit as savours of the place according to his own kind Zama is a City in Africa and Ismuc is a Town twenty miles from it and whereas all Africk besides is a great breeder of beasts especially of serpents about that Town there breed none at all nay if any be brought thither it dies and the earth of that place also killeth beasts whithersoever it is carried In the great Tarquine Lake of Italy are seen Trees some round some triangle as the wind moves them but none four-square In the Country beyond the River Po that part which is called Monsterax there is a kind of Corn called Siligo which being thrice sown makes good bread-corn Neer to Harpasum a Town of Asia there is a huge Rock which if you touch with one finger will move if with your whole body it will not move There are some places of the earth that are full of great fires as Aetna in Sicily the Hill Chimaera in Phaselis the fire whereof Ctesias writes will be kindled with water and quencht with earth And in the Country of Megalopolis and the fields about Arcia a coal falling on the earth sets it on fire So in Lycia the Hills Ephesti being touched with a Torch flame out insomuch that the stones and sands there do burn in the waters
is reverberated on the top and below too Stop it close and set a large Receiver under it for if it be too narrow the strong Spirits will break out with a great bounce crack the Vessel and frustrate your labour Distil it six hours if you calcine the Alome-fire the VVater will be stronger A Water for Separation of Gold Mix with the equal parts of Salt-Peter and Alom as much Vitriol and distil it as before there will proceed a VVater so strong that it will even corrode the â—iâ—cture of Gold Wherefore if this seem too violent take nine pounds of the former Salts being dissolved in VVater and two ounces of Sal Ammoniacum when they are melted set them two days in Fimo and with hot Ashes you may distil a VVater that will corrode Gold If you refund the VVater upon the Foeces let them macerate and distil it again the VVater will be much stronger How to purge the phlegm from these Waters without which they are of no force cast a little Silver into a litle of this VVater which being overcharged with phlegm will not corrode it But set it to heat over the fire and it will presently do it pour all this VVater into another Pot and leave the Foeces behinde in the former so the VVater will be clarified Oyl of Vitriol Dissolve Vitriol in an earthen Pan with a wide mouth let the phlegm evaporate then encrease the fire and burn it till it be all red and the fourth part be consumed Put it into a Glass-Retort luted all over thrice double and well dried and set in igne reverberationis continually augmenting the fire and continning it for three days until the Vessel melt and an Oyl drop out without any VVater Every three pounds will â—ield one ounce of Oyl Put it into a Glass-bottle and set it in hot Embeâ—s that the VVater if any be in the Oyl may evaporate for so it will be of greater strengh The sign of a perfect extraction is if it make a piece of VVood being cast into it smoak as if it burned it Oyl of Sulphur This is the proper way to extract Oyl of Sulphur Take a Glass with a large mouth in the form of a Bell and hang it up by a wire place a large Receiver under it that it may catch the Oyl as it droppeth out of the Bell. In the middle between these hang an earthen Vessel full of Sulphur kindle the fire and make the Sulphur burn the smoak of which ascendeth up into the Bell condenseth it self and falls down in an oyly substance When the Sulphur is consumed put in more until you have the quantity of Oyl which you desire There is also another way to extract it in a greater quantity Prepare a great Glass-Receiver such as I described in the Extraction of Oyl of Tartar and Aqua Fortis cut a hole thorow it with an Emerauld and indent the edges of it that the smoak may pass out set this upon an earthen Pan in which you burn the Sulphur Above this set another Vessel of a larger size so that it may be about a handful distant from the first cut the edges of the hole in deeper notches that the vapor ascending thorow the first and circulating about the second may distil out of both so you may add a third and fourth Pour this Oyl into another Glass and let the phlegm evaporate over hot Embers it will become of that strength that it will dissolve Silver and I may say Gold also if it be rightly made The fume of Sulphur is congealed in Sal Ammoniacum for I have gathered it in the Mountains of Campania and condensed it into Salt nothing at all differing from that which is brought out of the Eastern Countries Thus Sal Ammoniacus which hath so long lain unknown is discovered in our own Country and is nothing but Salt of Sulphur and this Oyl is the Water of Sal Ammoniac or Salt of Sulphur I would fain know how Learned Men do approve this my Invention I take the Earth thorow which the smoak of Sulphur hath arisen and dissole it in warm Waters and purge it thorow a hanging Receptacle described before then I make the Water evaporate and so finde a Salt nothing different as I hope from Ammoniacum CHAP. XXI Of the Separation of the Elements IN every Compound there are four Elements but for the most part one is predominant the rest are dull and unprofitable Hence when we speak of separating the Elements of a Compound we mean the separating that predominant one In the Water-Lilly the Element of Water is chief Air Earth and Fire are in it but in a small proportion Hence there is but a small quantity of heat and driness in it because VVater overwhelms them all The same must be understood in other things also But do not think that we intend by the separation of the Elements to divide them absolutely the Air from the VVater and the VVater from the Fire and Earth but onely by a certain similitude as what is hotter then the rest we call Fire the moister VVater Stones participate more of Earth VVoods of Fire Herbs of VVater VVe account those Airy which fill the Vessels and Receivers and easily burst them and so flie out VVhen the Elements are thus separated they may afterwards be purified and attenuated The manner of extracting them is various according to the diversity of natural things for some must be calcined some sublimated others distilled I will set down some examples How to separate the Elements of Metals Lay your Metal in Aqua Fortis as I shewed before till it be dissolved then draw out the Aqua Fortis by a Bath and pour it on again and so again until it be turned into an Oyl of a light Red or Ruby-colour Pour two parts of Aqua Fortis unto the Oyl and macerate them in a Glass in Fimo for a month then distil them on Embers till the VVater be all drawn out which you must take and still again in Balneo until it ascend so will you have two Elements By the Bath the Air is elevated the VVater and Earth remain in the bottom the Fire continueth in the bottom of the former Vessel for it is of a fiery substance this Nature and the Affusion of Water and the Distillation in Balneo will reduce into an Oyl again in which you must correct the Fire and it will be perfect You may lay Metal in Embers then by degrees encrease the fire the VVater will first gently ascend next the Earth In Silver the first Oyl is blewish and in perfect separation settleth to the bottom and the VVater ascendeth but in Balneo the Elements of Fire and Earth for the substance of it is cold and moist in Balneo the Elements of Fire and Earth remain first the Earth will come out afterwards the Fire So of Tin the first Oyl is yellow in Balneo the Air will remain in the bottom the Fire Earth and
vessel turned downwards touch the upper part of the lower liquor that no Air may enter for then the water will presently descend into the vessel underneath and the lighter part of the mingled liquor will ascend and the water will sink down and if it be all wine it will all ascend no wine will stay with the water if any thing stay behind you must know that so much water was mingled with the wine which may easily be known by the smell and taste if you do it as it should be done Then take a vessel that will hold more of the same liquor and put it into a vessel underneath till it takes it all in whence by the proportion of the wine ascended and of the water any man may know easily how much water is mingled with the wine But for convenience let the Vial that shall hold the water be of a round belly and the hole not very great and let the vessel under that contains the wine have a narrow mouth that the upper round mouth may the better joyn with the undermost and no Air come in But because it happeneth oft that the upper Ball when it hath drank in all the wine the wine will not fill it and we would part the water from the wine take therefore the round Glass in your hand and turn it about with the mouth upwards then will the wine presently turn about and come uppermost which may be a tongue laid in be all call'd forth Be careful to see when the wine is all drawn out remove the tongue and the water will remain pure CHAP. IV. How otherwise you may part water from wine I Can do this another way not by levity and gravity as I said but by thinness and thickness for water is the thinnest of all liquors because it is simple but wine being coloured and colour comes from the mixture of the Elements it is more corpulent Wherefore to part wine from water we must provide a matter that is full of holes and make a vessel thereof into which the wine poured with the water may drean forth for the water will drean forth through the pores of the matter that is opened by a minglâ—â— and corpulent body And though many kinds of wood be fit yet Ivy is the best because it is full of pores and chinks wherefore if you make a vessel of Ivy wood that is green and pour into it wine mingled with water the water will in a short time drean out Yet I see that all the Antients and modern Writers thought the contrary yet both reason and experience are against them For Gaeto saith If you would know whether there be water put to your wine make a vessel of Ivy put your wine you think is mixed with water into it if there be any water the wine will run forth and the water stay behind for an Ivy vessel will hold no wine And Pliny from him The Ivy is said to be wonderful for proof of wine If a vessel be made of Ivy-wood the wine will run forth and the water will stay behind if any were mingled with it Whereupon both of them are to be noted for a two sold error because they say it comes from the wonderful faculty of the Ivy whereas every porous wood can do the same Again he saith that the wine will run forth and the water stay behind whereas it is the contrary But Democritus thought what was truest and more probable who used not an Ivy vessel but one full of holes saith he they pour it into a new earthen pot not yet seasoned and hang it up for two days the pot saith he will leak if any water be mingled with it Democritas used another Art for the same purpose Some stop the mouth of the vessel with a new Spunge dipt in Oyl and incline it and let it run forth if there be water in it onely the water will run forth which experiment also he useth in Oyl For the Spunge is full of holes and open enough and being dipt in Oyl that hinders that the liquor cannot run forth so easily Africanus adds another reason Put liquid Alom into a vessel of wine then stop the mouth with a Spunge dipt in Oyl and incline it and let it run forth for nothing but the water will run out For the Alom binds the liquors that they drean forth very slowly CHAP. V. Another way to part a light body mingled with a heavy I Have another Art to seperate a light body from a heavy or wine from water or by another way Make a linnen tongue or of bombast and dip it into the vessel where wine is mingled with water and let the tongue swim above without the liquor and ascend above it and so hang pendulous out of the vessel for the lighter liquor will ascend by the tongue and drop on the outside but when the lighter ascends it attracts the heavy also wherefore when you see the colour change take the vessel away for the water runs forth It is evident that the wine being lighter will always ascend to the top of the vessel and run forth by the tongue though all Vintners say the contrary that the water will run forth by the tongue and that the wine will stay within CHAP. VI. How light is mingled in heavy or heavy in light VVE can easily know whether any light matter is mingled with heavy or any heavy matter with light And I will expound the manner out of Archimedes his Book concerning thingâ— that swim above water the cause whereof is that if Wood stone or any heavy Metal be equal in weight to the same quantity of water the utmost superficies oâ— the body will be equal with the superficies of the water if it weigh heavior it will sink to the bottom if it be lighter the lighter it is then the water so much of it will swim above the watâ—â— Since therefore this is true and wine is heavior then water one and the same thing will sink more in wine than in water and in thicker water the less Wherefore vessels are more drown'd in River than in the Sea for Sea-water is thicker and more heavy by reason of its salt mingled with it as also we have it in Alexander If therefore you would know Whether water be mingled with wine Put the wine you suspect to be mingled with water into some vessel and put an Apple or Pear into it if the Apple sink the wine is pure but if it floâ—e the wine hath water mingled with it because water is thicker than wine Which Democritus saith is contrary and false He saith it is necessary sometimes to commit the Care of the wine of new wine to Stewards and Servants also the Merchant hath the like reason to try whether his wine be pure They use to cast an Apple into the vessel but wilde Pears are the best others cast in a Locust others a Grashopper and if they swim it is pure wine but
because the air hath no place to get forth when therefore any man drinks when the water is drank up as far as the hole of the spire end by the air pressed within is the water thrust violently forth and flies in the face of him that drinks Also there is a vessel that no man can drink out of it but he who knows the art Make an earthen or metal vessel in form of a Bottle or Flagon and make it full of holes from the neck to the middle of the belly From the bottom let a pipe ascend by the handle of the vessel and the handle being round about it let it come above the brims of the vessel empty under the handle in a place not seen make a little hole that any man holding the vessel by the handle may with his finger stop and unstop this hole when he please under the brim of the vessel where you set it to your mouth let there be another secret hole Then pour water into the vessel if now any man put the bottle to his mouth and raiseth it to drink the water will run forth at the neck that is open and at the belly but he that knows the trick taking the vessel by the handle shuts the hole with his thumb and not moving the vessel he draws the air with his mouth for the water follows the air and so he drinks it all up but if any man suck and shut not the hole the water will not follow CHAP. VI. That we may use the Air in many Arts. VVE may use Air in many Artifices I shall set down some that I may give a hint to others to invent more And chiefly How wind may be made in a chamber that guests may almost freeze Make a deep pit and put in a sufficient quantity of river or running water let the pit be close stopt onely let a pipe convey it through the walls that it may be brought into the chamber Let the water be let down into the pit by a kind of Tunnel lest the air should come forth at the place where it goes in by the water is the air of the pit expelled and comes by the pipe into the chamber that not onely those that sleep there but such as converse there are extream cold and benummed I will shew How Air may serve for Bellows I saw this at Rome Make a little cellar that 's close on all sides pour in by a Tunnel from above a quantity of water on the top of the wall let there be a little hole at which the air may break forth with violence for it will come so forcibly that it will kindle a fire and serve for bellows for Brass and Iron-melting furnaces the Tunnel being so made that when need is it may be turned and water may be put in THE TWENTIETH BOOK OF Natural Magick The Chaos wherein the Experiments are set down without any Classical Order THE PROEME I Determined at the beginning of my Book to write Experiments that are contain'd in all Natural Sciences but by my business that called me off my mind was hindred so that I could not accomplish what I intended Since therefore I could not do what I would I must be willing to do what I can Therefore I shut up in this Book those Experiments that could be included in no Classes which were so diverse and various that they could not make up a Science or a Book and thereupon I have here heaped them altogether confusedly as what I had overpassed and if God please I will another time give you a more perfect Book Now you must rest content with these CHAP. I. How sea-Sea-water may be made potable IT is no small commodity to mankinde if sea-Sea-water may be made potable In long voyages as to the Indies it is of great concernment For whilst Sea men by reason of tempests are forced to stay longer at Sea than they would for want of water they fall into great danger of their lives Galleys are forced all most every ten days to put in for fresh water and therefore they cannot long wander in enemies countries nor go far for enemies stop their passages Moreover in sea Towns and Islands when they want water as in our days in the Island Malta and in the Syrses Souldiers and Inhabitants endured much hardness and Histories relate many such things Hence I thought it necessary to search curiously whether Sea-water might be made potable But it is impossible to finde out any thing for this how it may be done unless we first finde out the cause of its saltness and what our Ancestors have said concerning that matter especially since Aristotle saith That the salt may easily be taken from the Sea because the sea is not salt of its own Nature but by the Sun that heats the water which draws out of it cold and dry earthly exhalations to the top of it and these being there burnt cause it to be salt when the moist subtile parts are resolved into thin vapors We therefore imitating Nature by raising the thin parts by Chymical Instruments may easily make it sweet For so the Nature of the Sea makes sweet waters for the Rivers There are also veins of the Sea in the deep parts of the earth that are heated by the Sun and the vapours are elevated to the tops of the heighest Mountains where by the cold superficies they meet with they congeal into drops and dropping down by the vaulted roots of Caves they run forth in open streams We first fill a hollow vessel like a great Ball with Sea-water it must have a long neck and a cap upon it that live coles being put under the water may resolve into thin vapors and fill all vacuities being carryed aloft this ill sented grossness when it comes to touch the coldness of the head or cap and meets with the Glass gathers like dew about the skirts of it and so running down the arches of the cap it turns to water and a pipe being opened that pertains to it it runs forth largely and the receiver stands to receive it as it drops so will sweet water come from salt and the salt tarryeth at the bottom of the vessel and three pound of salt water will give two pounds of fresh water but if the cap of the limbeck be of Lead it will afford more water yet not so good For Galen saith That water that runs through pipes of Lead if it be drank will cause an excoriation of the intestines But I found a way How to get a greater quantity of fresh water when we distil salt water Make a cap of earth like to a Pyramis all full of holes that through the holes Urinals of Earth or Glass may be brought in Let their mouths stick forth well luâ—ed that the vapor may not exhale the cap after the fashion of the limbeck must have its pipe at the bottom running round and let it crop forth at the nose of it Set this upon a
brass Cauldron that will hold much water fill it with salt water after that the Urinals and putting on their caps when fire is put under both the Urinals will drop and the cap that contains others by its pipe will drop out water also for the vapors rising from the Cauldron of hot water will make the Urinals drop and the cap will drop withal But if at Sea the commodity of such a vessel cannot be had We may Distil salt water otherwise though but little Dioscorides shews the old way of distillation we may that way distil sea water in ships which Pliny shews also Fleeces of wool extended about the ship are made wet by the vapors rising from the Sea and sweet water is pressed out of them But let us see whiter Salt water may be made fresh another way Aristotle saith it and Solomon before him That all Rivers came from the Sea and return to the Sea for by the secret passages under ground the waters that are sent forth leave their earthly and dry parts mixed with the earth and they come forth pure and sweet He saith The cause why the salt water comes not forth is because it is ponderous and settles and therefore onely hot-waters of salt-waters can run forth for they have a lightness that oversways the weight of the salt for what is hot is lightest Adde that waters running through the earth are much strained and therefore the heavior and thicker they are the more do they continually sink down and are left behind and the lighter they are the more pure do they come forth and are severed For as Salt is heavy so sweet water is light and so it comes that they are sweet waters that run forth This is the very cause why salt-water when it moves and is changed is made the sweeter for motion makes it lighter and purer Let us see now if we can imitate Nature Fill then great vessels with earth and set them so one above another that one may drean into another and thus salt-water dreaning through many vessels may leave the salt behinde I tried it through ten vessels and it remain'd still salt My friend said that he made it sweet through twenty vessels Yet thus I thought to warn you of that all earth is not fit for this use Solinus saith That sea-water strain'd through clay will grow sweet and it is proved that the salt is taken away if you strain it often through thin sand of a River Earth that lies in covered places and under roots is naught for that is commonly salt as also where Cattle are sâ—alled which Columella saith is naught for Trees for that it makes salt-salt-water what is strain'd from it Black earth is naught for it makes the waters sharp but clay grounds make sweet waters Paxamus Anaxagoras said That the saltness of the sea came from the Rivers running through salt places and communicating that quality to the sea Some approve River-gravel for this use and their reason is because always sweet waters are found by the shores and they say this happens because they are strain'd through the sand and so grow fresh coming from the salt-salt-sea for the sweet water that is found neer the sea is not of the sea but such water as comes from the tops of hills through the secret channels of the earth thither For waters that drean forth sweet are sweet though they lye even with the sea and in plain places as Apuila where the waters drean not from the hills they are salt So on the shores of Africa But Aristotle brings an experiment from a vessel of wax for if one make a Ball of wax that is hollow and shall dip it into the sea it being of a sufficient thickness to contain he shall finde it full of fresh water because the corpulent saltness cannot get in through the pores of the wax And Pliny by letting down little nets into the sea and hollow balls of wax or empty vessels stopt saith they will draw in fresh water for sea-water strain'd through clay will grow fresh But I have found this to be false For I have made pots of clay as fine and well as I could and let them down into salt-water and after some days I found salt-water in them Also if it were true it is of no use when as to sweeten one pound of water a thousand Balls of wax a day were not sufficient But for this many vessels might be invented of porous wood and stones A vessel of Ivy that parts as I said wine from water will not part salt from water if it drean through it But stones are brought from Portingal made into vessels into which sea water put will drean forth sweet if not the first yet the second time they use it to break the stone also for that many pumex and porous stones may be tried Leo Baptista Albertus saith That an earthen pot well stopt and put into the sea will fill with potable water But I have tried all earthen vessels and I always found salt-water Aristotle in his Problems saith It may be done Another way If salt-water cannot be drank cold yet hot and cool again it is better to drink It is because a thing useth to change from contrary to contrary and salt-water is contrary to fresh and when it is boil'd the salt part is boil'd off and when it is cold stays at the bottom This I tried and found it false and more salt for by heat the thin vapors of the water that are sweet exhale and the salt stay behinde and in lesser water the same quantity of salt makes it salter as I said in my distillations I wonder such a wise man would relate such falsities Florentinus borrowing it from him saith If water be not good nor poâ—able but ill let it be boiled till a tenth part of it be consumed then purge it and it will be good For sea-water so boil'd will grow sweet Let me see whether it can be made so Another way and that in great quantity There is a thing that being cast into large vessels filled with sea-water by fastning the salt will make it fall to the bottom or by curdling it and so it frees the water from it Wherefore we must think on things that have a stiptick quality the Antients tried this the Moderns have effected it Pliny Nitrous of bitter waters if you put Barley-flower dried to them they are tempered that you may drink of them in two hours therefore is Barley-flower put into wine sacks and elswhere Those that go to the red-Red-sea through the Desarts make nitrous and salt and bitter waters fit to drink in two hours by putting in of Barley-meal and they eat Barley-meal The like force hath the Chalk of the Rhodes and our Clay Also Cooks with Catlings and Meal of Wheat will take salt out of very salt meaâ— I tried this oft but found it false yet some of the saltness was taken away Pliny If you must drink ill
waters strew in powder of Penniroyal Leo Baptista Albertus when they take up the water of Nilus muddy if they do but rub the edge of the vessel with an Almond it presently grows clear I tried this to and found it false when common salt is cast into Aqua fortis that parts Gold from Silver the Silver will presently descend We see also that in the making of that they call read Alac casting but Alom into Lye the salt and colour will presently precipitate to the bottom and nothing will remain but clear water We see that milk will curdle with many Herbs which we speak of elsewhere We shall use therefore for this purpose coagulaters and astringents Cooks say That a Spunge put into a pot of salt-water will draw the salt to it but pressed forth again and cast in once more will take it all out So wood wrapt about with fillets of linnen and put into the pot will draw the salt to it Others binde in a clout Wheat-meal and put it into the pot and draw forth the salt Palladius where he speaks of seasoning of wines saith The Greeks bid men keep sea-sea-water that is clean and taken out of the calm sea the year before whose Nature is that in this time it will lose its saltness or bitterness and smell sweet by age It remains to shew How sweet waters may be mended Leo Baptista saith If you place a glazed vessel full of salt and well stopt with lime putting oyl under that no water may penetrate into it that it may hang in the middle of the waters of a Cistern these waters will in no time corrupt Others adde also Quick-silver If water begin to corrupt cast in salt to purge them and if salt be wanting put in some sea-sea-water for so at Venice they draw water from St Nicolas Well for Marriners that go long voyages because it stands so neer the sea and salt lyes hid in it by communicating with those waters We read in Scripture that Elizeus did this who at Jericho or Palestina cast in salt into a Fountain and made it potable water which was before bitter and corrupt If water breeds worms cast in quick Lime and they will dye When we would make wine clear beat the white of an Egge and the troubled wine will descend if you put it in Others cast in the dust that is on the catlings of small nuts and the Spaniards cast in Gyp to make in clear and all these we may use in waters CHAP. II. How to make water of Air. IF all other means fail we may make water of air onely by changing it into air as Nature doth for she makes water of air or vapors Therefore when we want water we may make it of air and do as Nature doth We know when the Sun heats the earth it draws forth the thinnest vapors and carrieth them on high to that region of the air where the cold is those vapors are condensed into drops and fall down in Rain Also we see in summer that in Glass vessels well rinced and that are full of cold water the air by coming to the outermost superficies will presently clow'd the the Glass and make it lose its cleanness a little after it will be all in a dew and swell into bubbles and by degrees these will turn to drops and fall down which have no other reason for them but because the cold air sticking to the Glass grows thick and is changed into water We see also in Chambers at Venice where there windows are made of Glass when a gross and thick vapor sticks to the Glass within and a cold vapor prevails without that within will turn to dew and drop down Again in winter in Brass Guns which are always very cold and are kept in Cellars and vaulted places where men also use to be that the air will grow thick and lighting upon the cold superficies of them they will be all of a dew and drop with water But to say no more Make a large round vessel of Brass and put into it Salt-Peter unrefined what will fill it men call it Solazzo mingled with Ice for these two mixed as I said in this Book make a mighty cold and by shaking them with the wondeful force of the cold they gather air about the vessel and it will presently drop into a vessel underneath A deligent Artist will adde more that he may get a greater quantity of water It sufficeth that I have shewed the way CHAP. III. How one may so alter his face that not so much as his friends shall know him SUch as are taken prisoners or shut up close and desire to escape and such as do business for great men as spies and others that would not be known it is of great moment for them to know how to change their Countenances I will teach them to do it so exactly that their friends and wives shall not know them Great men do not a little enquire for such secrets because those that can dissemble theirown persons have done great matters and lovers have served their Mistresses and Parents have not suspected it Ulisses attempting to know what the Trojans did clothed in counterfeit garments and his face changed did all he would and was not discovered Homer With many scars he did transform his face In servants clothes as from a beggars race He went to Troy And when he desired to know what Penelope and her suters did he transformed himself again I shall shew how this may be done many ways by changing the Garments Hair Countenance Scars Swellings we may so change our Faces that in some places it may rise in bunches in other places it may sink down And first How to dye the Flesh. But to begin with the colouring of the Flesh. The Flesh may be dyed to last so long or to be soon washed out If you will have it soon wash'd off Steep the shells of Walnuts and of Pomegranates in Vinegar four or five days then press them forth by a Press and dye the face for it will make your face as black as an Ethiopian and this will last some days Oyl of honey makes a yellow colour and red and it will last fourteen days or more The fume of Brimstone will discolour the face that it will shew sickly as if one had long kept his bed but it will be soon gone But if you will have it last many days firm and very hardly to come off Use water of Depart that seperates Gold from Silver made of Salt-Peter and Vitriol and especially if it have first corroded any Silver this will last twenty days until the skin be changed But if you will Change the Hair I taught elsewhere how to do this yet I will take the pains to do it again Oyl of honey dyes the Hair of the head and beard of a yellow or red colour and this will hold a moneth But if they be hoary white or yellow we may dye them black with
of Magick THere are two sorts of Magick the one is infamous and unhappie because it hath to do with foul spirits and consists of Inchantments and wicked Curiosity and this is called Sorcery an art which all learned and good men derest neither is it able to yeeld any truth of Reason or Nature but stands meerly upon fancies and imaginations such as vanish presently away and leave nothing behinde them as Jamblichus writes in his book concerning the mysteries of the Aegyptians The other Magick is natural which all excellent wise men do admit and embrace and worship with great applause neither is there any thing more highly esteemed or better thought of by men of learning The most noble Philosophers that ever were Pythagoras Empedocles Democrites and Plato forsook their own countries and lived abroad as exiles and banished men rather then as strangers and all to search out and to attain this knowledge and when they came home again this was the Science which they professed and this they esteemed a profound mysterie They that have been most skilfuâ— in dark and hidden points of learning do call this knowledge the very highest point and the perfection of natural Science insomuch that if they could find out or devise amongst all natural Sciences any one thing more excellent or more wonderful then another that they would still call by the name of Magick Others have named it the practical part of natural Philosophy which produceth her effects by the mutual and fit application of one natural thing unto another The Platonicks as Plotinus imitating Mercurius writes in his book of Sacrifice and Magick makes it to be a Science whereby inferiour things are made subject to superiours earthly are subdued to heavenly and by certain pretty allurements it fetcheth forth the properties of the whole frame of the world Hence the Aegyptians termed Nature her self a Magician because she hath an alluring power to draw like things by their likes and this power say they consists in love and the things that were so drawn and brought together by the affinity of Nature those they said were drawn by Magick But I think that Magick is nothing else but the survey of the whole course of Nature For whilst we consider the Heavens the Stars the Elements how they are moved and how they are changed by this means we find out the hidden secrecies of living creatures of plants of metals and of their generation and corruption so that this whole Science seems meerly to depend upon the view of Nature as afterward we shall see more at large This doth Plato seem to signifie in his Alcibiades where he saith That the Magick of Zoroastres was nothing else in his opinion but the knowledge and study of Divine things wherewith the Kings Sons of Persia amongst other princely qualities were endued that by the example of the Common-wealth of the whole world they also might learn to govern their own Common-wealth And Tully in his book of Divinations saith That amongst the Persians no man might be a King unless he had first learned the Art of Magick for as Nature governs the world by the mutual agreement and disagreement of the creatures after the same sort they also might learn to govern the Common-wealth committed unto them This Art I say is full of much vertue of many secret mysteries it openeth unto us the properties and qualities of hidden things and the knowledge of the whole course of Nature and it reacheth us by the agreement and the disagreement of things either so to sâ—nder them or else to lay them so together by the mutual and fit applying of one thing to another as thereby we do strange works such as the vulgar sort call miracles and such as men can neither well conceive nor sufficiently admire For this cause Magick was wont to flourish in Aethiopia and India where was great store of herbs and stones and such other things as were fit for these purposes Wherefore as many of you as come to behold Magick must be perswaded that the works of Magick are nothing else but the works of Nature whose dutiful hand-maid Magick is For if she find any want in the affinity of Nature that it is not strong enough she doth supply such defects at convenient seasons by the help of vapours and by observing due measures and proportions as in Husbandry it is Nature that brings forth corn and herbs but it is Art that prepares and makes way for them Hence was it that Antipho the Poet said That we overcome those things by Art wherein Nature doth overcome us and Plotinus calls a Magician such a one as works by the help of Nature onely and not by the help of Art Superstitious profane and wicked men have nothing to do with this Science her gate is shut against them neither do we judge them worthy to be driven away from this profession onely but even out of Cities and out of the world to be grievously punished and utterly destroyed But now what is the 〈◊〉 and what must be the learning of this professor we purpose to 〈◊〉 in that which floweth CHAP. III. The Instruction of a Magician and what manner of man a Magician ought to be NOw it is meet to instruct a Magician both what he must know and what he must observe that being sufficiently instructed every way he may bring very strange and wonderful things to pass Seeing Magick as we shewed before is a practical part of Natural Philosophy therefore it behoveth a Magician and one that aspires to the dignity of that profession to be an exact and a very perfect Philosopher For Philosophy teaches what are the effects of fire earth air and water the principal matter of the heavens and what is the cause of the flowing of the Sea and of the divers-coloured Rain-bowe and of the loud Thunder and of Comets and firy lights that appear by night and of Earth-quakes and what are the beginnings of Gold and of Iron and what is the whole witty force of hidden Nature Then also he must be a skilful Physician for both these Sciences are very like and neer together and Physick by creeping in under colour of Magick hath purchased favour amongst men And surely it is a great help unto us in this kinde for it teaches mixtures and temperatures and so shews us how to compound and lay things together for such purposes Moreover it is required of him that he be an Herbalist not onely able to discern common Simples but very skilful and sharp-sighted in the nature of all plants for the uncertain names of plants and their neer likeness of one to another so that they can hardly be discerned hath put us to much trouble in some of our works and experiments And as there is no greater inconvenience to any Artificer then not to know his tools that he must work with so the knowledge of plants is so necessary to this profession that indeed it is all in all He
wherein if a man make a gutter with a staff he shall see Rivers of fire run therein The like things are reported of waters For seeing they passe under the earth through veins of allum pitch brimstone and such like hence it is that they are sometimes hurtful and sometimes wholsome for the body There are also many kinds of water and they have divers properties The River Himera in Sicily is divided into two parts that which runs against Aetna is very sweet that which runneth through the salt vein is very salt In Cappadocia betwixt the Cities Mazaca and Tuava there is a Lake whereinto if you put reeds or timber they become stones by little and little and are not changed from stones again neither can any thing in that water be ever changed In Hierapolis beyond the River Maeander there is a water that becomes gravel so that they which make water-courses raise up whole banks thereof The Rivers Cephises and Melas in Boeotia if cattel drink of them as they do continually to make them conceive though the dams be white yet their young shall be russet or dun or coal-black So the sheep that drink of the River Peneus in Thessaly and Astax in Pontus are thereby made black Some kinds of waters also are deadly which from the poisonous juice of the earth become poisonous as the Well of Terracina called Neptunius which kills as many as drink of it and therefore in old times it was stopt up And the Lake Cychros in Thracia kills all that drink of it and all that wash themselves with it In Nonacris a Country of Arcady there flow very cold waters out of a stone which are called the water of Styx which break to pieces all vessels of silver and brasse and nothing can hold them but a Mules hoof wherein it was brought from Antipater into the Country where Alexander was and there his Son Jolla killed the King with it In the Country about Flascon the way to Campania in the field Cornetum there is a Lake with a Well in it wherein seem to lie the bones of Snakes Lysards and other Serpents but when you would take them out there is no such thing So there are some sharp and sowre veins of water as Lyncesto and Theano in Italy which I sought out very diligently and found it by the way to Rome a mile from Theano and it is exceeding good against the Stone There is a Well in Paphlagonia whosoever drinks of it is presently drunken In Chios is a Well that makes all that drink of it sottish and senslesse In Susa is a Well whoso drinks of it loseth his teeth The water of Nilus is so fertile that it makes the clods of earth to become living creatures In Aethiopia is a Well which is so cold at noon that you cannot drink it and so not at midnight that you cannot touch it There are many other like Wells which Ovid speaks of Ammons Well is cold all day and warm both morning and evening the waters of Athamas set wood on fire at the small of the Moon there is a Well where the Cicones inhabit that turneth into stones all that toucheth it or drinks of it Crathis and Sybaris make hair shew like Amber and Gold the water of Salmax and the Aethiopian Lakes make them mad or in a trance that drink of it he that drinks of the Well Clitorius never cares for wine after the River Lyncestius makes men drunken the Lake Pheneus in Arcady is hurtful if you drink it by night if by day it is wholesome Other properties there are also of places and fountains which he that would know may learn out of Theophrastus Timaeus Possidonius Hegesias Herodotus Aristides Meirodorus and the like who have very diligently sought out and registred the properties of places and out of them Pliny Solinus and such Writers have gathered their books CHAP. XVIII That Compounds work more forcibly and how to compound and mix those Simples which we would use in our mixtures NOw we will shew how to mix and compound many Simples together that the mixture may cause them to be more operative Proclus in his book of Sacrifice and Magick saith That the antient Priests were wont to mix many things together because they saw that divers Simples had some property of a God in them but none of them by it self sufficient to resemble him Wherfore they did attract the heavenly influences by compounding many things into one whereby it might resemble that One which is above many They made images of sundry matters and many odors compounded artificially into one so to expresse the essence of a God who hath in himself very many powers This I thought good to alleadge that we may know the Ancients were wont to use mixtures that a compound might be the more operative And I my self have often compounded a preservative against poison of Dragon-herbs the Dragon-fish Vipers and the stone Ophites being led therein by the likenesse of things The herb Dragon-wort both the greater and smaller have a stalk full of sundry-coloured specks if any man eat their root or rub his hands with their leaves the Viper cannot hurt him The Dragon-fish being cut and opened and laid to the place which he hath stung is a present remedy against his sting as Aetius writes The Viper it self if you flay her and strip off her skin cut off her head and tail cast away all her intrails boil her like an Eele and give her to one that she hath bitten to eat it will cure him or if you cut off her head being alive and lay the part next the neck while it is hot upon the place which she hath bitten it will strangely draw out the poyson Many such compound medicines made of creatures living on the earth in the water in the air together with herbs and stones you may find most wittily devised in the books of Kirannides and Harprocration But now we will shew the way and manner how to compound Simples which the Physitians also do much observe Because we would not bring forth one effect only but sometimes have use of two or three therefore we must use mixtures that they may cause sundry effects Sometime things will not work forcibly enough therefore to make the action effectual we must take unto us many helps Again sometime they work too strongly and here we must have help to abate their force Oft-times we would practice upon some certain member as the head the heart or the bladder here we must mingle some things which are directly operative upon that part and upon none else whereby it falleth out that sometimes we must meddle contraries together But to proceed When you would do any work first consider what is the chief thing which your simple or compound should effect then take the ground or foundation of your mixture that which gives the name to your compound and let there be so much of it as may proportionably work your intent for
do they ever breed without rain though they have never so much water otherwise for it is the rain both that begets and nourishes them as Aristotle writes They are also generated of putrified things Experience hath proved that a dead horse thrown into a standing pool hath brought forth great store of Eeles and the like hath been done by the carcases of other creatures Aristotle saith they are generated of the garbage of the earth which he saith ariseth in the Sea in Rivers and in pools by reason chiefly of putrefaction but it arises in the Sea by reason of reeds in Pools and Rivers it arises by the banks-side for there the heat is more forcible to cause putrefaction And a friend of mine filled certain wooden vessels with water and Reeds and some other water-herbs and set them in the open Air having first covered them with a weighty stone and so in short time generated Eeles Such is the generation of Groundlings out of some and froth which fish the Greeks call Aphya because rain breeds it Many of them breed of the fome that rises out of the sandy chanel that still goes and comes at all times till at last it is dissolved so that this kind of fish breeds all times of the year in shadowy and warm places when the soyl is heated as in Attica neer to Salamnia and in Marathon where Themistocles got his famous victory In some places this fish breeds of fome by the help of the rain and swims on the top of the water in the fome as you see little wormes creep on the top of mud Athenaeus saith This fish is consecrated to Venus because she also comes of the froth of the Sea whence she is called Aphrodites Aelianus saith These fishes neither do beget nor are begotten but only come of mud for when dirt is clotted together in the Sea it waxes very black and slimy and then receives heat and life after a wonderful manner and so is changed into very many living Creatures and namely into Groundlings When the waves are too boistrous for him he hides himself in the clift of some rock neither doth he need any food And Oppianus makes the very same description of them and of their generation There is a kind of these fishes called a Mullet-Groundling which is generated of mud and of sand as hath been tried in many marish places amongst the rest in Gindus where in the Dog-daies the Lakes being dried up so that the mud was hard as soon as ever they began to be full of rain-rain-water again were generated little fishes a kind of Mullets about the bigness of little Cackrels which had neither seed nor egge in them And in some parts of Asia at the mouth of the Rivers into the Sea some of a bigger size are generated And as the Mullet-groundling comes of mud or of a sandy lome as Aristotle writes so it is to be thought that the Cackrel-groundling comes thereof also It seems too that A Carpe is generated of putrefaction Especially of the putrified mud of sweet water for it is experienced that in certain Lakes compassed about with Hills where there is no Well nor River to moisten it but only the rain after some few showers there hath been great store of fish especially Carps but there are some of this kind generated by copulation There are also in certain particular Lakes particular kinds of fishes as in the Lemane and the Benacian Lakes there be divers kind of Carpes and other such fishes Likewise there are certain Earthly fishes generated of putrefaction Pliny reports that in Paphlagonia they dig out of deep ditches certain earthly fishes very good to be eaten and it is so in places where there is no standing water and he wonders that they should be generated without copulation but surely it is by vertue of some moisture which he ascribes to the Wells because in some of them fishes are found Likewise Shel-fish are generated of the forthy mud or else meerly of the salt-water for they have neither seed nor male nor female the hardnesse and closenesse of their shels hindering all things from touching or rubbing their inward parts which might be fit for generation Aristotle saith they breed all of themselves which appears by this that oft-times they breed in Ships of a forthy mud putrified and in many places where no such thing was before many shel-fishes have bred when once the place waxed muddy for lack of moisture And that these fishes emit no seed or generative matter it appears because that when the men of Chios had brought out of Lesbos many Oysters and cast them into Lakes neer the Sea there were found no more then were cast in onely they were somewhat greater So then Oysters are generated in the Sea in Rivers and in Lakes and therefore are called Limnostrea because they breed in muddy places Oppianus writes also that they have neither male nor female but are generated of themselves and their own accord without the help of any copulation So the fish called Ortica and the Purple and Muscles and Scallops and Perwinkles and Limpins and all Shel-fish are generated of mud for they cannot couple together but live only as plants live And look how the mud differs so doth it bring forth different kinds of fishes durty mud genders Oysters sandy mud Perwinkles the mud in the Rocks breedeth Holoturia Lepades and such-like Limpins as experience hath shewed have bred of rotten hedges made to fish by and as soon as the hedges were gone there have been found no more Limpins CHAP. V. That new kinds of living Creatures may be generated of divers beasts by carnal copulation WE have shewed that living Creatures are generated of putrefaction now we will shew that sundry kinds of beasts coupling together may bring forth new kinds of Creatures and these also may bring forth others so that infinite monsters may be daily gendred for whereas Aristotle saith that Africk alwayes brings forth some new thing the reason thereof is this because the Country being in most places dry divers kinds of beasts come out of sundry quarters thither where the Rivers were and there partly for lust and partly by constraint coupled together and so gendred divers monstrous Creatures The Antients have set down many such generations and some are lately devised or found out by chance and what may be hereafter let men of learning judge Neither let the opinions of some Philosophers stay us which hold that of two kinds divers in nature a third cannot be made unlike to either of the parents and that some Creatures do not gender at all as Mules do not for we see that contrary to the first of these their positions many Creatures are generated of kinds divers in nature and of these are generated others to the perpetual conservation of this new kind as hath been tried in many Villages that divers kinds coupling together have brought forth other new kinds differing from their progenitors every
stone You must saith he bore a hole beneath through the body of the Tree and having so cut off the pith from passing upward you must fill up the hole with a stake of Willow or Prick-wood so shall you intercept the pith from ascending out of the root into the branches Some Writers there are which shew how to procure stoneless fruit by diligence in dressing and trimming of plants It is held for a rule in Husbandry that soft fat and moist nourishment doth alter all wilde and unkindly fruit into that which is milder and more natural It is a kind of mildeness in fruits to have a little soft and sweet kernel as on the contrary it is wildenesse to have a great and a hard kernel for it cometh by reason of a kind of harsh and dry nourishment that the earth sends up into them Wherefore no doubt but we may procure the kernel of a fruit to be smaller and more tender by diligence and skill in dressing them To begin with a Vine How a Vine may bring forth grapes without a harsh and stony kernel At such time as Vines are pruned you must take a fruitful sprig somewhat neer the top as you can and there as it grows you must pick out the pith at the highest end never cleaving it but hollowing it with some fit instrument as well as you can and there uphold it with a prop that it bow not down then take some Cyrenian juice as the Greeks call it and pour it into the place that is hollow but first you must steep this juice in water to the thickness of sodden wine and this you must do for eight dayes together every day once till the vine-branch sprout forth again Columella saith the very same that the vine-branch as it grows upon the Vine must be cut and the pith of it fetched out with some fit instrument as well as you may out of the top without the cleaving of the branch but the branch being whole and still growing on the Vine you must put into it some Benjamin or Cyrenian juice steeped in water as was shewed before and set it upright with a prop that the juice may not run forth and this is to be done for eight dayes together So if we would procure A Myrtle without a kernel Theophrastus teacheth us how to do it If you water the Myrtle-tree with hot water then saith he the fruit will be the better and without any kernel Some affirm that this experiment was found out by chance for whereas there stood neer to a Bath a Myrtle-tree which no man regarded the Commers by took off some of the fruit by chance and found them without any kernels then they carried some home and set them and so this kind of fruit began first in Athens Didymus also saith that if the Myrtle-tree be often watered with warm liquor it will yeeld berries without any stones or kernels within Theophrastus sheweth yet another way whereby this may be effected take saith he the filth or shavings of skins and put them in Urine and so lay them about the root of the Myrtle-tree at such time as the buds begin to shew themselves and so shall you have berries that have either none at all or else very small kernels in them Likewise the Pomegranate may be produced without any kernels within it if you lay good store of Swines-dung about the root of the Pomegranate-tree CHAP. XIII How fruit may be produced without any outward rines or shels THe very same helps and devices which we prescribed for the producing of fruits without their inner kernel we may likewise use in the practice of producing Nuts such like fruits as are wont to grow in shells and rines that they may grow naked as it were without any shel at all And first this may be effected by taking away the pith out of the plants that bear them so A Nut without a shell may be produced as Damageron teacheth If you bore a hole quite thorough the Nut-tree and put into it a stake of Elm to fill it up you shall thereby stop the pith from ascending into the upper parts and so no shells can grow because it is the pith only that causeth them Palladius counselleth you to bore the hole through the root and stop it up with a stake of box or some wedge made of iron or of copper But Theophrastus sheweth how to procure Almonds and Chest-nuts with a soft shell and this is by skill in dressing the Trees If you would soften and alter the fruit we must apply the root with Swins-dung for this is a very forcible worker likewise often digging will cause both the plants to prosper better and the fruit to become better also for the kernels will be smaller in such fruit as have any stones in them and such fruit as grow in shells or rines as Almonds and Chest-nuts will have the softer shell without and the larger kernel within for the greater store of nourishment there is applyed to the Tree the moister it is and the substance of the fruit is so much the more encreased But Palladius would perswade us that if we rid away the earth from the rootes of the Almond-tree some certain daies before it begin to blossom and all that while apply them with warm water we shall hereby procure the Almond-shels to be very tender If we would procure That kinde of Nut which is called Nux Tarentina the same author Damageron hath shewed us how to do it Every Nut and Almond will yeeld a mild fruit with a tender shell if we continually apply the body and root of the tree with pouring ashes upon them and likewise all other kind of fruits that grow in any shell or rine may be so wrought upon and will suffer the like alteration by the like means practised upon them If you would procure a Tarentine Nut Palladius saith you must water the Tree with Lye thrice a moneth throughout a whole year and so you may obtain your purpose Others effect such alterations by correcting the plants as by cutting off the tops of the roots If the Nut be too hard shelled you may also remedy it by cutting and paring off the bark of the Tree as Damageron sheweth for by this means you draw down that harsh and wilde humour The reason whereof is because the bark of the Tree answereth to the shell of the fruit as the pith of the Tree answereth to the kernel of the fruit and therefore as to amend the inner kernel we abated the pith so to soften or amend the utter shell or rine of the fruit we must abate the utter bark of the Tree A thing which we have observed by another like example for a Peach being engraffed upon a bitter Almond-tree the pill of the fruit thence growing was so bitter that it could not be eaten till the pill were pared off This secret may stead you in many other experiments of the like kind But this
a spung dipped in vinegar and aqua vitae then let it dry which done strew it with unquenched Lime Alome and Salt let it hang so two days in the smoak of Myrrhe Bay Rosemary and Cypress in a dry and open place Then make a mixture of unquenched Lime five pound of burnt Alome one pound good Salt two pound of Aloes and Myrrhe half a pound of Aloes-wood half a pound of the Oyl of Spicknard three onces of the powder of Rosemary-flowers five of burnt Green-brass and Calcanthum two of the best Theriack four of the dust of Cypress half a pound of dryed Saffron one once of the seeds of Coloquintida three and a half of Antimony beaten to powder one and an half of the ashes of Wine-lees five and a half of Musk half a dragm of Amber two Let all be diligently brayed and mixed together and strewed upon the Body which must be for three days together strongly rubbed in an open and dry place This also we admonish that in fat Bodies the fat of the Abdomen Buttocks Hips Muscles of the Leggs thighs and all other places must be first abstracted Things may be also preserved by Balsom But seeing we can compass no true Balsom or if there be any it is exceeding dear we are glad to make artificial Balsoms as we shall shew in due place CHAP. XVI How divers sorts of Bread may be made WE have spoken of preserving fruits and other things It remains to shew how we may use those we have kept Amongst the rest we shall teach you concerning those things that are most necessary for dayly use as for many kinds of Bread Wine Vinegar and Oyls that not onely the Housholder may provide for his family with small cost but when provision is dear he may provide for himself with small pains in Mountains and Desarts of all those things almost we have spoken of But we will begin with Bread and see what our fore-fathers used in case of necessity I shall let pass those common things as Spilt and Bean-corn Amel-corn Typh-wheat Panick Sesamum being all well known But first To make Bread of Wall-nuts Dioscorides saith there is a kind of Thistle commonly found in the waters that onely in Rivers brings forth a certain seed as big as a Ches-nut with three points membranous full of white pith that tastes like Ches-nuts they call them water ches-nuts vulgarly and the Inhabitants use them in meats as they do Ches-nuts Pilgrims make Chapelets of them The Thracians that dwell by the River Strimon fat their horses with this Thistle when it is green and of the same seed they make Bread to eat Moreover in places where they grow amongst us the Inhabitants when provision is dear make Bread of them as at Ferrara they do of Ches-â—uts and the Brutii rost them in the embers and eat them for juncates Almost in the same manner To make Bread of the Lote tree Theophrastus teacheth it The Lote-tree grows in plain ground where the Countries are overflowed with water The fruit is like a Bean naturally but less and more slender That which grows on the head comes forth promiscuously as Beans do many and very thick together When the Sun sets it closeth and opens when he riseth and springs up above the water The head is as great as a Poppy-head where it grows in Euphrates The Egyptians lay those heads on heaps to putrefie and when the shells are putrefied they wash them in a River and part the fruit from them and dry it and break it and make bread of it and eat it Pliny There is also bread made of the seed of it like to Millet seed in Egypt by the Shepherds and they knead it with water especially or with milk They say that nothing is more wholesom then that bread or lighter whil'st it is hot but cold it is harder to digest and becomes heavy It is certain that those who live upon that are never troubled with Dysenteries Tenasmus or any diseases of the belly And therefore it is one of their remedies For it was of old a custom To make bread of Dates which Pliny writes of Dates that are very dry of Thebes and Arabia that are slender and very lean with a continual vapour they are terrified and are covered rather with a Shel then a Skin In Ethiopia it is crumbled so great is the draught and like meal it is made into bread Bread of the Mulberry-figtree In Caria and Rhodes there is a great Fig of Egypt or increase of the Sycamore-tree and in the neighbouring places where there is little wheat the people for want of corn use it for bread and for all bread corn So great and continual plenty is there of that Apple and abundance of bread is made of it pleasing to the stomach but it affords but little nutriment and we might make the same if we would We find it in Writers of husbandry How we may make bread without leaven Out of Didymus some adde Nitre for Nitre makes bread more crumbly as it doth flesh also Some the day before they make their bread cast Grapes into the water and the next day when they will make their bread they take them away for they swim above the water and they press them out and use the moisture pressed forth for leaven and so they make their bread more pleasing If you would have leaven last you all the year when the new wine hath boiled in the vessels Skim off the froth that boils on the top and mingle with it Millet-meal and work it well together and make morsels of it which dry in the Sun and lay up in a moist place and you may take a sufficient quantity and use it for leaven CHAP. XVII Divers sorts of Bread made of Roots and fruits NOw we shall proceed to other kinds of bread found out in our days that are no small profit to us when corn is dear How to make bread of the Roots of Cuckow-pint the root of Wake-Robin when it is not too acrimonious is eaten and desired in meats Dioscorides saith The decoction was drank as not being over sharp Galen That it was eaten as Rape-roots and in some Countries it grows more corroding To prepare it rightly pour out the water of the first boyling and presently cast it into other hot water In Cyrene those Roots are otherwise then amongst us for there it is no Physical root and is not acrimonious at all so that it is more profitable then a Rape-root Also our forefathers when Corn was dear used this Root in meats with great profit Caesar de bello civili Also there is a kind of Root found by them that were with Valerius which is called Chara which mingled with milk releived a Souldier that was hungry and it was made up like to bread There was great plenty of this Root and of it bread was made when those of Pompey his side objected to our Souldiers that they wanted food they would commonly
throw these at them that they might deceive their expectation And a little after the Army used this and were very healthful And in Dioscorides in the false names of simples Cuckow-pint was of old called Chara with us it is so acrimonious that we scarce can endure to touch it with our tongues But I shall open the reason how excellent bread may be made of it and if I may say so better then Wheat-bread The great Roots are made clean and they are cut into small thin plates for the thinner they are cut the sooner will they become pleasant and they must boil in vessels of hot water until you perceive the water grow sharp and the Roots somewhat sweet pour out the former water and pour in fresh then boil them again till the water become sweet and the root when it is cheweded hath no acrimony left Then take them out of the water and put them upon linnen cloths extended and hanging up until they be dry then grind them in hand-mils and the meal will be exceeding white which by it self a with a third part of wheat-meal added to it will make most pure bread and well rasted There are other ways to make it sooner when you have obtained this art you will be exceeding glad I am very certain of it For with great pleasure Bread of Asphodils is eaten This is so fruitful of round-heads with us that no Plant hath more for oftimes 80 heads will be heaped together Moreover Mountains and Sea-shores are full of them that it may be truly thought to be made for mans meat Pliny The Daffodil is eaten with the seed and head terrified But this rosted in the embers as Hesiod affirms is eaten with oyle also braied with figs it is eaten with great pleasure These Round-heads are like to Navews of moderate bigness So saith Galen also But with us they are so unpleasant and acrimonious in tast that a man cannot eat them and Sowes digging them up with their snowts will hardly feed on them no not when we want corn can we eat this in our greatest hunger it was the poor fair of frugal antiquity But by boiling the sharpness of it becomes more mild and the heat of it more tolerable as we said of Cuckow-pint It will be sufficient to satisfie a mans hunger as of old it was used As Pliny saith We have made most wholesom bread of these mingled with meal especially for men wasted and in consumptions also Bread is made of Rape-roots Turneps and Skirworts For of those boil'd and cooked first cleansed from all excrements a most commendable bread may be made as I have tried But meal must be mingled with them to a third part or else half as much of one and the other as we shall shew a little after And not to be tedious the same way-bread to eat may be made of all Navews Roots or Bulbous-heads Also there is made Excellent bread of Gourds For Gourds may be had very cheap and they make savoury bread with meal and so the bread is greater for this is the greatest of all fruits for with a very little meal in time of Famine we may feed many men and not onely use it for need but for dainties also for seasoned with Sugar and prepared for mens pallats and to quench feaverish heats they are carried about every where to be sold. The way to make them up is this Take great round Gourds and fully ripe and cut into many pieces the dry skin and the pith must be taken from them with a knife put them into a kettle of boiling water and boil them for by long boiling the grassy greenness and the rank smell and loathsom taste are taken away and they will smell better and taste and nourish better and will last as long as bread Being now brought to the form of an ointment press it through a linnen strainer with your hands that if any parts of it be not well boiled or any woddy pieces be there they may be kept back by the narrowness of the strainer To this Mass adde a third part of meal and make them into bread together which will be pleasant to eat daily I will not have you to eat your fill of it but if you eat it moderately it will profit much When it is new it is excellent but stale it is not so sightly nor dainty I have shew'd you the way how you must use such things of superfluous moisture now do you learn wisely to do it CHAP. XVIII Divers ways to make bread of all sorts of Corn and Pulse ANtiently they made Bread of divers kinds of Corn and Pulse it would be needless to repeat them for you may find them in the Books of the Antients and there can be no error in making them In Campania very sweet bread is made of Millet Also the people of Sarmatia are chiefly fed with this bread and with the raw meal tempered with Mares-milk or blood drawn out of the veins of their legs The Ethiopians know no other Corn then Millet and Barley Some parts of France use Panick but chiefly Aquitane But Italy about Po adde Beans to it without which they make nothing The people of Pontus prefer no meat before Panick Panick meal now adays is neglected by us and out of use for it is dry and of small nourishment of Millet bread and cakes are made but they are heavy and hard of digestion and clammy to eat Unless they be eaten presently when they are newly baked or not else they become heavy and compact together Of the Indian Mais heavy bread is made and not pleasant at all very dry and earthly next to Millet like to this is bread called Exsergo that is also void of nutrimental juice There was also of old bread called Ornidos made of a certain seed of Ethiopia so like Sesamum that it is hard to know them asunder Also Bread is made of Lupins The best kind was known also to the Antients For Didymus teacheth how Lupins will grow sweet being three days infused in River or sea-Sea-water and when they grow mild they must be dried and laid aside and then the meal of them mingled with Barley-meal or Wheat-meal is fit to make bread But we make it thus First the Lupins are ground in mills and are made into flower fifty pound of these are put into a wooden vessel and fair water is cast upon them that it may swim four fingers breadth above them and it must be often stirred with a woodden stick then let it settle till the water grow clear and the meal sink down then strain the water well that no meal be lost and pour on water the second time and stir it as before do so the third time till the meal and water be come sweet which will be done in one day if the water be often changed As that is done put the meal into a linnen cloth laid abroad that the meal may be seperated with a wooden slice
meal Do this thrice or four times and so you may increase it continually and this must be done in a stove that the dewy spirit may be fostered I thought good to tell you also before that you must not prick the lump lest the generative blast should breath forth and flie into the air for so you will lose your labour and there must not want presently a dewy vapour which being carried into the air and made to drop may moisten the lump so you will rejoice at the wonderful increase but you must be cunning in the manual application Pray do not destroy by your negligence what was invented by the careful ingenuity of those that tried it CHAP. XX. How we may long endure hunger and thirst THe Antients had some compositions to drive away hunger and thirst and they were very necessary both in times of Famine and in wars Pliny saith some things being but tasted will abate hunger and thirst and preserve our forces as Butter Licoris Hippace and elsewhere Scythia first produced that root which is called Scythia and about Baeotia it grows very sweet And another that is excellent against Convulsions also it is a high commendation of it that such as have it in their mouths fell nor hunger nor thirst Hippace amongst them doth the same which effects the same in horses also And they report that with these two herbs the Scythians will fast twelve dayes and live without drink also all which he translated out of Theophrastus first book The Scythian Hippace is sweet also and some call it Dulcis it grows by Maeotis Amongst other properties it quencheth thirst also if it be held in the mouth For which cause both with both with that and with the other called equestris men say the Scythians will endure hunger and thirst twelve dayes Hence it appears that Pliny translated all this out of Theophrastus But I think he erred for Hippace signifies Cheese made of Mares milk and is no herb Theodorus translated it Equestrem as it were a root like Licoris fit to drive away hunger and thirst For Hippocrates saith the Scythian shepherds eat Hippace but that is Mares Cheese and elsewhere The Scythians pour Mares milk into hollow vessels of wood and shake it and that froths with churming and the fat of it they call butter which swims on the top that which is heavy sinks to the bottom they separate this and dry it when it is dry they call it Hippace the reason is because Mares milk nourisheth exceedingly and is as good as Cows milk Dioscorides The west Indians use another composition also To endure hunger and thirst Of the herb called Tobacco namely of the juice thereof and the ashes of Cockle shells they make little balls and dry them in the shade and as they travel for three or four dayes they will hold one of them between their under lip and their teeth and this they suck continually and swallow down what they suck and so all the day they feel neither hunger thirst nor weariness but we will teach another composition which Heron mentions and it was called The Epimenidian composition to endure hunger and thirst For it was a medicament that nourished much and abated thirst and this was the food the besiegers of Cities and the besieged also lived on It was called the Epimenidian composition from the Sea-onion called Epimendium that is one of the ingredients of that composition it was made thus The squil was boiled and washt with water and dryed and then cut into very small pieces then mingle sesamum a fift part poppy a fifteenth part make all these up with honey as the best to make up the mass to mitigate it divide the whole as into great Olives and take one of these about two of the clock another about ten and they felt no hurt by hunger that used it There is another composition of the same that hath of Athenian sesamum half a Sextarius of honey a half part of oyle a Cotyle and a Chaenice of sweet Almonds mundified the sesamum and Almonds must be dried and ground and winowed then the squil must have the outsides taken off and the roots and leaves must be cut into small pieces and put into a morter and bruised till they be well mollified then you must make up the squils with the like quantity of honey and of oyle and put all into a pot and set them in cold and stir them well with a wooden ladle till they be well mingled when the lump is firm it is good to cut it into little morsels and he that eats one in the morning another at night hath meat enough This medicament is good for an Army for it is sweet and so fills a man and quencheth thirst we had this in an old Scholiast a Manuscript upon the book of Heron in the Vatican Library I saw the same composition in Philo in his fifth book of wars where he describes such like other things CHAP. XXI Of what fruits wines may be made NOw we shall speak of fruits of which wines may be made And first our Ancestors did do thus but they had two wayes for some were for Physicks which are found plentifully in Physick books others again were for ordinary use and they were divers and almost infinite according as the differences of places and Nations are for what is granted to one is denyed to another First Wine of Dates Pliny saith that in the East they make wine of Dates and he reckons up fifty kinds of Dates and as many different wines from them Cariotae are the chief full of juice of which are made the principal wines in the East they are naught for the head and thence they have their name The best are found in Judaea chiefly about Jericho yet those of Archelaiis are well esteemed and of Phaselis and of Libias valleyes of the same Country The chiefest property they have is this they are full of a white fat juice and very sweet tasting like wine with honey The wine will make one drunk and the fruit also eaten largely Dioscorides teacheth thus Put ripe Dates called Chydeae into a pitcher with a hole at bottom and stopt with a pitched reed shut the hole with linnen and to fourty Sextarii pour on three gallons of water If you would not have it so sweet five gallons will be sufficient to pour on after ten dayes take away the reed with the linnen take the thick sweet wine and set it up Also wine is made Of Figs. Sotion relates it thus Some make wine of green figs filling half the vessel with them and the other half to the brim they fill with fair water and they try still by tasting for when it tasts like wine they strain it and use it It is made faith Dioscorides of ripe figs and it is called Catorchites or Sycites Chelidonian or Phaenician figs called Caricae are steeped in a pot with a hole in the bottom with a pitched reed
and the hole stopt with flax to fourty Sextarii you must pour on three gallons of water and if you will not have the wine so sweet pour on five gallons and it will do After ten dayes the liquor is taken and again the third time also the same measure of water wherein the figs were infused is poured on and in the like manner after four or five dayes it is drawn off Some to six Amphorae thereof adde ten Sextarii of salt that it may not early corrupt others put Fennel and Thyme in the bottom and the Caricae on the top and so in order till the vessel be full also men make Wine of Pears which from the Greek word for Pears is called Apyres and from the Latin Piery Palladius saith it was thus They are bruised and put in a very course bag of Canvas and pressed with weights or in a Press It lasts in the Winter but in Summer comes it sowrer Dioscorides will not have the Pears too ripe the same way is made Wine of Pomegranates Sotion makes wine of the grains of the Pomegranate taking away what is in the middle of the grains Palladius put the ripe grains well purged into a Date pail and press them out with a scrue press then boil them gently to half when it is cold put it into vessels that are pitched or plaistered with Gipsum Some do not boil the juice but to every Sextarius they mingle one pound of honey and put all in the said vessels and keep it There is made Wine of the Lote-tree fruit There is a kind of Lote without any inward kernel which is as hard as a bone in the other kind wine is pressed also out of it like Mead that will not last above ten dayes Nepos saith the same from Pliny Athenaus from Polybius Wine is made of the Lote steeped in water and bruised very pleasant to the taste as the best Mead is it is drunk pure without water also but it will not last above ten dayes wherefore they make but little for use to last onely so long Vineger is made also of it And yet not much or good enough yet there is made Wine of Myrtles berries and Cornels Out of Sotion who of the berries of Myrtles and Cornels when they are fresh pounded and pressed our made wine Now I shall shew how we may make Wine of Corn. Drink is made of Corn. Dioscorides teacheth to make Beer of Barley also a drink is made of Barley called Curmi they use that drink oft-times for wine the like drinks are wont to be made of Wheat In Hiberia toward the west and in Britany whence Pliny of Corn drink is made Beer in Egypt called Zythum in Spain Caelia and Ceria Beer in France and other Provinces In Aristotles book of drunkenness those that drink wine made of Barley till they be drunk fall upon their backs they call that wine 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but those that are drunk with any other kind of drinks fall any way on the right or left hand forward or backward but those that drink Pinum fall onely upon their backs Wine made of Barley they call Brytum Sophocles in Triptolemo and Aeschylus in Lycurgo But Hellanicus saith that Brytum is made in Farms out of roots Hecateus saith that the Egyptians grinde Barley to make drink and that the Macedonians drink Brytum made of Barley and Parabia made of Millet and Rice saith Athenaeus Also wine is made of Rice for saith Aelianus when an Elephant fights in war they give him not onely wine of grapes but of Rice also Now the same drink is made in the Northern Climates of Corn and they call it Biera but they put hops to it for it cannot be made without Barley and Wheat are infused in the decoction of it We see that of Barley and Wheat steeped in water a drink is made that tastes like wine and of them I have made the best aqua vitae But these drinks of old were Physical rather then to use as wine But I shall shew how some drinks that are so like wine in taste that you would think they were wine indeed And first Wine of Honey To nine vessels of water put eighteen pounds of Honey into brass Caldrons covered with Tin and let them boil a long time stirring all with wooden ladles and wiping away the froth that riseth with little brushes pour it out put it into a wine vessel then take two pounds of red wine Tartar and boil them in water till they be dissolved to which add an eighth part of a vessel of vineger that the loathsome and unpleasing taste of the sweetnesse of Honey may be lost let these be mingled then pour on two vessels of the best wine then let it settle after some days strain it through a hair-cloth strainer or one of cloth to cleanse it from the filth and excrements A liquor will run from this that will serve for sparing and to abate charge in a family and it is good to drink in health and sickness cover it close and drink it I shall shew you another way to make Wine of Raisins Pour into a brass Caldron seven vessels of water put in two pounds of Raisins let them boil till they be wasted in the water and the water be sweet as Mead if your kettle be too small do it at several times then take your kettle from the fire and when the liquor grows cold strain it gently forth put up the strained liquor in a wine vessel and pour into it a measure of the sharpest red wine vineger to abate the sweetnesse of the Raisins then add nine pound of Tartar finely powdered unto it and pouring on a fourth part of the best wine stop the vessel close when it is full after one week use it Another Wine of Quinces Put into brass Caldrons glazed with Tin a vessel of new wine and put thereto about fifty wild Quinces namely such as are full of streeks and wrinkled take out their kernels cut the Quinces in peices like as you do Rape Roots boil all at a gentle fire when they have boild a while take them off and let them cool pound the Quinces in a morter with a wooden pestle press them out with a press put the juice pressed forth of them the new wine and set it up in a glazed earthen vessel for a whole year When wine is scarce and you have occasion to use this put â—nto a vessel four parts of water two of new wine and one fourth part of the aforesaid mixture cover the vessel and let it boil and when it is clear use it Of all these an amphora of vineger a pound of honey as much Tartar in powder let them boil a while in a pot glazed with Nitre and mingle them and for every vessel of water pour on an Amphora of wine and cover all and after twenty dayes use it or take honey one pound as much red wine Tartar half
a pound of Raisins two Amphoras of Vineger let them boil in a pot adde wine also to them and it will be for drink I shall adde the Northern drink Wine called Metheglin The drink in Pannonia Poland and England is more pleasant and wholesome then many wines are it is made of twenty pound of good honey and of water one hundred and twenty pound skimming it till all comes to eighty pound which being cold and tunned up into a wine vessel put in leaven of bread six ounces or as much as will serve to make it work and purifie it self and withal put into a bag that hangs and may be put into the liquor and not touch the bottom of Cinnamon granes of Paradise Pepper Ginger Cloves two drams one hand full of Elder flowers let them stand in a wine Cellar all the Winter in Summer set them fourty dayes in the Sun till they taste like wine and the unpleasant taste of the honey be gone But it will be more pleasant if you add a third part of wine CHAP. XXII How vineger may be made divers wayes and of what AFter wine it follows to speak of vineger First how our forefathers made it then how of late years that it may be made extream sowre which is not only good for a family but is necessary for many Arts. Also there are some Countries where wine and so vineger is scarce Therefore in those places divers men have used their wits to make it wherefore to begin we say that Vineger may be made of the Fig-tree Out of Columella A green fig must be taken very betimes and also if it have rained and the figs fall to the earth beaten down with showres gather those figs and put them up in Hogs-heads or Amphora and let them ferment there then when it grows sharp and hath sent out some liquor what vineger there is strain it out diligently and pour it into a sweet pitched vessel This yields the best sharp vineger and it will never grow musty or hoary if it be not set in too moist a place Some to make more quantity mingle water with the figs and then they adde to them the ripest new figs and they â—et them consume in that liquor until it tast sharp enough like vineger then they strain all through rushy baskets or withie bags and they boil this vineger till they have taken off all the froth and filth from it Then they adde some terrefied salt and that hinders worms and other vermine to breed in it Cassianus makes it thus Put into a vessel old figs terresied Barley and the internal parts of Citrons Stir it often and diligently and when they are putrified and soaked strain them out and use them Apuleius They make vineger of figs wet upon the Trees and cast into water to putrifie Dioscorides The liquor of figs steeped grows sharp as vineger and is used for it There is made also Vineger of Dates To Date wine we speak of some adde water and receive it again and they do this three four five or six times and at last it grows sowre From the same Pliny teacheth to make Vineger of honey You must wash your honey vessels or hives in water with this decoction is made the most wholesome vineger Palladius teacheth the way to make Vineger of Pears wild Pears are such as are sharp and ripe are kept three dayes in a heap then they are put into a vessel and fountain or river water is put to them the vessel is left covered thirty dayes then as much vineger as is taken out for use so much water is put in to repair it Cassianus makes Vineger of Peaches Put soft delicate Peaches into a vessel and adde parched Barley to them let them putrifie for one day then strain them out and use it We may from Cassianus make Vineger without wine If you boil Gypsum and sea-water and then mingle it with River water and use it being strained But if you will Turn wine into vineger and contrarily vineger into wine Cassianus hath it He puts Beet roots bruised into wine it will be vineger when three hours are over But if he would restore it again as it was he puts in Cabbage roots So also To make the same We may do it another way and quickly Cast into wine Salt Pepper and sowre leaven mingle them and they will soon make it vineger But to do it more quickly quench in it often a red hot brick or piece of steel also provide for that unripe Medlars Cornels Mulberries and Plums But Sotion shews to make Sharp vineger of new wine Dry the mother of wine of grapes at the Sun and put them into new wine adding a few sowre grapes thereto and it will make sharp vineger that will be for use after seven dayes or put in pellitory of Spain and it will be sharp Moreover if you boil a fourth or fifth part of vineger at the fire put that to the rest and set all eight days in the Sun you shall have most sharp and pleasant wine The roots of old grass and Raisins and the leaves of a wild Pear-tree bruised and the root of the bramble and whey of milk burnt Acorns Prunes rosted and the decoctions of Chiches and pot-sheards red hot all of these put severally into vineger will make it tart Apuleius teacheth To double the quantity of vineger Take a good measure of Vineger about a Metreta and to that adde one Metreta of Sea-water boiled to half mingle them and set them aside in a vessel Some steep Barley and strain it and of that juice they mingle one Metreta and they stir them together and they cast in torrefied salt when it is yet hot a good quantity then they cover the vessel and let it stand eight dayes But I use to make it thus Vineger of clusters of grapes pressed forth After the Vintage we cast in the clusters when the wine is pressed forth into a wooden vessel and we pour upon them a quantity of water and it will be vineger when a week is over Moreover we cut the tendrels from Vines and bruise them and put water to them and it will be vineger Also thus Ill wine is turned to vineger When the bunches of grapes are pressed forth lay them between two wooden bowls not very thick together let them grow hot for four days then pour on them so much naughty wine as may cover them let them alone 24 hours then strain them into another wooden bowl and after so many hours put them into another bowl and do so til it be turned into most sharp white vineger and if you would make more of the same clusters pour on upon them some sharp vineger and let them alone till they be extream sharp and sowre then take that out and pour on ill wine and do as you did Lastly press those clusters out in a press and you shall recover as great quantity as of the wine that was spent CHAP. XXIII
How the defects of wine may be managed and restored OUr forefathers found out many remedies to preserve wine and in our dayes we have taken no less pains For wine is easily corrupted and takes to it self many strange qualities Paxamus saith wine either grows sowre or dead about the Solstices and when the seven stars set or when the dog star causeth heat and when it is extream cold or hot or rainy or windy or when it thunders We shall shew remedies for all these First we shall lay down out of Africanus the signs to know wines that will last or will corrupt When you have put your wine into a vessel after some time change the vessel and look well on the Lees for thence shall you know what the wine is proving it by smelling to it whether it corrupt or weevils breed in it these are signs it putrifies Others take wine out of the middle of the vessel they heat it and when it is cold they taste of it and they judge of the wine by the favour some by the smell of the cover a strong taste is the best sign a watry the worst sharpness of duration weakness of corrupting The signs must be taken at the times to be feared we mentioned But to come to the remedies we shall shew how To mend weak wine The wine will be weak when it begins to breath forth that force of heat fot when the soul of it is breathed forth the wine grows immediately sowre vineger is the carcasse of wine Then we may presently prevent it by adding aqua vitae to it for by that it may put on a new soul the measure will be the fourth part of a pound for a vessel Another remedy will be That wine may not grow hot In the Summer Solstice wine grows hot by the hot weather and is spoiled then put quick-silver into a glass-viol well stopt and hang it in the middle of the vessel and the coldness of it will keep the wine from heating The quantity is two pound for great vessels for when the air is hot the external heat draws forth the inward heat and when that is gone it is spoiled We That wine may not exhale use this remedy The vessel being full we pour oyle upon it and cover it for oyle keeps the spirits from evaporating which I see is now used for all liquors that they may not be perverted Wines sometimes are troubled But To clear wines Fronto bids us do thus Cast three whites of egges into a large earthen dish and beat them that they may froth put some white salt to them that they may be exceeding white and pour them into a vessel full of wine for salt and the white of an egge will make all thick liquors clear but as many Dolia or such measures as there are in the vessel so many whites of egges must you have to be mingled again with so many ounces of salt but you must stir the mixture with a stick and in four dayes it will grow clear Also it is done That wines may not corrupt I said that salt keeps all things from corrupting wherefore for every Dolium powder one ounce of Allome and put it into the wine vessel with the wine for it will keep it from corrupting The same is done if you put in one ounce of common salt or half one half the other Also brimstone hinders putrefaction Wherefore if you shall adde to eight ounces of Allome or of Salt four ounces of brimstone you shall do well The Antients were wont to peserve wine by adding Salt or sea-sea-water to it and it would continue along time Columella teacheth thus when the winds are quiet you must take water out of the deep sea when it is very calm and boyl it to thirds adding to it if you please some spices There are many ordinary things but we let them pass CHAP. XXIV How Oyl may be made of divers things IT is an excellent thing to shew the diversity of ways to make Oyl That if Olives should ever be scarce yet we might know how to draw Oyl from many kinds of fruits and seeds And some of these ways that came from the Antients yet onely the best and such as are our inventions Wherefore to begin We say that Oyl may be made of Ricinus call'd Cicinum Dioscorides makes it thus Let ripe Ricini as many as you please wither in the hot Sun and be laid upon hurdles let them be so long in the Sun till the outward shell break and fall off Take the flesh of them and bruise it in a morter diligently then put it into a Caldron glazed with Tin that is full of water put fire under and boil them and when they have yielded their inbred juyce take the vessel from the fire and with a shell skim off the Oyl on the top and keep it But in Egypt where the custom of it is more common for they cleanse the Ricini and put them into a Mill and being well grownd they press them in a press through a basket Pliny saith They must be boiled in water and the Oyl that swims on the top must be taken off But in Egypt where there is plenty of it without fire and water sprinkled with Salt it is ill for to eat but good for Candles But we collected them in September for then is the time to gather them with it parts from a prickly cover and a coat that holds the seed in it it is easily cleansed in a hot Caldron The weight of Oyl is half as much as the seed but it must be twice knocked and twice pressed Palladius shews how Oyl of Mastick is made gather many Grains of the Mastick-tree and let them lye in a heap for a day and a night Then put a basket full of those Berries into any vessel and pouring hot water thereto tread them and press them forth Then from that humour that runs forth of them the Oyl of Mastick that swims on the top is poured off But remember lest the cold might hold it there to pour hot water often on For thus we see it made with us and all the Country of Surrentum also so is made Oyl of Turpentine as Damageron teacheth The fruit of Turpentine is grownd in a Mill as the Olives are and is pressed out and so it sends forth Oyl The kernels serve to feed hogs and to burn Likewise Oyl of Bays Boil Bay-berries in water the shels yield a certain fat it is forced out by crushing them in the hands then gather the Oyl into horns Palladius almost as Dioscorides in January boil many Bay-berries that are ripe and full in hot water and when they have boy'ld long the watry oyl that swims on the top that comes from them you shall gently pour off into vessels driving it easily with feathers The Indians make as it is said Oyl of Sesamon It is made as we said before it sends forth excellent Oyl abundantly There is made Oyl of
this is the time when it is ripe When it is pull'd the bundles are set in heaps for two days to take the wind on the third day it is opened and spread in the Sun and is dried and then again it is brought into the house in bundles Afterwards it is well steep'd in sea-water or other water where that is wanting Then being dried in the Sun again it is watered if we have presently need of it if it be wet with hot water in a vessel it will be the shorter way But it must be heat to make it good for the fresh nor sea-water cannot soften it enough Ropes of Hemp are preferred when they are dry but Broom is preserved wet to make good the dryness of the ground it grows on The upper part of Egypt toward Arabia makes linnen of Cotten Asia makes Flax of Spanish Broom especially for Fishers nets to last long the Shrub must be soaked for ten days And so every Countrey hath its Thread made of divers Plants and Shrubs We know that there is made Thread of Nettles amongst the Northern people and it is very fine and white also there is made Thread of Aloes in America it is hard white and most perfect I shall describe it by their relation because the extream parts are full of prickles we strike them off that they may not hinder us and we cut the branches into long pieces long ways that the substance under the rind may be the better taken away then two Poles of wood are fastned in the earth crossing one the other in the middle like a cross these are held fast with the left hand to make them hold fast together and with the right the foresaid pieces or fillets are taken by one end and drawn over the cross that the inward part may part from the wooddy part and the Flax from the substance and then they are kembed so often till they become white pure nervous as Fiddle or Harp-strings then are they washed dried and laid up In thirteen years after that it is planted the leaves grow very long even twenty foot the stalk riseth in the middle forty foot long Then the top is adorned with flowers and bears fruit I saw this at Rome and I never remember that I saw any thing more beautiful I shall now speak of Flax call'd Asbestinum Pliny saith there is Flax also found That fire will not consume they call it live-Flax and I have seen Napkins and Table-clothes burning in the fire at Feasts and they were better cleansed of filth with the fire then they could be by water Wherefore of this they made Coats for Kings funerals to keep the ashes of the Body from other ashes It grows in India in the desarts and scorched places with the Sun where no rain falls but there are terrible creatures and serpents and this is preserved by burning it is hard to be found and difficult to wear because it is so short when it is found it is as dear as the most precious Pearls The Greeks call it Asbestinum from the nature of it So saith Pliny out of which words it is plain that he knew not the Stone Asbestinum when he said that it was hard to find and difficult to wear for the shortness of it for it is kembed and spun by every wâ—man almost if she be not ignorant of it as I saw at Venice a woman of Cyprâ— and another of Valentia that shewed me it in great abundance in the Arsenel or Hospital It is an excellent secret very rare and profitable thouâ—h few knew it of our times but I have freely communicated it though it cannot be had but at great â—ates CHAP. XXVI To hatch Eggs with out a Hen. NOw shall I shew how without a Hen Eggs of Hens and other Birds may be hatcht in summer or winter so that if any sick people desire to eat Chickens then they may have them Birds Eggs are hatched with heat either of the same Birds or of others as the heat of man of the Sun or fire for I have seen Hens sit on Geese Ducks and Peacocks Eggs and Pigeons sit on Hen Eggs and a Cuckow to sit upon any of them And I have seen women to foster and hatch Eggs between their brests in their bosoms and under their arm-pits Livia Augusta when she was young and great with childe of Nero by Caesar Tiberius because she earnestly desired to bring first a boy she made use of this Omen to try it by for she fostered an Egge in her bosom and when she must lay it aside she put it into her nurses bosom that the heat might not abate Pliny But Aristotle saith that Birds Eggs and Eggs of forefooted Beasts are ripened by the incubation of the dam for all these lay in the earth and their Eggs are hatched by the warmth of the earth For if forefooted Beasts that lay Eggs came often where they are that is more to preserve and keep them then otherwise And again Eggs are hatcht by sitting It is Natures way but Eggs are not onely so hatched but of their own accord in the earth as in Egypt covered with dung they will bring Chickens Diodorus Siculus de Egyptiis Some are found out by mans industry by those that keep Birds and Geese besides the ways that others have to produce them that they may have Birds that are strange and great numbers of them for Birds do not sit upon their Eggs but they by their skill hatch the Eggs themselves At Syracuse a certain drunken companion put Eggs under the earth in mats and he would not leave off drinking till the Eggs were hatcht In Egypt about grand Cayro Eggs are artificially hatcht they make an Oven with many holes into which they put Eggs of divers kinds as Goose eggs Hen Eggs and of other Birds they cover the Oven with hot dung and if need be they make a fire round about it so are the Eggs hatcht at their due times Paulus Jovius in his Book of his Histories In Egypt there is abundance of Hen Chickens For Hens do not there sit on their Eggs but they are hatcht in Ovens by a gentle heat that by a an admirable and compendious art Chickens are hatcht in very few days and bred up which they sell not by tale but by measure They make the measure without a bottom and when it is full they take it away And in the Island of Malta in Sicily they make an Oven where into they put Eggs of divers Fowls as of Hens Geese then they make a fire round about and the Eggs grew ripe at times But let us see how our Ancestors hatched their Eggs Democritus teacheth If a Hen do not sit how she may have many Chickens The day you set your Hen upon Eggs take Hens dung pound it and sist it and put it into a hollow vessel with a great belly lay Hens feathers round about Then lay your Eggs upright in it so that the sharp end
be this set the pot in a Centre as it were that the fire may lye as it were in the circumference round about it to the distance of one foot from the Centre a little after this move you fire neerer to the pot that there may not be above the distance of half a foot betwixt them then within a while lay the fire a little neerer and so by little and little let the fire be brought close to the pot yea and let the pot be covered all over with hot burning coals within the space of one hour and so let it stand hidden in the fire for the space of six whole hours together And after the six hours you must not take away the coals but let them go out and die of themselves and let the pot so stand under them until it be stark cold and when it is thoroughly cold break it into pieces and there you shall find your little thin plates so brittle that if you do but touch them somewhat hard with your fingers they will soon be crumbled into dust When you have taken them out of the pot you must afterward put them into some casting vessel that is very hard and durable and there within half an hour it will be melted then put into it some of your powder by little and little till all of it be molten together then cast it all forth into some hollow place into some form or mould that it may run along into rods and the metal will be as brittle and as easie to be broken into small crumbs as any Ice can be After all this you must melt two pounds of brass but you must first purifie it and cleanse it a little by casting upon it some broken glass and Lees of wine and Salt-ammoniack and Salt-peeter every one of them by turns and by little and little When you have thus cleansed it you must put unto it one pound of that metal which you made of the Copper and powder before spoken of and you must still sprinkle upon theâ— some of that powder and after all this you must take half so much of the best silver that may be gotten and melt it amongst the metals before spoken of and cast them all togeâ—her into some hollow place like a mould and so you shall obtain your purpose But that the surface and the utmost out-sides of the metal may appear whiâ—e you must throw it into the fire that it may be burning hot and then take it forth and cast it into that water wherein the Lees of wine and ordinary salt have been liquefied and dissolved and there let it boil for a certain time and so shall you make it very white and moreover so pliant and so easie to be framed and wrought to any fashion that you may draw it thorough any little hole yea even thorough the eye of a needle Furthermore this is not to be omitted nor buried in silence for it is a matter of great use and special force in the colouring of metals that they be inwardly cleansed and purged of their dross that they may be thoroughly washed and rid of all such scum and â—ffals as are incident unto them for being thus handled they will be more serviceable and operative for all experiments As for example let brass be molten and then quenched in vineger and then reduced into powder with salt so that the more gross and infectious parts thereof be extracted from it and let it be so handled oftentimes till there be nothing of its natural uncleanness remaining within it and so shall it receive a deeper dye and be changed into a more lively colour Let the vessel wherein you melt your metals to prepare and make them fit for your turn be bored thorough in the bottom with sundry holes that the metal being melted may strain thorough but the dross and scum and offals of it may be left behind that there may be nothing but pure metal to be used in your experiments for the less drosse and offals that your metal have they are so much the more serviceable for your use in working Let this therefore be a general rule alwayes to be remembred and observed that your metals be throughly purged and rid from their dross as much as may possibly be before ever you entertain any of them into your service for these intendments There is yet also another way whereby we may bring to pass that Brass should resemble silver and this by Arsnick Orpine which is an effectual means to accomplish this matter and whereas in tract of time the metal will somewhat recover it self to its own former paleness and dim colour we will seek to remedy it and prevent it Take the best Arsnick Orpine that may be gotten such as yawns and gapes as though it had scales upon it it must be of a very orient golden colour you must meddle this Orpine with the dust of brass that hath been filed from it and put into them some Lees of wine but they must be each of them of an equal weight and quantity when you drench them together within the liquor and so shall it bear a continual orient colour and glister very brightly without ever any fading at all After this take you some silver and dissolve with that kind of water which is called Aqua-fortis but it must be such as hath in it very little store of moisture for the most waterish humour that is in it must be evaporated in some scalding pot or other such vessel which you must fill up to the brim six or seven several times with the same water after the vapours of it have been extracted by the heat of the fire that is under the vessel when you have thus done you must mingle your silver that is so dissolved with the brass filings and the Arsnick Orpine which we spake of before and then you must plain it and smooth it all over with the red marble-stone that the clefts or scales before spoken of may be closed up and withal you must water it by little and little as it were drop after drop with the oyle that hath been exprest or extracted out of the Lees of wine or else out of the firmest Salt-ammoniack that may be had And when the Sun is gotten up to any strength that it shews forth it self in very hot gleams you must bring forth this confection and let the force of the heat work upon it even till it be thorough dry afterward you must supple it with more of the same oyle again and then let it be dryed up again so long till that which is remaining do weigh just so much as the silver weighed before it was dissolved Then closâ— it up in a vessel of glass and lay it under some dunghil till it be dissolved again and after the dissolution be gathered together into a Gelly then cast into it ten or eight pieces of brass and it will colour them all that they shall most lively counterfeit
silver But if you desire To make brass shew it self of a silver colour by rubbing it betwixt your hands as boyes and cozening companions are oftentimes wont to do that if they do but handle any vessels of brass they will make them straightways to glitter like Silver you may use this devise Take Ammoniack-salt and Alome and Salt-peeter of each of them an equal weight and mingle them together and put unto them a small quantity of Silver-dust that hath been filed off then set them all to the fire that they may be thoroughly hot and when the fume or vapour is exhaled from them that they have left reaking make a powder of them and whatsoever brass you cast that powder upon if you do withal either wet it with your own spittle or else by little and little rub it over with your fingers you shall find that they will seem to be of a silver colour But if you would whiten such brass more handsomely and neatly you must take another course You must dissolve a little silver with Aqua fortis and put unto it so much Lees of wine and as much Ammoniack-salt let them so lie together till they be about the thickness of the filth that is rubbed off from a mans body after his sweating then roul it up in some small round balls and so let them wax dry when they are dry if you rub them with your fingers upon any brass or other like metal and still as you rub them moisten them with a little spittle you shall make that which you rub upon to be very like unto silver The very like experiment may be wrought by Quick-silver for this hath a wonderful force in making any metal to become white Now whereas we promised before to teach you not onely how to endue brase or such other metal with a silver colour but also how to preserve and keep the bodies so coloured from returning to their former hiew again you must beware that these bodies which are endued with such a silver colour do not take hurt by any sharp or sowre liquor for either the urine or vineger or the juice of limons or any such tart and sowre liquor wâ—ll cause this colour soon to fade away and so discredit your work and declare the colour of those metals to be false and counterfeit CHAP. IV. Of Iron and how to transform it into a more worthy metal NOw the order of my proceedings requires that I should speak somewhat also concerning Iron for this is a metal which the Wizards of India did highly esteem as having in it self much goodness and being of such a temperature that it may easily be transformed into a more worthy and excellent metal then it self is Notwithstanding some there are which reject this metal as altogether unprofitable because it is so full of gross earthly substance and can hardly be melted in the fire by reason of that firm and setled brimstone which is found in it But if any man would Change Iron into Brass so that no part of the grosse and earthly substance shall remain in it he may easily obtain his purpose by Coppresse or Vitriol It is reported that in the mountain Carpatus an Hill of Pannonia at a certain Town called Smolinitium there is a Lake in which there are three channels full of water and whatsoever Iron is put into those channels it is converted into brass and if the Iron which you cast into them be in small pieces or little clamps presently they are converted into mud or dirt but if that mud be baked and hardened in the fire it will be turned into perfect good brass But there is an artificial means whereby this also may be affected and it is to be done on this wise Take Iron and put into a casting vessel and when it is red hot with the vehement heat of the fire and that it beginneth to melt you must cast upon it by little and little some sprinkling of quick brimstone then you must pour it forth and cast into small rods and beat it with hammers it is very brittle and will easily be broken then dissolve it with Aqua-fortis such as is compounded of vitriol and Alome tempered together set it upon hot cinders till it boil and be dissolved into vapours and so quite vanish away and the subsidence thereof or the rubbish that remains behind if it be reduced into one solid body again will become good brass If you would Make Iron to become white you may effect it by divers and sundry sleights yet let this onely device content you in this matter First you must cleanse and purge your Iron of that dross and refuse that is in it and of that poysoned corruption of rust that it is generally infected withal for it hath more earthly substance and parts in it then any other metal hath insomuch that if you boil it and purge it never so often it will still of it self yield some new excrements To cleanse and purge it this is the best way Take some small thin plates of Iron and make them red hot and then quench them in strong lye and vineger which have been boiled with ordinary Salt and Alome and this you must use to do with them oftentimes till they be somewhat whitened the fragments or scrapings also of Iron you must pown in a morâ—er after they have been steeped in salt and you must bray them together till the salt be quite changed so that there be no blackness left in the liquor of it and till the Iron be cleansed and purged from the dross that is in it When you have thus prepared your Iron you must whiten it on this manner Make a plaister as it were of quick-silver and lead tempered together then pown them into powder and put that powder into an earthen vessel amongst your plates of Iron that you have prepared to be whitened close up the vessel fast and plaister it all over with morter so that there may be no breathing place for any air either to get in or out then put it into the fire and there let it stay for one whole day together and at length encrease your fire that it may be so vehement hot as to melt the Iron for the plaister or confection which was made of lead and Quick-silver will work in the Iron two effects for first it will dispose it to melting that it shall soon be dissolved and secondly it will dispose it to whitening that it shall the sooner receive a glittering colour After all this draw forth your Iron into small thin plates again and proceed the second time in the same course as before till you find that it hath taken so much whitenesse as your purpose was to endue it withal In like manner if you melt it in a vessel that hath holes in the bottom of it and melt with it lead and the Marchasiâ—e or fire-stone and Arsnick and such other things as we spake of before in our experiments
find the brimstone almost white at the bottom of the vessel adde that to what you had before and set it again to boil with three parts as much distilled vinegar till the vinegar all evaporate and dry the brimstone take heed it burn not when it is dry put it again into distilled vinegar working the same way so often until putting a little of it upon a red hot plate of iron it will melt without flame or smoke Then cast it on a lump of gold and silver and the gold will sink to the bottom presently but the silver will remain on the top For if brimstone be boil'd in a Lixivium so strong that it will bear an egg until it will not smoke and will melt on a fire-cole if it be projected on a mass of gold and silver mingled when they are melted it will part the gold from the silver Also there is an ingenious and admirable way To part silver from brass with certain powders The best are those are made of powdred lead half so much quick brimstone and arsenick and common salt double as much salt-peter one half powder those fine each by themselves then mingle them Take the mixt metal with half so much more of the powder and in a vessel that will endure fire strew it in by turns and set the vessel fil'd at a strong fire till all melt take it out and cast it into another vessel that is broad atop narrow at bottom and hot as we said and smeered with ram or sowes grease clarified let it cool for you shall find the silver at the bottom and the brass on the top part one from the other with an iron rasp or file if you will you may purge your silver again in a copple But the silver must be made into thin plates that when it is strewed interchangeably with the powders they may come at it on all sides then cover the vessel with its cover and lute it well But the salt must be decrepitated that it leap not out and the brimstone prepared and fixed But we may thus Part gold from brass Make salt of these things that follow namely Vitriol Alom Salt-peter quick Brimstone of each a pound Salt-ammoniack half a pound Powder them all and boil them in a lye made of ashes one part as much quick lime four parts of beech-ashes melt them at the fire and decant them and boil them till the Lixivium be gone then dry it and keep it in a place not moist lest it melt and mingle with it one pound of powder of lead and strew on of this powder six ounces for every pound of brass made not in a melting vessel and let them be shaken and stirred vehemently with an iron thing to stir it with when the vessel is cold break it you shall find a lump of gold in the bottom Do the rest as I said CHAP. X. A compendious way to part gold or silver from other Metals with aqua fortis WE shall teach thus compendiously to part gold from silver and silver from other metals and it is no small gain to be got by it if a man well understood what I write for I have known some by this art that have got great wealth For example take a mixture of brass and silver dissolve it in common aqua fortis when it is consumed cast fountain-water into it to remove the sharpness of the water and that it can no more corrode the metal Put the water into a great mouthed earthen vessel and plunge plates of brass therein for the silver will stick to them like a cloud the brass is best in the water put the water into a glass retort with a large belly and make a soft fire under and the fountain-water will distil forth by degrees When you know that the whole quantity of fountain-water is distilled out or the belly of the retort looks of a yellow colour and the sent of the salts pierceth your nostrils take away the receiver and put another that is empty to it and lure it well that nothing break forth Augment the fire and you shall draw off your aqua fortis as strong as before and the brass will be at the bottom of the retort The aqua fortis will be as good as it was and you may use it oft-times THE SIXTH BOOK OF Natural Magick Of counterfeiting Precious Sones THE PROEME FRom the adulterating of Metals we shall pass to the counterfeiting of Jewels They are by the same reason both Arts are of kin and done by the fire And it is no fraud saith Pliny to get gain to live by and the desire of money hath so kindled the firebrand of luxury that the most cunning artists are sometimes cheated They are counterfeited by divers ways either by cutting Jewels in the middle and putting in the colours and joyning them together or else by giving a tincture to Crystal that is all one piece or counterfeiting Crystal by many ingredients or we shall attempt to make true Jewels to depart from their proper colour and all of them to be so handsomly coloured that they may shew like natural Jewels Lastly I shall shew how to make Smalt of divers colours CHAP. I. Of certain Salts used in the composition of Gems WE wil first set down certain operations which are very necessary in the making of Gems lest we be forced to repeat the same thing over again And first How to make Sal Soda The herb Kali or Saltwort is commonly called Soda grinde this Soda very small and sift it into powder put it into a brass Cauldron and boil it pouring in for every pound of Soda a firkin of water Let it boil for four hours till the water be consumed to a third part Then take it from the fire and let it stand twelve hours while the dregs settle to the bottom and the water becomes clear then drain out the water with a linnen cloth into another vessel and pour fresh water into the Cauldron Boil it again and when it is cold as before and all the dross setled filtrate the clear water out again Do as much the third time still having a care to try with your tongue whether it be still salt At last strain the water and set it in an earthen vessel over the fire keeping a constant fire under it until the moisture being almost consumed the water grow more thick and be condensed into salt which must presently be taken out with an iron ladle and of five pound of Soda you will have one pound of salt How to make Salt of Tartar Take the lees of old wine and dry it carefully it is commonly called Tartar put it into an Alimbeck made in such sort that the flame may be retorted from the top and so augment the heat There let it burn you will see it grow white then turn it with your iron tongs so that the upper part which is white may be at bottom and turn the back up to the
flame when it hath ceas'd smoaking take it out and break part of it to see whether it be white quite through for that is an argument of the sufficient burning because it oftentimes happens that the outside onely is burned and the rest of it remaineth crude Therefore when it hath gained the colour of chalk it must be taken out and when it is cold grinde it and lay it in water in some wide-mouth'd vessel a quarter of a day When the water is grown clear filtrate it and strain it into another vessel and then pour water again unto the settlement observing the same things we spoke before until the water have taken out all the salt which will come to pass in the third or forth time Pour your waters which you saved into a vessel of glass and all things being ready put live coles under it and attend the work until the water be consumed by the force of the fire which being done the salt will stick to the bottom it being thus made preserve it in a dry place lest it turn to oyl CHAP. II. How Flint or Crystal is to be prepared and how Pastils are boiled THe matter of which Gems are made is either Crystal or Flint from whence we strike fire or round pebbles found by river sides those are the best which are taken up by the river Thames white clear and of the bigness of an egge for of those are made best counterfeit Gemms though all will serve in some sort Some think that Crystal is the best for this purpose because of the brightness and transparency of it but they are deceived The way of making Gems is this Take riverpebbles and put them into a fornace in that place where the retorted flame is most intense when they are red hot take them out and fling them into water then dry them and powder them in a mortar or a hand-mill until they are very fine put them into a wide-mouthed vessel full of rain water and shake it well in your hands for so the finest part will rise to the top and the grossest will settle to the bottom to that which swims at top pour fresh water and stir the dust again and do this oftentimes until the gross part be quite separated and sunk down Then take out the water and let it settle and in the bottom there will lie a certain slimy matter gather together and reserve the refined powder But whil'st the stone is ground both the morter and the mill will lose somewhat of themselves which being mixt with the powder will foul the Gem wherefore it will be worth the labâ—r to wash that away to which end let water be often poured into the lavel and stirred about the dust of the morter will rise to the top by reason of its levity and the powder of the pebbles will retire to the bottom by reason of its weight skim the lavel and separate them with a spoon till all that sandy and black dust be taken off then strain out the water and reserve the powder dry These being done we must teach How Pastils are boiled Artificers call those pellets which are made of the salts and the forenamed powder and water Pastils Take five parts of salt of Tartar as many of salt of Soda double the quantity of these of the forespoken powder of pebbles and mix them very well in a stone morter sprinkle them with water wet them so that they may grow into a past and make Pastils of them in bigness of your fist set them in the sun and dry them well Then put them into a fornace of reverbaration the space of six hours encreasing the fire by degrees that at last they may become red hot but not melt wherefore use no bellows when they are baked enough let them cool and they will become so hard that they will endure almost the hammer CHAP. III. Of the Fornace and the Parts thereof NOw the Fornace is to be built which is like to that of glass-makers but less according to the proportion of the work Let your fornace be eight foot high and consist of two vaults the roof of the lower must be a handful and a half thick the vault it self must have a little door by which you may cast in wood to feed the fire there Let it also have on the top and in the middle of its roof a hole about a foot in breadth by which the flame may penetrate into the second vault and reach to the upper roof whence the flame being reverberated doth cause a vehement heat In this upper vault there must be cut out in the wall small holes of a handful in breadth which must open and shut to set the pots and pans in on the floor and to take them out again Artificers call these pots Crucibles they are made of clay which is brought from Valencia and doth very strongly endure fire They must be a finger thick and a foot and a half deep their bottom somewhat thicker lest they should break with the force of the fire All things being thus provided cast in your wood and fire and let the fornace heat by degrees so that it may be perfectly hot in a quarter of a day Your workmen must be diligent to perform their duty then let the Pastils being broken into pieces about the bigness of a wall-nut be put into crucibles and set in the holes of the fornace built for that purpose with a pair of iron tongs to every pot When they melt they will rise up in bubbles and growing greater and greater must be pricked with sharp wires that the vapor passing out the bubbles may sink down again and not run over the mouth of the crucibles Then let other pieces be put in and do as before until the pots be filled to the top and continue the fire for a whole day until the matter be concocted Then put an iron hook into the pots and try whether the matter have obtained a perfect transparency which if it have take it out of the pots with iron instruments for that purpose and cast it into clear water to wash off the filth and stains and to purge out the salt for when the Gems are made on a suddain the salt breaks forth as it were spued out and overcast them like a cloud Yet there must be a great deal of diligence used whilâ—st you draw out this vitrified matter lest it touch the sides of the fornace for it will cleave thereto like birdâ—ime hardly to be pulled off without part of the wall as also lest it fall into the vessels for it is very difficult to separate it and it prejudices the clearness of the glasâ— When it is cold put it again into the crucibles and let it glow for two days until it be concocted into perfect glass When this vitrified matter hath stood so for two days some to make it more fine and bright lest it should be specked with certain little bubbles
and run out with great cries Then may he take away their Gold and chink The reason is Because the Loadstone is melancholick as you may conjecture by the colour of it the fumes whereof rising into the brain will cause those that are a sleep to have melancholick phantasms presented unto them and Coles will do the like The weight Davic with Serpents fat and juice of Metals given to one to drink will make him mad and make him run out of his House Country and Nation and this is doth by exaggeration of black Melancholy or it will make people lunatick and melancholick if they do but hold it in their mouths and by its drawing out of iron Physitians think it will help well to draw an Arrow-head out of ones body But we use the Loadstone in making Glass Pliny After Glass was found out as it is a very cunning invention men were not content to mingle Nitre but they began to add the Loadstone thereunto because it is supposed that it will attract the liquor of the Glass into it self and into iron also Hence it is that in making Glass we add a little piece of Loadstone to it for that singular vertue is confirmed by our times as well as former times it is thought so to attract into it self the liquor of the Glass as it draws iron to it and being attracted it purgeth it and from green or yellowish Glass it makes it white but the fire afterwards consumes the Loadstone Out of Agricola We read also That a Loadstone laid to ones head will take away all the pains Galen saith It hath purging faculties and therefore it is given to drink for the Dropsie and it will draw forth all the water in the Belly Lastly I shall not pass by the error of Hadrian concerning the Loadstone for he saith That the iron by its weight makes the Loadstone never the heavier For the Naturalists report That if a great Loadstone were weighed in a Scale and after that should draw iron to it it would be no heavier then it was when it was alone though they be both together so the weight of the iron is as it were consumed by the Loadstone and hindred by it from any effect or motion which I finde to be false It is like that jear in Aristophanes of a Clown that rid upon an Ass and carried his Coulter at his back that he might not load the Ass too much THE EIGHTH BOOK OF Natural Magick Of Physical Experiments THE PROEME I Intended to pass by these following Experiments in Physick because I have everywhere mentioned them in my History of Plants and we have not omitted any thing that was certain and secret in them that we knew unless iâ— be such things as could not be brought into that rank And though other things shall be described in my Book of Distillations yet that this place of Physick be not left empty I changed my opinion and have set down some of them here CHAP. I. Of Medicines which cause sleep THat we may in order set down those Experiments of which we intend to speak we will begin with those Diseases which happen in the Head and first with Sleep for Soporiferous Receits are very requisite to be placed amongst these Arcana and are of very great esteem amongst Physitians who by Sleep are wont to cheat their Patients of pain and not of less amongst Captains and Generals when they practice Stratagemes upon their Enemies Soporiferous Medicines do consist for the most part of cold and moist things Plutarch in Simpos saith That Sleep is caused by cold and therefore Dormitives have a cooling quality We will teach first how To cause Sleep with Mandrake Dioscorides saith That men will presently fall asleep in the very same posture wherein they drink Mandrake losing all their senses for three or four hours after and that Physitians do use it when they would burn or cut off a member And skilful men affirm That Mandrake growing by a Vine will transmit its Soporiferous quality into it so that those who drink the Wine that is made thereof shall more easily and readily fall asleep Here we will relate the pleasant stories of the Mandrake out of Authors of Stratagems Junius Frontinus reports That Hannibal being sent by the Charthagenians against some Rebels in Africa and knowing they were a Nation greedy of Wine mixed a great quantity of Mandrake with his Wines the quality of which is between poysonous and sleepy then beginning a light Skirmish he retired on purpose and in the middle of the Night counterfeited a flight leaving some Baggage in his Camp and all the infected Wine Now when those Barbarians had took his Camp and for joy had liberally tasted of that treacherous Wine he returned took and slew them all as they lay dead as it were before Polinaeus the same And Caesar sailing towards Nicomedia was taken about Malea by some Cilician Pirates and when they demanded a great Ransome for his Liberty he promised them double what they asked They arrived at Miletum the people came out of the Town to see them Caesar sent his Servant being a Milesian named Epicrates to those of the Town desiring them to lend him some money which they presently sent to him Epicrates according to Caesar's command brought the money and with it a sumpâ—uous Banquet a Water-pot full of Swords and Wine mixed with Mandrake Caesar paid to the Pirates the promised sum and set the Banquet before them who being exalted with their great Riches fell freely to it and drinking the infected Wine fell into a sleep Caesar commanded them to be killed sleeping and presently repaid the Milesians their own money Demosthenes intending to express those who are bitten as it were by a sleepy Dragon and are slothful and so deprived of sense that they cannot be awakened saith They seem like men who have drunk Mandrake Pliny affirmeth That smelling to the Leaves of it provoketh sleep For the same with Nightshade We may make the same of Nightshade which is also called Hypnoticon from the effect of it a Drachm of the Rinde drank in Wine causeth sleep but gently and kindely This later Age seemeth to have lost the knowledge of Solanum Manicon for in the very description of it Dioscorides seems to be mad But in my judgement as I have elsewhere said he describes two several Plants in that place Fuschius his Stramonium and the Herb commonly called Bell a Donna whose qualities are wonderfully dormitive for they infect Water without giving it either taste or sent so that the deceit cannot be discovered especially considering it must be given but in a very small quantity I prepared a Water of it and gave it to a Friend for certain uses who instead of a Drachm drank an Ounce and thereupon lay four days without meat or motion so that he was thought dead by all neither could he be awakened by any means till at last when the vapours were digested he arose
Ancients used the decoction of the Lote-Tree raspt which we call Melo Fiocco and so they made their Hair Red. Or else by burning me Foeces of the old Wine as I said they added Oyl of mastick thereto which they provided thus to the purpose They heaped up the ripe Berries of the Mastick-Tree for some dayes till they might wither the they poured on water and boyled them so long in Brazen Kettles until they brake they put them in Bags and pressed out the Oyl with a press With this Oyntment they kept their Head anoynted all the night and so made them Red. But how we may Dye the Hair Red I shall teach you There is a Powder brought to us from Africa they commonly call Alchena if we boyl it in a Lye till it be coloured and anoynt our Hair with it it will dye them red for many days that is indelible but whilst you handle it take heed you wet no your Nails therewith for they will be so died you cannot easily make them clean So also we dye the Tails and Mains of white Horses red But I can easily do it with Oyl of Honey for when the clear and Saffron-coloured waters are drawn off increase the fire and the Oyl will come forth the red This is exellent to make the Hairs red and it will dye white Hairs red for many dayes and when that tincture is worn off the Hairs will shine of a golden colour But when we anoynt our Heads with a Lye we take a wet sponge with nippers that we may not stain our Hands or skin of our Heads With Herbs a woman dy'd her hoary Head Arts Colours better'd Natures as 't is said CHAP. III. How the Hairs are dyed Black IT is worth the while to shew such as are ashamed to seem old how to dye their hoary Hairs black as if they might grow young again by it And if we provide for young women we must do as much for aged Matrons especially if it fall out that they grow hoary too soon Of old they made a decoction of Sage-Leaves the green Husks of Walnuts Sumacts Myrtle-berries Black-berries Cypress-nuts Rindes of the Roots of Halm-Tree and such-like for the Rinde of the Root of Halm-Tree boyled till it be sort and consumed and then smeered on all night blacks the Hair first made clean with Fullers Earth Learn therefore How Gray Hairs and dyed Black Anoynt your Hair in the Sun with Leeches that have lain to corrupt in the blackest Wine sixty daies and they will become very black Or else Let a sextary of Leeches stand in two sextaries of Vinegar in a Leaden Vessel to corrupt for sixty daies and as I said anoynt your Hair Pliny saith It will dye so strongly that unless they hold Ovl in their mouths when they dye the Hair it will make their Teeth black also But if you would have Long and Black Hair Take a green Lizard and cutting off the Head and Tail boyl it in common Oyl and anoynt your Head with it You shall have also Another Yet you may thus dye your Hair and Beard handsomely if they be grown Gray Froth of Silver burnt Brass must be mingled with four times the quantity of strong Lye and when it bubbles on an easie fire wash your Hair with it and when they are dry wash them with hot water I used this as the Ancients taught it and I made a Lye of Quick-Lime and Oak-Ashes that they commonly call the Capitel in that I boyled Litharge of Silver then I tried it on white Wool for if it be dyed black as I would have it then I took it from the fire or else I boyled it longer If it burnt the Wool I put water to it or else dyed with it Add Lytharge Wash your Hair or Beard with this and it will dye them with a shining black colour and it will not be discerned for the more you wash it the better it will shine CHAP. IV. To make Hairs part smooth BEcause sometimes a part is deformed with abundance of Hair or for lack of Hair I shall shew how to make a smooth part thick with Hair and a hairy part smooth by depilatories A common Depilatory which men use commonly in Baths It consists of Quick-Lime four parts made into Powder Orpiment one part boyl them Try with a Hens Feather when that is made bare with it it is boyl'd take heed you boyl it not too much or that it stay not too long upon your skin for it will burn but if it chance to burn your skin take Populeum and Oyl of Roses or Violets and anoynt the place and the pain will be gone This must be done in a Bath but if you cannot have one let the Woman be covered with cloths very well and let it be cast on burning Stones or Tiles that she may receive the fume of it and swear After she hath sweat let her wash her self with her water and wipe it off then let her anoynt her self all over for the parts anoynted thus will presently grow smooth And thus may all parts be kept free from Hair The Ancients used these as Saserna as Varro reports teacheth in his Book of Husbandry If saith he you would make any one smooth from Hair cast a pale Frog into water and boyl it to a third part and with that anoynt the Body But by pale Frog we must understand a Toad for a Frog hath no such faculty A Salamander soaked in Oyl will pull out the Hair Dioscorides But it will be stronger if you steep it long in Oyl and dissolve it The filthy matter that is white as Milk and is vomited up at the mouth by the Salamander if it touch any part of the Body all the Hair will fall off Dioscorides saith That the Sea-Scolopendra boyled in Oyl and smeered on the part will pluck off the Hair by the Roots But To make Hair grow slowly If you press Oyl out of Henbane-Seed with a Press or do often anoynt the places with the juice of it they will grow again very slowly The same is done with the juice of Hemlock Or to take off the Hairs men added to Ants Eggs red Orpiment and Ivy-Gum with Vinegar and they rubbed the place where the Hair was taken away In former times they rubbed the down-parts of children with the Roots of Hyacinthus and the Hair would never grow there And therefore it is well known in trimming Medicaments sold here and there that being smeered on with sweet Wine keeps back the Bread and will not let it break forth But if you would That Hair should never grow again In which business I have taken great pains and tried many things that I found to be false First foment the part with hot water and pull out the Hairs one by one with womens nippers then dissolve Salt-Peter in water and anonynt the holes where the Hairs grew It will be better done with Oyl of Brimstone or of Vitriol and so they will never
their Shells distil all at a gentle fire add to the water a little Camphire and Borax put into a glazed vessel two yong naked Pigeons with their guts taken forth and put in as much Milk as will cover them and add one ounce of Borax Turpentine three ounces Caâ—phire one ounce five whites of Eggs put on the cover and distil them for it is fat things that make the Face soft I shall say more when I come to speak of making the hands white and soft the reason is the same for both CHAP. XII How to make the face clear and shining like silver THe face is not onely made clear but white as silver by those things that I said were white as silver yet not exactly as silver but they shine as clear as silver There is an herb commonly called Argentaria or Argentina or wilde Tansey whose leaves are green above but on the backside they shine of a silver colour the distilled water of it is drank by women against spots in their faces and to make them white as silver The snails that are found in moist places and leave behind them as they creep a silver cord Dioscorides saith will cure the spots in the face women much desire them for they put them in a still and draw out water from them that polisheth the skin exceedingly and makes it contract a silver gloss And the seashell-fish like an ear whose shell is of a silver colour within or pearl colour and many kinds of shells that being steeped in vinegar will grow pure casting off the outward crust as the Oystershel doth that brings forth pearl There are also shells we call the Mothers of pearl that inwardly are shining and of a silver colour like pearls all which women use for their art of beautifying themselves for they make the face smooth and to shine as white as silver But pearls do it best of all things when they are dissolved in sharp juyces and soaked in rotten dung till they send forth a clear oyl that is the best thing to beautifie the face as I shall shew elsewhere For the same use is a glass-stone used that shines like silver But no better water is prepared then from Talk or Quick-silver as I shall shew in that which follows CHAP. XIII How to dissolve Talk for to beautifie women THough I shall speak in a work on purpose more at large how Talk may be dissolved into water or oyl We shall here onely set down how it may be fitted for womens use Of all such ways as are used I shall set forth such as I have tried to be good Beat Talk in a mortar of metal then put it into a pot of the strongest clay and cover it and bind it in with strong iron wyer lute it well all cover and stop the joynts that nothing breathe out and set it in the Sun to dry Then put this stone in an oven that flames strongly or in some other place where the fire is most vehement When the fire of the oven is out take it forth and break the vessel and if it be well calcined it is enough Otherwise do the same again until the calx of it be as white as it ought to be When the calcined body of it is white as it must be grind it on a porphyry-stone and put it into a little bag or upon a marble in a very moist place or deep well or cistern and let it lie there long and with much moisture it will drop forth at last It will more easily and perfectly dissolve into water if it were burnt long enough and turned into a calx For the parts being turn'd to lime and made exceeding dry by force of fire they attract moisture It is also done Another way that is good Calcine the Talk and put it in an earthen pot and set it in the hottest part of a potters oven to stay there six days When the Talk is thus turn'd to a calx put it into a gourd-glass which you shall first make clean and make a hole at the bottom of it and setting a vessel under it you shall have the moisture of it drop forth and the calx will resolve into water put this into a glass vial and let the water evaporate in Balâ—eo take the sediment out for your use I use also Another way Put snails in an earthen vessel in the open air that they may be kept hungry three days and pine for want of meat and be purged then take a silver Loadstone or Talk most finely powdred mingle it with the white of an egge and make an ointment anoint the earthen vessel with it and put the snails into it for they will eat up all the Talk When they have eaten all and voided their excrements bruise the snails with their shells and putting them into a retott draw out their moisture with a gentle fire the humour that drops forth will exceedingly adorn the face CHAP. XIV The preparation of Sublimate I Said that there was nothing better than quick-silver for womens paints and to cleanse their faces and make them shine Wherefore I shall set down many ways to Prepare it that you may have the use of it to your desire Take one ounce and half of pure quick-silver not falsified with lead for if there be lead mingled with it all your labour is lost How it must be purged and known I taught elsewhere Mingle this with half a pound of Mercury sublimate and put it into a marble mortar and with a new wooden pestle stir it well turning it round about First it will be black in six hours it will grow white if you cease not to beat it Then adde one ounce and half of white salt always turning it about with the pâ—stle for the more you grind it the perfecter it will be When it is very well ground it must be washt Sprinkle boiling clear water into the mortar and stir it and then stay a while until the muddy part may sink down and the filth that was lighter and swims on the top laying the vessel on one side pour out the water gently and pour in fresh do this five or six times in the same manner until the pure and onely powder remain without dregs make little cakes of it and dry it in the sun Some whilst they bruise it sprinkle water on lest the powder by grinding should be made so small that it should fly away into the air The chief business is to purge it and grind it well that it be not troubled when it is strain'd forth that which is gone to the bottom and so part of it be lost some open a hole in the belly of a pot that when it is settled the hole being opened the water with the dregs may run forth Others to sublimate adde a third part of quick-silver and grind it in a wooden mortar and in the â—â—an while they chew four grains of mastick in their mouths and they spit the clammy spittle
it and press her between your hands that no Wine remain and then adding two Cups of white-Wine distil her in a Chymical Vessel then distil the Flowers of Bindeweed Citrons Oranges together and keep this water by it self Then open Lemmons and press out the juice And also take water of Bean-flowers then distil six cups of Asseâ— milk and as many of Cows-milk You shall do the same with water of Gourds and of Milk well boyled and of water of Bean-flowers and of Rosin of Turpentine Then provide a glazed Vessel put into it Camphire two drachms four ounces of Ceruss finely powdered mingle them with the aforesaid waters and set it in a soft Vessel in the open Air fifteen days and nights When you would use it wet a Linen-rag in it and wash your Face CHAP. XVII How to make the Face Rose-coloured I Have made the Face white now I will make it red that the wise may be made wholly Beautiful for her husband And first To make a pale Face purple-coloured And to adorn one that wants colour use this Remedy Take Vinegar twice distilled and cast into it the raspings of red Sanders as much as you please boyl it at a gentle fire adding a little Allom and you shall have a red colour most perfect to dye the Face If you would have it sweet-smelling add a little Musk Civet Cloves or any Spices Now Another Take Flowers of Clove-Gilliflowers bruise the ends of the sprigs and draw forth the juice if they be so ripe that they are black add juice of Lemmons that they may shine with a more clear red With this paint your Face and you shall have a pleasant red colour without any stinking smell or wet the sprigs of Clove-gilliflowers in juice of Lemmons and set them in the Sun Take away the old and put in fresh until it be as red as you would have it let the juice dry and the color will be most glorious But I draw a quintessence from Clovegill flowers Roses Flower-gentle with Spirit of Wine then I add Allom and the juice of a Citron and I made an excellent colour to beautifie the Face Take Another If you add to the best Wine one tenth part of Honey and one ounce of Frankinsenceâ— and then distil it and steep in it the raspings of red Saunders until it is coloured to your minde and then wash your Face with it it will make your Face white and well-coloured Also A Fucus that cannot be detected And it is so cunningly made that it will delude all men for a cleer water makes the Cheeks purple-coloured and it will last long and the cleerer the part will be the more your wash it with it and rub it with a cloth of Woolen You shall draw out a water from the Seeds of Cardamom which the Apothecaries call Grains of Paradise Cubebs Indian Cloves raspings of Brasil and Spirit of Wine distilled when they have been infused some time draw forth the water with a gentle fire or corrupt Dung and wet your Face often with this There are also Experiments To colour the Body If you boyl Nettles in water and wash your Body with it it will make it red-colored if you continue it long If you distil Straw-berries and wash your self with the water you shall make your Face red as a Rose But the Ancients dyed their bodies of divers colours partly for ornament partly for terrour as Caesar writes of the Britans going to war for they painted themselves with wood Theophrastus calls it Isatis and we call it Guado The Grecian-women painted themselves with wood as Zenophon writes And in our days the West-Indians crush out in Harvest-time a blood-red juice from the Roots of wilde Bugloss which the women know well enough whereby they cover their pale colour with a pleasant red and so change their over-white colour with this Experiment CHAP. XVIII To wash away the over-much redness of the Face I Have shewed you how to colour the Face now I shall shew how to uncolour it when the Face is too red and women that are very red desire this The way is To wash away the too-much redness of the Face Take four ounces of Peach-Kernels and Gourd-Seed two ounces pown them and crush them out strongly that you may draw forth an oyly Liquor with this morning and evening anoynt the red Carbuncles of your face and by degrees they will vanish and be gone Another Take Purple-Violets Egg-shells Saunders Camphire mingled with water set the water in the open Air and wash the redness therewith Also I know that the distilled water of white Lillies will take away the redness CHAP. XIX How to make a Sun-burnt Face white WHen women travel in the open Air and take journeys in Summer the Sun in one day will burn them so black that it is hard to take it off I found out this Experiment Beat about ten whites of Eggs till they come to water put them in a glazed Vessel adding one ounce of Sugar-Candy to them and when you go to bed anoynt your Face and in the morning wash it off with Foutain-water Pliny also saith thus Another If the Face be smeered with the white of an Egg it will not be Sun-burnt With us women that have to do in the Sun to defend their Faces from the heat of it that they may not be black they defend it with the white of an Egg beaten with a little Starch and mingled and when the Voyage is done they wash off this covering with Barley-water Some do it Another way rubbing their foul Skin with Melon-Rindes and so they easily rub off Sun-burnings and all other spots outwardly on the Skin The Seed also bruised and rubbed on will do it better Also a Liquor found in little bladders of the Elm-Tree when the Buds first come forth makes the Face clear and shining and takes away Sun-burnings CHAP. XX. How Spots may be taken from the Face OFt-times fair women are disgraced by spots in their Faces but the Remedy for it is this to use Abstergents and Detergents in whiting of their Faces Therefore To take off spots from the Face anoynt the Face with Oyl of Tartar and let it dry on and wash it not at all do this for ten days then wash it with a Lixivium and you shall see the spots no more If the part be not yet clean enough do it once more If this please you not take Another Put Quick-Lime into hot water mingle them and stir them for ten days After two days pour forth the clear water into a Brazen Vessel then take Salt-Ammoniac between your Finger-tops and rub it so long at the bottom of the Vessel until you see the water become of a blew-colour and the more you rub it the better colour it will have and it will turn into a Skie-colour or Purple-colour very pleasant to behold Wet Linen-cloths in this water and lay them on the spots till they be dry and wet them again till
six hours always fomenting the place with Rain or Cistern-water and that for twenty four hours and it will here and there make little Bladders which being touched will bleed much blood that she can hardly be known from a Maid Midwives that take care of this do it another way They contract the place with the Decoction of the forementioned things then they set a Leech fast on upon the place and so they make a crusty matter or scab which being rub'd will bleed Others when they have straightned the part inject the dried Blood of a Hare or Pigeon which being moistned by the moysture of the Matrix shews like live fresh Blood I found out this noble way I powder Litharge very finely and boyl it in Vinegar till the Vinegar be thick I strain out that and put in more till that be coloured also then I exhale the Vinegar at an easie fire and resolve it into smoak CHAP. XXX Some sports against women THus far I have shewed how to beautifie women now I shall attempt some things against their decking of themselves and make some merriment after those things that I seriously discovered to adorn them To make a painted Face look pale If you would know a painted Face do thus Chew Saffron between you Teeth and stand neer to a woman with your mouth when you talk with her your breath will foul her Face and make it yellowish but if she be not painted the natural colour will continue Or burn Brimstone in the room where she is for if there be Ceruss or Mercury sublimate on her Face the smoak will make her brown or black The painted Women that walk at Puteoli in the Mountains of Phlegra are made so black as Silver-money is shut up in bags We may also know thus Whether she be painted with red Chew Grains of Cummin or a Clove of Garlick and speak close by her if it be natural it will remain but counterfeit with Ceruss or Quick-silver it presently decays To make a woman full of red pimples Of a Stellio is made an ill Medicament for when he is dead in Wine all the Faces of those that drink of it will be red-spotted Wherefore they that would disfigure Whores kill him in an Oyntment The Remedy is the yelk of an Egg Honey and Glass Pliny To make the Face green Avicenna saith That the Decoction of Chamaeleon put into a bath will make him green-coloured that stays long in that bath and then by degrees he will recover his former colour To make the Hair fall off the Head and Beard Touch any part of mans body with a matter white as milk that the Salamander vomits up out of its mouth and the Hairs will fall off and what is touched is changed into the Leprosie Pliny THE TENTH BOOK OF Natural Magick Of Distillation THE PROEME NOw I am come to the Arts and I shall begin from Distillation an Invention of later times a wonderful thing to be praised beyond the power of man not that which the vulgar and unskilful men use for they do but corrupt and destroy what is good but that which is done by skilful Artists This admirable Art teacheth how to make Spirits and sublime gross Bodies and how to condense and make Spirits become gross Bodies and to draw forth of Plants Minerals Stones and Jewels the Strength of them that are involved and overwhelmed with great bulk lying hid as it were in their Chests and to make them more pure and thin and more noble as not being content with their common condition and to lift them up as high as Heaven We can by Chymical Instruments search out the Vertues of Plants and better then the Ancients could do by tasting them What therefore could be thought on that is greater It is Natures part to produce things and give them faculties but Art may ennoble them when they are produced and give them many several qualities Let one that loves Learning and to search Natures Secrets enter upon this for a dull Fellow will never attain to this Art of Distilling First we shall extract Waters and Oyls then the Essences Tinctures Elixirs Salts and such-like then we shall shew how to resolve mix'd Bodies into the Elements and make them all more pure to separate their divers and contrary qualities and draw them forth that we may use them at pleasure and other things that will never repent us to know and do CHAP. I. What Distillation is and of how many sorts WHether the Art of Distillation were known to the Learned Ancients or no I will not undertake to dispute yet there is another kinde of Art to be read in Dioscorides then what we use He saith thus There is an Oyl extracted out of Pitch by separating the watry part which swimmeth on the top like Whey in Milk and hanging clean flocks of Wool in the vapor arising from it while the Pitch boyls and when they are moyst squeezing them into some Vessel This must be done as long as it boyleth Geber defineth it thus Distillation is the Elevation of moist vapors in a proper Vessel but we will declare the true definition of it elsewhere He maketh three sorts of it by Ascent by Descent and by Filtration But I cannot but confess that Filtration is not properly a species of Distillation But I say by Ascent by Descent and by Inclination which is a middle between both and is very necessary for when a thing is unwilling to ascend we teach it by this to rise by degrees by inclining the Vessel and raise it by little and little until it become thinner and know how to ascend The Instructions for Distillation shall be these First Provide a Glass or Brazen Vessel with a Belly swelling out like a Cupping-Glass and sharpened upward like a Top or a Pear fit it to the under-Vessel like a Cap so that the neck of that lower Vessel may come into the belly of the upper A Pipe must run about the Bottom of the Cap which must send forth a Beak under which there must stand another Vessel called the Receiver from receiving the distilling water Stop all the vents close with Stawmortar or rags of Linen that the spirituous Aery matter may not pass out The fire being put under this Stillatory the inclosed matter will be dissolved by the heat of the fire into a dewy vapor and ascendeth to the top where meeting with the cold sides of the Head it sticketh there being condensed by the cold swelleth into little bubbles bedeweth the roof and sides then gathereth into moyst pearls runneth down in drops turneth into water and by the Pipe and Nose is conveyed into the Receiver But both the Vessels and the Receiver must be considered according to the Nature of the things to be distilled For if they be of a flatulent vaporous Nature they will require large and low Vessels and a more capacious Receiver for when the Heat shall have raised up the flatulent matter and that finde
the whole work depended on it let it circulate in Balneo a whole month take off the yellow Oyl or Quintessence of all with a Silver-Spoon and add to it a drachm of Musk and Amber and set it by for your use in a Glass-bottle close stopt Distil the remainder and it will afford a yellow cleer water but you cannot extract the Oyl without a stink of burning I have very exactly extracted Oyl of Gums Roots and Seeds of the forementioned and mixing them together have effected strange things with them Most of their operations are against Poysons and Pestilential Contagions especially those that are apt to seize on the Spirits for a drop of it being anoynted on the Lips or Nostrils reviveth the Soul and keepeth it in perfect Senses at least six hours CHAP. XVIII Of a Clyssus and how it is made THat there may nothing be omitted I will now shew what a Clyssus is and how it may be made A Clyssus is the Extraction of the Spirits of every part of a Plant united in one common entity There are in a Plant the Root Leaf Flower Fruit and Seed and in every one of these parts there is a peculiar Nature The Operation is thus Dig the Roots when they are full of juice the Leaves when they are fresh and green the Flowers when they are blown the Fruit and Seeds in their due time Extract the Spirits or Essences out of all these by Distillation Maceration or Calcination or any other of the former wayes But when they are all extracted severally one in the form of Oyl another of Salt or Liquor then mix them all together so that the may be conjoyned and united in one body which is called a Clyssus Some mix them in Distillation in Vessels made for the purpose in this manner They put the Water Salt and Oyl in three several Curbicles of equal height and bigness and tying their three necks together and put them into one common Head which may be fit to receive them all close them lute them and kindle the fire under The heat will elevate the thinnest substance in all of them which will meet and mix in the Head and run down by the Nose or Spout into the Receiver so set them by for use This Congregation of Essences doth penetrate and search all the remote passages of the Body and is very useful in Physick CHAP. XIX How to get Oyl out of Salts I Have declared many ways of extracting Oyl now I will shew how to draw it out of Salts that they may be more penetrative and work more powerfully which can be done no other way They seem to have some kinde of fat in them yet will not burn so that it cannot be called a perfect Oyl How to extract Oyl of Tartar Burn the Tartar and reduce it into a Salt as I shewed before then lay it on a Marble in a moyst place and in a few days it will turn to Oyl and run down into a dish which you must set underneath to receive it Thus you may easily make it into Salt Beat the Tartar into Powder and mix an equal quantity of Salt-Peter with it when they are mixt in Iron Mortar set them in the fire until they be quite burned grind the remaining Foeces and dissolve them in a Lye strain it and let the Lye evaporate away and the Salt will settle to the bottom then boyl some Eggs hard take ouâ— the yelks and fill up their place with Salt and in a little time it will dissolve into Oyl Oyl of Sal Sodae Dissolve the Salt in Water and strain it through a cloth then dry it lay it on a Marble and set it in a moyst place and it will run down in an Oyl So The famous Oyl of Talk is extracted onely by the vehement heat of fire yet I knew not at first what it was useful for But I perceive it is much accounted of by women in their Fâ—cus Beat it into fine Powder in an Iron-Morter and put it into a very strong thick Pot fasten the cover on with wire plaiâ—â—er it with Potters Clay and set it in the Sun for three days then thrust it into a Potters Furnace where the flames are most violent After three or four days take it out break open the Pot and if you finde it not sufficiently calcined make it up and set it in again When it is burned perfectly white lay it on a Marble and place it in a moyst room or in a hole dug in the earth and there let it stand for a good while until it dissolve into Oyl then reserve it in a Glass-bottle So also is made Red Oyl of Sulphur Grinde live Sulphur into a small Powder and mix it with an equal quantity of the former Oyl of Tartar boyl it three hours in a Glass-bottle and when it is dissolved strain it through a Linnen-cloth into another Glass and set it over a Gentle fire till it thicken like clotted blood and so dry Then powder it and lay it on a Marble in a moist Cellar there it will dissolve and run down into the under-placed dish Set this Liquor being first strained thorow a cloth in a Glass-bottle over warm Ashes until the moysture be consumed and there will remain a red Oyl of Sulphur Oyl of Myrrh Boyl some Eggs hard cut them in the middle take out the yelks and fill their places with Myrrh powdered and seirced lay them in an earthen Pan upon long cross-sticks that the Eggs may not imbibe the Oyl again and shut them in a moist Cellar so the Oyl will drop down into the Pan. CHAP. XX. Of Aqua Fortis NOw I will recite those Distillations which draw out neither Water nor Oyl but a middle between both for the terrene parts are forced up turned into Water by the vehemency of the fire from whence they do acquire so great a heat that corrode and burn most violently They are extracted onely in igne reverberationis and with great care and labour How to draw Aqua Fortis or Oyl out of Salt It is a piece of Art discovered to very few Take Pit-Salt put into a Glass-Retort treble luted over and dried set it in igne reverberationis where the flames do struggle most violently the first time you will get but little moysture Break the Retort and remove the Foeces into another and pour the extracted Water into them and distill them again the second time thou wilt get more Do the same a third time and so to the tenth until the Salt be all turned into Liquor which is a most precious Jewel and worth thy labor Some quench hot Bricks in the liquified Salt and then distil them with a most intense fire as in Oyl of Bricks A Water for the Separation of Silver Take Salt-Peter and Alom in equal quantity beat them in a Morter and put them into a Glass-Retort luted over three double when it is well dried set it in the circulating-fire that is which
remaining Powders make a mass which you may form into cakes which being burnt on hot Ashes smell very sweetly I take out the Cinnamon and the Woods because in burning they cast forth a stink of smoak Another way Take one pound and a half of the Coals of Willow ground into dust and seirced four ounces of Labdanum three drachms of Storax two of Benjamin one of Lignum Aloes mix the Storax Benjamin and Labdanum in a Brass Morter with an Iron Pestle heated and put to them the Coal and Lignum Aloes powdered Add to these half an ounce of liquid Storax then dissolve Gum Tragacantha in Rose-water and drop it by degrees into the Morter When the powders are mixed into the form of an Unguent you may make it up into the shape of Birds or any other things and dry them in the shade You may wash them over with a little Musk and Amber upon a Pencil and when you burn them you will receive a most sweet fume from them Another Perfume Anoynt the Pill of Citron or Lemmon with a little Civet stick it with Cloves and Races of Cinnamon boyl it in Rose-water and it will fill your chamber with an odorifeous fume CHAP. IX How to adulterate Musk. THese Perfumes are often counterfeited by Impostors wherefore I will declare how you may discern and beware of these Cheats for you must not trust whole Musk-Cods of it there being cunning Impostors who fill them with other things and onely mix Musk enough to give its sent to them Black Musk inclining to a dark red is counterfeited with Goats blood a little rosted or toasted bread so that three or four parts of them beaten with one of Musk will hardly be discovered The Imposture may be discerned onely thus The Bread is easie to be crumb'd and the Goats blood looketh clear and bright within when it is broken It is counterfeited by others in this manner Beat Nutmegs Mace Cinnamon Cloves Spikenard of each one handful and seirce them carefully then mix them with the warm blood of Pigeons and dry them in the Sun Afterward beat them again and wet them with Musk-water and Rose-water dry them beat them and moysten them very many times at length add a fourth part of pure Musk and mix them well and wet them again with Rose-water and Musk-water divide the Mass into several parts and rowl them in the hair of a Goat which groweth under his Tail Others do it Another way and mingle Storax Labdanum and Powder of Lignum Aloes add to the Composition Musk and Civet and mingle all together with Rose-water The Imposture is discovered by the easie dissolving of it in water and it differeth in colour and sent Others augment Musk by adding Roots of Angelica which doth in some sort imitate the sent of Musk. So also they endeavour To adulterate Civet with the Gall of an Ox and Storax liquified and washed or Cretan Honey But if your Musk or Amber have lost their sent thus you must do To make Musk recover its sent hang it in a Jakes and among stinks for by striving against those ill savours it exciteth its own vertue reviveth and recovereth its lost sent THE TWELFTH BOOK OF Natural Magick Of Artificial Fires THE PROEME BEfore I leave off to write of Fire I shall treat of that dangerous Fire that works wonderful things which the vulgar call Artificial Fire which the Commanders of Armies and Generals use lamentably in divers Artifices and monstrous Designs to break open Walls and Cities and totally to subvert them and in Sea-fights to the infinite ruine of mâ—rtal men and whereby they oft-times frustrate the malicious enterprizes of their Enemies The matter is very useful and wonderful and there is nothing in the world that more frights and terrifies the mindes of men God is coming to judge the world by Fire I shall describe the mighty hot Fires of our Ancestors which they used to besiege places with and I shall add those that are of later Invention that far exceed them and lastly I shall speak of those of our days You have here the Compositions of terrible Gun-powder that makes a noise and then of that which makes no noise of Pipes that vomit forth deadly Fires and of Fires that cannot be quenched and that will rage under Water at the very bottom of it Whereby the Seas rend asunder as if they were undermined by the great violence of the flames striving against them and are lifted up into the Air that Ships are drawn by the monstrous Gulphs Of Fireâ—Balls that flie with glittering Fire and terrifie Troops of Horse-men and overthrow them So that we are come almost to eternal Fires CHAP. I. How divers ways to procure Fire may be prepared VItruvius saith That it fell out by accident that sundry Trees frequently moved with Windes and Tempests the Bows of them rubbing one against another and the parts smiting each other and so being ratified caused heat and took fire and flamed exceedingly Wilde people that saw this ran away When the Fire was out and they durst come neerer and found it to be a great commodity for the Body of man they preserved the Fire and so they perceived that it afforded causes of civility of conversing and talking together Pliny saith It was found out by Souldiers and Shepherds In the Camp those that keep watch found this out for necessity and so did Shepherds because there is not always a Flint ready Theophrastus teacheth what kindes of Wood are good for this purpose and though the Anger and the handle are sometimes both made of one sort of Wood yet it is so that one part acts and the other suffers so that he thinks the one part should be of hard Wood and the other of soft Example Wood that by rubbing together will take Fire They are such as are very hot as the Bay-Tree the Buck-thorn the Holm the Piel-Tree But Mâ—estor adds the Mulberry-Tree and men conjecture so because they will presently blunt the Ax. Oâ— all these they make the Auger that by rubbing they may resist the more and do the business more firmly but the handle to receive them is to be made of soft Wood as the Ivy the wilde Vine and the like being dried and all moisture taken from them The Olive is not fit because it is full of fat matter and too much moysture But those are worst of all to make Fires that grow in shady places Pliny from him One Wood is rub'd against another and by rubbing takes Fire some dry fuel as Mushroomes or Leaves easily receiving the Fire from them But there is nothing better then the Ivy that may be rubbed with the Bay-Tree or this with that Also the wilde Vine is good which is another kinde of wilde Vine and runs upon Trees as the Ivy doth But I do it more conveniently thus Rub one Bay-Tree against another and rub lustily for it will presently smoak adding a little Brimstone put your fuel
neerer or dry matter made of dry Toad-stools or Leaves that are very fine found about the Roots of Colts-foot for they will soon take fire and retain it I have done the same with Ivy-wood cleansed from the Bark and dried and by rubbing one Reed against another or which is better drawing a cord swiftly upon it The West-Indians binde two dry sticks together and they put a stick between them which they turn about with their hands moved from them and so they kindle fire But since the minde of Man seldom rests in the thing once invented but seeks for new Inventions by mans industry there is found out A stone that will raise Fire with any moysture The way to make it is thus Take quick Brimstone Salt-Peter refined of each a like weight Camphire the double weight to quick Lime and beat them all in a Morter till they be so fine that they will flie into the Air binde them all fast together wrapt in a Linen-clout and put them into an earthen pot let it be well stopt lute it well with clay and straw and let it dry in the Sun then put them into a Potters Oven and when the earthen Vessel is perfectly baked they will grow together and be hard as a Stone take them out and lay them up in a dry place for use I went to try this in haste and my experience failed me I know certainly that some of my Friends have done it but the pot must not have any vent for it will all burn away Yet I have seen water cast upon quick Lime and by putting Brimstone to it it took Fire and fired Gun-powder This I can maintain CHAP. II. Of the Compositions for Fire that our Ancestors used BEfore I come to our Compositions for Fire-works I shall set down those that our fore-Fathers used in Sea-fights and in taking or defending of Cities Thucidides saith That those that besieged Plataenenses when Engines would do no good they fell to Fire-works for casting about the Walls bundles of stuff and throwing in Fire Brimstone and Pitch they burnt the wall whence arose such a flame that until that time no man ever saw the like Heron teacheth That in burning of Walls after you have made a hole thorow you must put wood of the Pine-Tree under and anoynt them with dry pitch and powdered Brimstone together with Tar or Oyl and set this on fire And elsewhere he teacheth to burn with a pot Take an earthen Pitcher and binde it about with plates of Iron on the outside and let it be full of small coal let there be a hole about the bottom to put in the Bellows for when the coals take fire by sprinkling on of vinegar piss or any other sharp matter the Walls are broken Vegetius teacheth what combustible matter must be used and he useth burning Oyl Hards Brimstone Bitumen Burning Arrows are shot in Cross-bows into the Enemies Ships and these being smeered over with Wax Pitch and Rosin they quickly fire the Decks with so many things that afford fuell to the Fire I shall add The Fire-Darts the Ancients used Aâ—â—ianus Marcellinus described Fire-Darts a kinde of Weapon made after such a fashion It is an Arrow of Cane joyned with many Irons between the Shaft and the Head and they are made hollow after the fashion of a womans Distaff wherewith Linen-threed is spun in the midst of it it hath many small holes and in the very hollow of it is put fire with some combustible matter and so is it easily shot forth of a weak Bow for a Bow that is strong puts out the Fire and there is no means to put it out but by casting on Dust or Lees of Oyl Livy Some came with burning Torches others carrying Tow Pitch and Fire-Darts and the whole Army shined as if it were all in flames but in the concave part of this Dart there was Glue and Fuel for Fire not to be extinguished of Colophonia Brimstone Salt-Peter all mingled with Oyl of Bays Others say with Oyl of Peter Ducks-grease the Pith of the Reed of Ferula Brimstone and as others think with Oyl Tallow Colophonia Camphire Rosin Tow. The old Warriors called this an incendiary composition Lucan speaks of burning of Ships This plague to water is not consonant For burning Torches Oyl and Brimstone joyn'd Are cast abroad and fuel was not scant The Ships do burn with Pitch or Wax combin'd And elsewhere He bids them shoot their Shafts into the Sails Besmeer'd with Pitch and so he soon prevails The Fire straight doth burn what 's made of Flax And so their Decks were fir'd by melting Wax And tops of Masts were burâ—â— and Sea-mens packs But in compositions for Arrows and Darts that they might burn the more vehemently they put melted Vernish Printers Oyl Petroleum Turpentine made up with the sharpest Vinegar pressed close and dried at the Sun and wrap'd over with Tow and with sharp Irons to defend it wrought together like to a bottom of yarn all which at last only passing over one hole are smeered over with Colophonia and Brimstone after the manner that follows But by the subtilty of the Greeks there was invented A Fire called the Greek Fire To overcome the Ship presently they boyl'd Willow-coals Salt Spirit of VVine Brimstone Pitch with the yarn of the soft VVooll of Ethiopia and Camphire which it is wonderful to speak will burn alone in the water consuming all matter Callimachus the Architect flying from Heliopolis taught the Romans that thing first and many of their Emperors did use that against their Enemies afterwards Leo the Emperor burnt with this kinde of Fire those of the East that sail'd against Constantinople with 1800 Carvels The same Emperor shortly after burnt with the same Fire 4000 Ships of the Enemy and 350 in like manner Prometheus found out that Fire would keep a yeer in the Cane Ferula wherefore Martial speaks of them thus Canes that the Masters love but Boys do hate Are by Prâ—metheus gift held at great rate CHAP. III. Of the divers Compositions of Gun-powder WE should be ill spoken of if that treating of fiery Compositions we should not first say something of that wonderful Gun-powder that is the Author of so many wonderful things for it is an ingredient in all mixtures and all depends upon it not that I have any minde to speak of it because it is so common but of such things that have some new or hidden secret in them It is made of four parts of Salt-Peter Brimstone and VVillow-coals of each one part But the Salt-Peter must be refined from common Salt the fat and earthly parts for that is the Foundation and Basis of the rest All of these must be well powdered and finely seirced and perfectly mingled together Therefore if you would have Gun-powder that shall make a great noise and do much service Put in more parts of Salt-Peter namely to one part of Brimstone and one of Willow-coal put in six or
with the best Gunpowder onely but the pipe with that mixture that burns more gently that when fire is put to it you may hold it so long in your hand until that slow composition may come to the centre and then throw it amongst the enemies for it will break in a thousand pieces and the iron wires and pieces of iron and parts of the Ball will fly far and strike so violently that they will go into planks or a wall a hand depth These are cast in by Souldiers when Cities are besiged for one may wound two hundred men and then it is worse to wound then to kill them as experience in wars shews But when you will fill the pipes hold one in your hand without a Ball full of the composition and try it how long it will burn that you may learn to know the time to cast them lest you kill your self and your friends I shall teach you how with the same Balls Troops of Horsemen may be put into confusion There are made some of these sorts of Balls that are greater about a foot in bigness bound with the same wire but fuller of iron piles namely with a thousand of them These are cast amongst Troops of Horsemen or into Cities besieged or into ships with slings or iron guns which they call Petrels and divers ways for if they be armed with iron pieces when they break they are cast forth so with the violence of the fire that they will strike through armed men and horses and so fright the horses with a huge noise that they cannot be ruled by bridle nor spurs but will break their ranks They have four holes made through them and they are filled with this said mixture that being fired they may be cast amongst Troops of Horsemen and they will cast their flames so far with a noise and cracking that the flames will seem like to thunder and lightning CHAP. VIII How in plain ground and under waters mines may be presently digged TO dig Mines to overthrow Cities and Forts there is required great cost time and pains and they can hardly be made but the enemy will discover it I shall shew how to make them in that champion ground where both armies are to meet with little labour and in short time To make Mines in plain grounds where the Armies are to meet If you would do this in sight of the enemy for they know not what you do I shall first teach how A little before night or in the twilight where the meeting shall be or passage or standing there may pits be made of three foot depth and the one pit may be distant from the other about ten foot There fit your Balls about a foot in bigness that you may fill the whole plain with them then dig trenches from one to the other that through them cotton matches may pass well through earthen pipes or hollow caâ—es but fire the Balls at three or four places then bury them and make the ground even leaving a space to give fire to them all at once Then at the time of war when the enemy stands upon the ground then remove at your pleasure or counterfeit that you fly from them and cast in fire at the open place and the whole ground will presently burn with fire and make a cruel and terrible slaughter amongst them for you shall see their limbs fly into the air and others fall dead pierced through burnt with the horrible flames thereof that scarce one man shall scape You shall make your Match thus In a new Test let the best Aqua vitae boyl with gunpowder till it grow thick and be like pap put your matches into it and role them in the mixture take the Test from the fire and strew on as much gunpowder as they will receive and set them to dry in the Sun put this into a hollow cane and fill it full of gunpowder or take one part refined salt-peter brimstone half as much and let it boyl in a new earthen pot with oyl of linseed put in your Match and wet them well all over with that liquor take them away and dry them in the Sun But if you will make Mines under the Water use this rare invention You shall make your Mines where the enemies Galleys or Ships come to ride you shall upon a plain place fit many beams or pieces of timber fastned cross-wise and thrust through or like nets according to the quantity in the divisions you shall make fit circles of wood and fasten them and fill them with gunpowder the beams must be made hollow and be filled with match and powder that you may set fire to the round circles with great diligence and cunning smeer over the circles and the beams with pitch and cover them well with it that the water may not enter and the powder take wet for so your labour will be lost and you must leave a place to put fire in then sink your engine with weights to the bottom of the water and cover it with stones mud and weeds a little before the enemy come Let a Scout keep watch that when their Ships or Galleys ride over the place that the snare is laid for fire being put to it the sea will part and be cast up into the air and drown'd the Ships or will tear them in a thousand pieces that there is nothing more wonderful to be seen or done I have tried this in waters and ponds and it performed more then I imagined it would CHAP. IX What things are good to extinguish the fire I Have spoken of kindling fires but now I shall shew how to quench them and by the way what things obnoxious to the fire will endure it and remain But first I will relate what our Ancestours have left concerning this business Vitruvious saith That the Larch-tree-wood will not burn or kindle by it self but like a stone in the furnace will make no coles but burn very slowly He saith the reason is That there is in it very little air or fire but much water and earth and that it is very solid and hath no pores that the fire can enter at He relates how this is known When Caesar commanded the Citizens about the Alps to bring him in provision those that were secure in a Castle of wood refused to obey his commands Caesar bade make bundles of wood and to light torches and lay these to the Castle when the matter took fire the flame flew exceeding high and he supposed the Castle would have fallen down but when all was burnt the Castle was not touched Whence Pliny writes The Larch-tree will neither burn to coles nor is otherwise consumed by fire then stones are But this is most false For seeing it is rosiny and oyly it presently takes fire and burns and being one fired is hard to put out Wherefore I admire that this error should spread so far and that the Town Larignum so called from the abundance of
that the souls of the dead did always rest in the grave as the ashes do and that they might not lye in the dark they endeavovred all they could to send out this light that their souls might enjoy light continually Therefore we must think on another experiment and make trial of it But this must be held for a rare and firm principle in Natures shop that the cause of wonders is because there can be no vacuum and the frame of the work will sooner break asunder and all things run to nothing then there can be any such thing Wherefore if a flame were shut up in a glass and all vent-holes stopt close if it could last one moment it would last continually and it were not possible for it to be put out There are many wonders declared in this Book and many more shall be set down that have no other cause But how the flame should be lighted within side this is worth the while to know It must be a liquor or some subtile substance and that will evaporate but little and if then it can be shut up in the glass when the glass is shut it will last always which may easily be performed by burning-glasses fire industry and cunning It cannot be extinguished because the Air can come in nowhere to fill up the emptiness of the Vial The Oyl is always turned into smoke and this being it cannot be dissolved into Air it turns to Oyl and kindleth again and so it will always by course afford fuel for the light You have heard the beginnings now search labour and make trial THE THIRTEENTH BOOK OF Natural Magick Of tempering Steel THE PROEME I Have taught you concering monstrous Fires and before I part from them I shall treat of Iron Mines for Iron is wrought by Fire not that I intend to handle the Art of it but onely to set down some of the choicest Secrets that are no less necessary for the use of men in those things I have spoken of already besides the things I spake of in my Chymical works Of Iron there are made the best and the worst Instruments for the life of man saith Pliny For we use it for works of Husbandry and building of Houses and we use it for Wars and Slaughters not onely hard by but to shoot with Arrows and Darts and Bullets far off For that man might die the sooner he hath made it swift and hath put wings to Iron I shall teach you the divers tempers of Iron and how to make it soft and hard that it shall not onely cut Iron and other the hardest substances but shall engrave the hardest Porphyr and Marble Stones In brief the force of Iron conquers all things CHAP. I. That Iron by mixture may be made harder IT is apparent by most famous and well-known Experience that Iron will grow more hard by being tempered and be made soft also And when I had sought a long time whether it would grow soft or hard by hot cold moist or dry things I found that hot things would make it hard and soft and so would cold and all the other qualities wherefore somthing else must be thought on to hunt out the causes I found that it will grow hard by its contraries and soft by things that are friendly to it and so I came to Sympathy and Antipathy The Ancients thought it was done by some Superstitious Worship and that there was a Chain of Iron by the River Euphrates that was called Zeugma wherewith Alexander the Great had there bound the Bridge and that the links of it that were new made were grown rusty the other links not being so Pliny and others think That this proceeded from some different qualities it may be some juices or Minerals might run underneath that left some qualities whereby Iron might be made hard or soft He saith But the chief difference is in the water that it is oft plunged into when it is red hot The pre-eminence of Iron that is so profitable hath made some places famous here and there as Bilbilis and Turassio in Spain Comum in Italy yet are there no Iron Mynes there But of all the kindes the Seric Iron bears the Garland in the next place the Parthian nor are there any other kindes of Iron tempered of pure Steel for the rest are mingled Justine the Historian reports That in Gallicia of Spain the chiefest matter for Iron is found but the water there is more fortible then the Iron for the tempering with that makes the Iron more sharp and there is no weapon approved amongst them that is not made of the River Bilbilis or tempered with the water of Chalybes And hence are those people that live neer this River called Chalybes and they are held to have the best Iron Yet Strabo saith That the Chalybes were people in Pontus neer the River Thermodon Virgil speaks And the naked Calybes Iron Then as Pliny saith It is commonly made soft with Oyl and hardened by Water It is a custome to quench thin Bars of Iron in Oyl that they may not grow brittle by being quenched in Water Nothing hath put me forward more to seek higher matters then this certain Experiment That Iron may be made so weak and soft by Oyl that it may be wrested and broken with ones hands and by Water it may be made so hard and stubborn that it will cut Iron like Lead CHAP. II. How Iron will wax soft I Shall first say how Iron may grow soft and become tractable so that one may make Steel like Iron and Iron soft as Lead That which is hard grows soft by fat things as I said and without fat matter by the fire onely as Pliny affirm Iron made red hot in the fire unless you beat it hard it corrupts as if he should say Steel grows soft of it self if it be oft made red hot and left to cool of it self in the fire and so will Iron grow softer I can do the same divers wayes That Iron may grow soft Anoynt Iron with Oyl Wax Asafoetida and lure it over with straw and dung and dry it then let it for one night be made red hot in burning coals When it grows cold of it self you shall finde it soft and tractable Or take Brimstone three parts four parts of Potters Earth powdered mingle these with Oyl to make it soft Then cover the Iron in this well and dry it and bury it in burning coals and as I said you may use Tallow and Butter the same way Iron wire red hot if it cool alone it will be so soft and ductible that you may use them like Flax. There are also soft juices of Herbs and fat as Mallons Bean-Pods and such-like that can soften Iron but they must be hot when the Iron is quenched and Juices not distilled Waters for Iron will grow hard in all cold waters and in liquid Oyl CHAP. III. The temper of Iron must be used upon soft Irons I Have said how Iron may
Return Taking it out of the Water shake it up and down in Vinegar that it may be polished and the colour be made perspicuous then make red hot a plate of Iron and lay part of the Coat of Male or all of it upon the same when it shews an Ash-colour workmen call it Berotinum cast it again into the water and that hardness abated and will it yield to the stroke more easily so of a base Coat of Male you shall have one that will resist all blows By the mixture of Sharp things iron is made hard and brittle but unless strengh be added it will flie in pieces with every blow therefore it is needful to learn perfectly how to add strength to it CHAP. V. Liquors that will temper Iron to be exceeding hard I Said that by Antipathy Iron is hardened and softened by Sympathy it delights in fat things and the pores are opened by it and it grows soft but on the contrary astringent things and cold that shut up the pores by a contrary quality make it extreme hard they seem therefore to do it yet we must not omit such things as do it by their property If you would have A Saw tempered to saw Iron Make your Saw of the best Steel and arm it well that it be not wrested by extinguishing it Then make a wooden Pipe as long as the Iron of the Saw that may contain a liquor made of Water Alon and Piss Plunge in the red hot Iron and take it out and observe the colours when it comes to be violet put all into the liquor till it grow cold Yet I will not conceal that it may be done by a Brass wire bent like a bow and with Powder of Emril and Oyl for you shall cut Iron like Wood. Also there are tempered Fish-hooks to become extream hard The Hook serves for a part to catch Fish for it must be small and strong if it be great the Fish will see it and will not swallow it if it be too small it will break with great weight and motion if it be soft it will be made straight and the Fish will get off Wherefore that they may be strâ—ng small and not to be bended in the mouth you shall thus temper them Of Mowers Sythes make wire or of the best Steel and make Hooks thereof small and fine heat them not red-hot in the Fire for that will devour them but lay them on a plate of red hot Iron When they grow red cast them into the water when they are cold take them out and dry them Then make the plate of Iron hot again and lay on the Hooks the second time and when an Ash colour or that they commonly call Berotinus appears plunge them into the water again that they may be strong for else they would be brittle So you may make Culters extream hard Albertus from whom others have it saith That Iron is made more strong if it be tempered with juice of Radish and Water of Earth-worms three or four times But I when I had often tempered it with juice of Radish and Horse-Radish and Worms I found it alwayes softer till it became like Lead and it was false as the rest of his Receits are But thus shall you make Steel extream hard that with that onely and no other mixture you may make Culters very hard Divide the Steel into very small pieces like Dice and let them touch one the other binding Iron wires over them fastning all with an Iron wire put them into the Fire till they grow red hot and sparkle at least fifteen times and wrap them in these powders that are made of black Borax one part Oyster-shells Cuttle-bones of each two parts then strike them with a Hammer that they may all unite together and make Culters or Knives or what you will for they will be extream hard For this is the most excellent sort of Steel that onely tempered with waters is made most hard There is another but not so good and unless it be well tempered it alwayes grows worse It is this To temper a Graver to cut Marble Make your Graver of the best Steel let it be red hot in the Fire till it be red or Rose coloured dip it into water then take it away and observe the second colour When it is yellow as Gold cast it into the water So almost is A Tool made to cut Iron When the same red Rose colour appears plunge it into the water or some sharp liquor that we shall shew and you must observe the second yellow colour or wheat colour and then cast it into the water These are the best Tempers for Swords Swords must be tough lest whilst we should make a thrust they should break also they must have a sharp edge that when we cut they may cut off what we cut The way is thus Temper the body of it with Oyl and Butter to make it tough and temper the edge with sharp things that they may be strong to cut and this is done either with wooden Pipes or woollen Cloths wet with Liquor use it wittily and cunningly CHAP. VI. Of the temper of a Tool shall cut a Porphyr Marble Stone OUr Ancestors knew well to temper their Tools wherewith they could easily cut a Porphyr Stone as infinite Works testifie that were left to us but the way was shewed by none and is wholly concealed which is a mighty disgrace to our times when we neglect such rare and useful Inventions and make no account of them That we might be freed from this dishonour with great care and pains and cost I made trial of all things came to my hand or I could think of by divers wayes and experiments that I might attain unto it at last by Gods great blessing I found a far greater passage for to come to these things and what exceeds this And I will not be grieved to relate what I found out by chance whilst I made trial of these things The business consiâ—ed in these difficulties If the temper of the Graver was too strong and stubborn with the vehement blow of the Hammer it flew in piece but if it was soft it bowed and would not touch the stone wherefore it was to be most strong and tough that it might neither yield to the stroke nor flie asunder Moreover the juice or water the Iron must be tempered in muâ— be cleer and pure for if it be troubled the colours coming from heat could not be discerned and so the time to plunge the Tools in would not be known on which the whole Art depends So then cleer and purified juices will shew the time of the temper The colours must be chiefly regarded for they shew the time to plunge it in and take it out and because that the Iron must be made most hard and tough therefore the colour must be a middle colour between silver and gold and when this colour is come plunge the whole edge of the Tool into the
put into it a little musk stop the mouth close that it vent not set it in the summer-Sun two weeks always stirring the water The use is if you put a drop of this into a gallon of wine all the wine will smell of Musk and so for Cinnamon or other Spices So you may make Hippocras Wine Take the sweetest wine we call it commonly Mangiaguâ—rra and into four Vials full of that pour in two pounds of beaten Sugar four ounces of Cinnamon Pepper and grains of Paradise one ounce and half let them infuse one day then strain them adde in the end in a knot a little Musk and it will be excellent Wine or to powdred Sugar we put a little Aqua vitae wherein Cinnamon Pepper Grains of Paradise and musk have been infused as I said and it is presently provided for it draws forth the quintessence I shall shew how Wine may freeze in Glasses Because the chief thing desired at Feasts is that Wine cold as ice may be drunk especially in summer I will teach you how Wine shall presently not onely grow cold but freeze that you cannot drink it but by sucking and drawing in of your breath Put Wine into a Vial and put a little water to it that it may turn to ice the sooner then cast snow into a wooden vessel and strew into it Salt-peter powdred or the cleansing of Salt-peter called vulgarly Salazzo Turn the Vial in the snow and it will congeal by degrees Some keep snow all the summer Let water boil in brass kettles then pour it into great bowls and set them in the frosty cold Air it will freeze and grow harder than snow and last longer CHAP. XII To make men drunk and to make them loath Wine NOw we are come to speak of Wine before we pass from it I will shew you how to make your guests drunk for drunkenness at Feasts increaseth mirth and then how to keep them safe from drunkenness when they are often provoked to drink healths and to strive who shall drink most You may with these fruits Make men drunk The fruits of the Arbute and the Lote-tree being eaten will make men as though they were drunk also Dates eat in too great a quantity cause drunkenness and the pain of the head Sow-bread with Wine makes a man drunk Amber-greese or Musk put in Wine exasperate drunkenness The filth of a Dogs ear mingled with Wine makes one drunk as Albertus saith But Rhases out of whom he took it saith That Wine wherein the seeds of Ricinus are infused if any one drink it it will inebriate them Camels froth drunk with water by a drunken man will make him mad as possessed with a Devil Let these suffice for I said more in my description of Plants But on the contrary these things will Take away drunkenness Because Hemlock with Wine is the cause of death by its venome it hath been invented and found true that Hemlock is the cause of life to others Pliny seems to intimate as much Also venoms are prepared to drink some taking Hemlock before that they may drink and die If a man hath drunk too much Wine that doth him hurt he shall discuss it thus Cato bids that at the beginning and middle of Supper a man should eat four or five tops of raw Coleworts and it will take off his drunkenness and remove the hurt comes by Wine and will make a man as though he had neither eat nor drank The Egyptians before all meat did eat boil'd Coleworts and so provided themselves for drink Many to keep themselves sober take Colewort-seeds first The Tibaritae saith Simaeus before they drank fenced themselves by feeding on Coleworts Alexis Yesterday thou drank'st too much And now thy head doth ake but such Distemper fasting cures then Eat boil'd Coleworts drink agen And Amphis There is no means can half so well As sudden trouble drink dispel For that will wonderfully cure Eat else Radish that 's as sure They were wont in a vessel of Amethyst to make another remedy for drunkenness that they might drink Wine without danger Athenaeus If you would otherwise hinder the vapours of the Wine drink it well tempered with water for they are soonest drunk that drink strongest Wines Africaâ—â—â— saith If thou have drunk too much eat before meat three or four bitter Almonds they are drying and will drink up the moysture and drive away drunkenness Plutarch relates That there was a Physitian with Drâ—sâ—s who when he had first eaten five or six bitter Almonds he always conquered at the duel of drunkenness The powder of Pumex-stone will do as much if the drinker take that first Theophrastus saith it is dangerous unless he drink abundantly So Eâ—deâ—â—â— drank two and twenty Cups at last he went into a Bath and did not vomit and supped so as if he had drank nothing for by its drying quality it consumes all the moysture and being cast into a vessel of new Wine that works the heat of the Wine is strait allayed There are other things prepated by the Antients to extinguish drunkenness as to eat Lettice at the end of Supper for they are very cold we eat it now first to procure appetite whence Martial writes Why do we first our Lettice eat Our Fathers made it their last meat Dioscorides seems to call it Acrepula because it hinders drunkenness Leeks discuss drunkenness and he that takes Saffron before shall feel no drunkenness There are also Herbs and Flowers that if you make Garlands of them they will hinder drunkenness as Violets Roses and Ivy-berries The ashes of the Bill of a Swallow powdred with Myrrhe and strewed into the Wine you drink will keep you secure from being drunk Hâ—rus the King of Assyria found out this invention Pliny I have said how drunkenness may be disposed now I shall shew how men shall abstain That love Wine to refrain it There are many who when they have drank much Wine that is the worst thing in the world for them fall sick and die of it Now if you would refrain and abhor Wine and strong drink because the Fountain Clitorins is too far off let three or four live eels put into the Wine stay there till they die Let one drink of this Wine who is given to drunkenness and he will loath Wine and always hate it and will never drink it again or if he do he will drink but little and with much sobriety Another way wash a Tortois with Wine a good while and give one of that wine to drink privately half a cup full every morning for three days and you shall see a wonderful vertue Myrepsus VVhen one complained before the King of the Indians that he had Sons born to him but when once they began to drink a little wine they all died Jarchus answered him thus It is better for them that they died for had they lived they would have all run mad because they were begot of seed that was too cold Therefore
the Birds will be so stupid that they cannot flie but are catch'd with ones hand Or mingle Barley and mushrooms that are so called from flies with the seeds of Henbane and make the pap of it and lay on a board as before To catch Rooks with your hands Powder Nux vomica and mingle it with flesh So also you may make Fish drunk Opian teacheth some ways If you will Make Fish drunk Sow-bread will do it for I said that Sow-bread will make men more drunk His words are Of Sow-bread-Root they make a paste that 's white And fat with which the rocks and holes they smeer The water 's poyson'd by it and the might And force thereof doth spread both far and neer The Fishes fall the Fishes are made blinde And tremble at it for the stinking smell This Root thus ordered alwayes leaves behinde Doth make them drunk as Fishers know full well CHAP. IX The peculiar poysons of Animals are declared DO not think I mean that one poyson can kill all living Creatures but every one hath his several poyson for what is venome to one may serve to preserve another which comes not by reason of the quality but of the distinct nature Would we mention The venoms that kill Dogs Dioscâ—rides saith that white Chamaeleon made up with Barley-Flour will kill Dogs Sows and Mice being wet with water or Oyl Theophrastus saith Dogs and Sows kneaded with water and Oyl but with Coleworts Sows Nux vomica which from the effect is called Dogs Nut if it be filed and the thin filings thereof be given with Butter or some fat thing to a Dog to swallow it will kill him in three hours space he will be astonished and fall suddenly and dies without any noise but it must be fresh that Nature seems to have produced this Nut alone to kill Dogs They will not eat the Fruit of the Ash because it makes pain in their back-bone and hips yet Sows are fatted by it So there is one Plant called Dogs bane Chrysippus saith that Dogs are killed with it if the shoots of it are given to them with water Dogs cole or wilde cole if it be given with Flesh so the fumes of Lead Aristotle in his wonders concerning the Country of the Scythians and Medes saith that there is Barley that men feed on but Dogs and Sows will not endure the Excrements of those that eat it as being poyson to them I say nothing of Aconitum called by Dioscorides Dogs bane I shall say the same Of Wolfs bane Wolfs bane kills Wolfs and many other wild Beasts and it 's so called from the effect Mountebanks make venome thus Take black Hellebore two ounces Yew-leaves one ounce Beech-rinde Glass quick Lime yellow Arsenick of each one ounce and half of sweet Almonds three ounces Honey what may suffice Make pellets as big as a small Nut. Others take Wolfs bane yellow Arsenick and Yew-leaves of each alike and mingle them There are other Herbs that kill Wolfs but I pass them to avoid tediousness Aelian saith By Nilus grows an Herb called Wolfs bane if a Wolf tread on it he dies of convulsions Wherefore the Egyptians forbid any such Herb to be imported into their Country because they adore this Creature There are also Herbs that kill Mice That Aconitum which is called Myoctonon kills Mice a great way off Dioscorides and Nicandor Staves-acre hath almost the same forces whose Root or Seed in powder mingled with Meal and fried with Butter kills Mice if they eat it They are driven away with the Root of Daffodils and if their holes be stopt with it they die The wilde Cucumber and Coloquintida kill Mice If Mice eat Tithymal cut into small slices and mingled with Flour and Metheglin they will be blinde So Chamaeleon Myacanthus Realgar namely of live Brimstone quick Lime and Orpiment will do the same But amongst Wolfs banes is reckoned Libards bane by whose Root powdered and given with flesh they are killed Flesh is strewed with Aconite and Panthers are killed if they taste thereof Their jaws and throat are presently in pain therefore it is called Pardalianches They are killed also by Dogs bane which also they call Pardalianches Lious bane is called Leontophonon it is a little Creature that breeds nowhere but where the Lion is Being taken it is burnt and with the Ashes thereof flesh is strewed and being cast in the high-ways where they meet Lions are killed so Pardalianches kills Lions as well as Panthers Ox bane The juice of black Chamaeleon kills Heifers by a Quinsey wherefore some call it Ulophonon Oxen fear black Hellebore yet they will eat the white Goats bane There is an Herb that from killing Beasts but especially Goats is called Aegolethros The Flowers of it in a watry Spring-time are venome when they wither so that this mischief is not found every yeer Harts bane Some 〈◊〉 First are found in Armenia with the powder of them they scatter Figs strewed with it in the places where wilde Beasts come Beasts no sooner taste of them but they diâ—â— And by this Art are Harts and Bores killed Aelian Horse banes are Aconite Hellebore and red Arsenick Wheezles bane are Sal Ammoniacâ— and Corn moystened with some Liquor scatter this about such places as Wheeâ—les haunt when they eat it they die or flie away Sheeps bane Nardum kills Sheep Dioscorides Cattel and Goats if they drink the water where Rhododendron is steeped will die Pliny and Ononyâ—â—ius an Author nameless Flea-bane kills Goats and Sheep so doth Savin Pigeons bane Sâ—r apio writes that Pigeons are killed when they eat Corn or Beans steept in water wherein white Hellebore hath been infused Hens bane Hens die by eating the Seeds of Broom called Spartum Bats bane 〈◊〉 in Geopon saith they die by the fume of Ivy. Vultures Some Animals are killed by â—ings that smell very sweet to us Vultures by Unguents and black Beetâ—â—â— by Roses The same happens if a man do but anoynt them or give them meat that is smeered with sweet Oyntment Aristotle lib. Mirabil Scorâ—ions bane Aconite called Theliphonum from killing Scorpions Scorpions are stupified by touching it and they wax pale shewing thâ—â— they are conquered The Eagle is killed with Comfrey the 〈◊〉 with the Gall of the Hiaenaâ— the Stare with Garlick-seed the 〈◊〉 with Brimstone the Urcâ—in with Pondweed the Faulcon the Sea-gill the Turtlâ— the black-Bird the Vulture the night-Bird called Scopes perish with Pomegranate Kâ—rneâ— The â—â—â—ling by the Flower of Willows the Grow with Rocket-seed the Bâ—â—tle with sweâ—t Oyntment the Rook with the reliques of flesh the Wolf hath fed on the â—ark by Mustard-seed the Crane by the Vine-juice CHAP. X. Of the venomes for Fishes THe Sea and Rivers use to be infected with some Herbs and other simples whereby the Fishes 〈…〉 those waters are 〈…〉 and die But because they are several foâ— several Fish 〈…〉 the Particulars and the Genâ—â—als that the Fisherman taught by these may invâ—â—â— others
come forth and seem above the stone But if you would have 〈◊〉 writ with water only appear black that you may the better be provided 〈◊〉 more speedily for a voyage beat Galls and Vitriol finely and strew this 〈◊〉 on your paper rub it with a cloth and polish it well that so it may stick fast to the 〈◊〉 and be like it Powder Jâ—niper-gum which Scriveners call Vernish and 〈◊〉 to the rest when you would use it write with water oâ—â—pittle and they will be black letters There are many such Arts too tedious to relate CHAP. II. 〈…〉 in the fire 〈…〉 letters are not made visible 〈◊〉 by fire or not unless 〈◊〉 light interpose or may be read when they are burnt To make letters visible by fire So we may bring 〈…〉 between the verses and in the close setting together or larger 〈…〉 â—â—ables Let 〈…〉 contain soâ—e void space that the letters may not 〈…〉 and if this 〈…〉 â—ed it 〈…〉 be read If you write with the juice of Citrons Oranges Onyons or almost 〈…〉 things if you make it 〈…〉 presently discovered 〈◊〉 they are undigested juic◠〈…〉 detected by the 〈◊〉 of the fire and 〈◊〉 they 〈◊〉 forth 〈…〉 would 〈◊〉 â—f they were 〈…〉 a 〈…〉 that 〈…〉 to the fire they are concocted and will give the 〈…〉 colour they would in due time gâ—ve upon the tree when they were 〈◊〉 Juice of 〈◊〉 added to Calaâ—us will make a green to 〈…〉 will shew divers colours by the fire By these means 〈…〉 love-Letters escape from those that have 〈…〉 of Salt called Ammoniac this powderâ—â— and mingled with 〈…〉 will 〈…〉 letters and can hardly be distinguished from the paper 〈◊〉 hold them to 〈…〉 will shew black Also Letters thâ—â— cannot be read unless the paper be burnt For the mixture will be white 〈…〉 but when it is burnt the paper will be black and 〈…〉 will be 〈…〉 â—â—rpest vinegar and the white of an Egâ—â— in these 〈◊〉 Quick 〈◊〉 stir it well and with that mixture make Letters 〈…〉 and the letters 〈…〉 unburnt or make letters 〈…〉 or any and or Salt or Lime these bring they cannot be see◠〈…〉 when the 〈◊〉 is burnt and made black they will appear white If you will you may Write letters 〈…〉 of fire Do it thâ—â—â— Mingle 〈…〉 with Gâ—m Traganth soaked and of this mixture 〈…〉 that 〈…〉 the 〈…〉 letters 〈…〉 for that 〈◊〉 of 〈◊〉 matter opposed against outward 〈◊〉 it that the â—ays cannot come to out â—ight and 〈…〉 a shadow CHAP. III. How Letters rub d with dust may be seen NOw I will use another artifice that Letters rubbed with dust may be read that were before invisible which I read was used by the Ancients wherefore do thus That Letters rubbed with mill-dust may be read That as in paper so on some unseen parts of the Body Letters written may lie hid and be opened when need is write secretly on your Back or Arms oâ— other Limbs with Vinegar or Urine and dry it that nothing may appear now to have it read rub it over with foot or burnt paper for so the Letters will shineforth Or Otherwise If you make Letters with Fat Tallow or any other fatty with Gum or Milk of a Fig-tree and strew them with the dust of 〈◊〉 or 〈…〉 they will appear It may be by this craft as 〈◊〉 the Greek saith 〈◊〉 used the inprinted inscription in a Beast for a sacrifice He 〈…〉 Soldiers to make them fight valiantly with their Enemies 〈…〉 number supposing it would be no little advantage to put them 〈◊〉 before hand of the assurance of the victory invented a trivial business but otherwise profitable with the Priest that was to 〈◊〉 the sacrifice 〈◊〉 Before the day they were to fight he prepares for the victoryâ— for 〈…〉 to offer sacrifice pray'd unto the gods and 〈◊〉 the Sacrifice in 〈…〉 King used powdered Gum 〈◊〉 from the right to the left side he dreâ—◠〈◊〉 words Regâ— Victoria The Victory is the King 's and when the Entrails were drawn forth he thrust his hand into the hottest and most spunâ—◠〈◊〉 and 〈…〉 the inscription But the 〈◊〉 changing the outer parts and doing his 〈…〉 the part where this inscription was contained Regâ— Victoria 〈…〉 sooner published but the Soldiers generally 〈…〉 to shâ—w how ready they were to fight so 〈…〉 with certain 〈◊〉 of the Victory and depending on this promise from 〈…〉 they fight to â—â—agiously and subdued the French But to the matter 〈…〉 the 〈◊〉 will do the same if it be written on white paper and afterwards 〈…〉 be 〈…〉 with cole dust strewed upon it and made clea◠〈…〉 presently appear black Pliny saith the Milk of Tâ—hynalâ— will do the like to make the Letters and dust strewed on them to 〈◊〉 them 〈…〉 had rather speak with Adulterers then by Letters 〈◊〉 confirms this 〈…〉 Amandi how they may safely write to their Sweet-hearts 〈…〉 Milk it 's 〈…〉 but 〈◊〉 The writing with cole-dust 〈◊〉 full-right 〈…〉 as if 〈…〉 〈…〉 Also there is an Art that one would not imagine to write upon Chrystal for being all transparent no 〈◊〉 will dream of it and the letters may lie hid within Do it thus That letter◠〈…〉 of fine dusâ— Dissolve Gum 〈…〉 may be clâ—er and when it is well dissolved it 〈…〉 or 〈◊〉 a Cup or Glass for when the 〈…〉 No man will imagine the fraud if a Cup besent to one in 〈…〉 Glass 〈…〉 when he would see the letters rub 〈◊〉 straw 〈◊〉 paper upon it 〈…〉 will presently be seen Here is another secret That letters on the paper may be read not by fire nor water or any other thing but in the dust only This is a secret worth knowing dissolve Goats suet with a little Turpentine rub the paper with this liquor and keep it when you would send some news to your friend lay on the paper 〈◊〉 with the â—at upon a letter you would send to your friend write upon that with an iron point and the suet will make the characters on the letter send this away and if it be intercepted no water will make the words visible or any other Art but only strewing dust upon it Also you may make That upon black paper white letters may appear The reason is this mingle the white and yelk of an Egg together that it may be liquid as ink with this liquer writeth the paper what words you please and dry them when the paper is dry shake a black colour over it and dry it again and send it but that the letters may be visible scrape the superficies of the paper with a broad iron for so it will be that the ink being scraped off where the letters were they will appear white CHAP. IV. How you may write in an Egg. 〈…〉 by the Pâ—pal Inquisition and no 〈…〉 I will shew you how Letters may be writ on the upper shell 〈…〉 of an Egg also for example That letters may be written the Egg-sheâ—â—â—
dilated again and all the wrinkles will be gone and it will appear as it did at frst that you may read the Letters upon it without any hindrance Now I will shew the way How in the Sections of Books the Characters shall be hid When the Book is well bound and cut and coloured black if we open it and turn back the leaves that they may be turned in we may write at the corners of the leaves what we will but when the Book is set back again and the leaves put into their own places nothing is seen or can be imagined to be writ in them but he that would read those Letters must set the Book that way as it was and the Letters will be read So may we write on fly-traps that are made with wrinkles and then draw them forth If need be we may do The same with Cards to play with You may excellent well write on Cards if you put them in some order that one may follow the other and some shall be upright others turned downwards When you have set them right together you may write all things where they divide mingle the Cards together again and turn them and nothing will be seen but some disorderly marks if any man look curiously upon them But he that would read them must set them in order and they will joyn and be read exactly Also we may write in white Pigeons and other white Birds feathers of their wings turning them upwards for when they return to their own places they will shew nothing But if they be brought to their former posture you will read the Letters and this is no small benefit for those that shall use them for messengers There is a way To hide Letters upon wood Any one may make Letters upon wood and not be suspected for they shall not be seen but when we please Let the wood be fleshy and soft of Poplar or Tile-tree or such like and with those iron Markers Printers use when they make stamps upon Brass commonly called Ponzones make Letters in the wood half a finger thick then hew the wood with a Carpenters hatchet as deep as the Letters go when all is made plain and equal send the stick to your friend or board to him that knows the matter he putting the wood into the water the wood will swell out that was beaten in with the marks and the Letters will come forth That we may do in wooden vessels polished by the turner if when they are turned we mark the Letters on them and then turn them again when this is done send it to your friend and let him soke it in water c. CHAP. VI. In what places Letters may be inclosed I Shall speak in what places Letters may be inclosed and not be suspected and I shall speak last of Carriers I shall bring such examples as I have read in Antient Histories and what good a man may learn by them First How to hide Letters in wood Theophrastus's opinion was that if we cut the green bark of a Tree and make it hollow within as much as will contain the Letters and then bind it about in a short time it will grow together again with the Letters shut up within it Thus he saith That by including some religious precepts in wood people may be allured for they will admire at it But I mention this out of Theophrastus rather for a similitude then for to do the thing I would have for that would require a long time But this may be done well in dry wood as in Fir thus the chinks fastning together with common white glew Also the Antients used To conceal Letters in Junkets I will relate the cunning of the Wife of Polycretes for she whilst in the Milesian camps they solemnized a Solemn Feast of their Country when they were all fast asleep and drunk took this opportunity to tell her brothers of it and did thus She desired Diognetus General of the Erythrei that she might send some Junkets to her brothers and when she had leave she put a leaden scrole into a cake and she bad the bearer tell her brothers from her that no man should eat of it but themselves When they heard this they opened the cake and found the Letter and performed the contents of it They came upon the enemy by night that was dead drunk at the Feast and conquered him Also the Antients were wont To shut up Letters in living creatures Herodotus saith That Harpagus sent Letters to Cyrus put into the belly of a Hare whose entrails were taken out by one that counterfeited a shepherd hunting So Letters may be hid in Garments The secret places of clothes are best to avoid suspicion as in your bosom or under the soles of your feet Ovid in his Arte Amandi writes to this purpose Letters may be concealed in your brest Wrapt in a clowt which way is held the best Or else you may under your feet provide A place full closely Letters for to hide To hide Letters in your belt Those of Campania were wont when they would discover any thing to the Carthaginians and the Romans besieged them round they sent a man that seemed to run from them with a Letter concealed in his girdle and he taking occasion to escape brought it to the Carthaginians Others carried Letters in their scabbards and sent them away by messengers and were not found out But we use now adays To hide letters in the Bowels of living creatures For we wrap them in some meat and give them to a Dog or some other creature to swallow that when he is killed the letters may be found in his belly and there is nothing neglected to make this way certain The like was done by Harpagus He as Herodotus saith being to discover to Cyrus some secrets when the ways were stopt that he could do it by no other means he delivered the letters to a faithful servant who went like a Hunter that had catcht a Hare and in her belly were the letters put when the guts were taken forth and so they were brought to Persis We use also To shut up letters in stones Flints are beaten very fine in brazen Mortars and sifted then are they melted in a brass Cauldron by putting two ounces of Colophonia to one pound of the powder of the stone and mingling them put your letters into leaden plates and hide them in the middle of the composition and put the lump into a linnen bag and tye it fast that it may be round then sink it into cold water and it will grow hard and appear like a flint CHAP. VII What secret Messengers may be used THe Antients used the same craft for Messengers for they used men that should be disguised by their habits and some living creatures besides For To counterfeit the shape of a Dog It was the crafty counsel of Josippus that the Messengers should be clad with skins and so they past the enemies guards and
Aqua fortis that eats the paper or some decaying liquors that will vanish with any light touch and leave the place where they were without any spot I shall teach How letters are made that eat the paper If you mingle oyl of Vitriol with common ink or any other black colour in few days by corroding the paper or the ink it self the letters will vanish or in a moneth as you put in more or less of the oyl and this you may try before you send away your letter If you would have it work more slowly add but a little oyl if faster put in more you may when it is too strong put some water to it The same is performed if you mix a strong lye they call it the Capital with your ink for first they will be yellow and then they will vanish The same is done by oyl of Tartar or Salt Alkali or Soda and strong water of separation of Gold for these corrode the letters and the paper that nothing of the letters will appear If you desire to know How letters may be made that will soon vanish Make them with the strongest Aqua vitae or use Camphir and burnt straws for the letters in time will decay and vanish the tincture will fall off when the glutinous matter is gone Make a powder of a very fine touch-stone for the Sandy-stone will sooner decay that no letter shall be seen Also it is done Another way Infuse the small filings of steel in water of separation take a treble quantity of this and add thereto liquid Pitch or Soot of Turpentine to make it the blacker and cover the vessel grind this on a Porphyre-stone write and they will vanish and fall away This secret I thought not fit to overpass because it is the principal thing to be considered to make tryal oft-times for if it stay long on the paper add more strong water to it and if you be careful no mark of the writing will remain You shall do it like to this another way If it be good so to counterfeit Take Chrysocolla Salt Ammoniac and Alom all alike powder them all and put them into a Crucible and make a strong lye of quick-lime and laying a linnen cloth over the mouth of the vessel that must receive it strain it boil it a little mingle this with your ink they will remain a while but in short time the letters will vanish away Set it up for you use But contrarily if you will That invisible letters after some time shall become visible and shew themselves I will give you some examples that you may invent more thereby your self If you write with juice of Citrons or Oranges on Copper or Brass and leave this so for twenty days the letters will appear green upon the place the same may be done many other ways namely by dissolving salt Ammoniac in water and writing with it upon Brass the place will sooner appear of verdigreese-colour CHAP. X. How we may take off letters that are written upon the paper IF we would take letters from off the paper or that such as are blotted out might appear again we must use this art As if we would Take letters off the paper or from parchment Take Aqua fortis that is it that parts gold from silver with a pensil wipe some of this upon the letters it will presently wipe off letters written with Gall and Copras If you use Aqua fortis wherein salt Ammoniac is dissolved it will be sooner done But printed letters are harder taken out because that ink hath neither Galls nor Copras Or rub it with salt Alkali and Sulphur making little balls of them and that will eat them out that nothing shall be seen But if you desire to write any thing in the place you have made clean first wet the place with water wherein Alom is dissolved for the ink will not run about If you desire To renew letters decayed or to read such as are vanished Boil Galls in wine and with a spunge wipe over the letters the letters will presently be seen when they are once wet thus and be well coloured as they were at first CHAP. XI How to counterfeit a seal and writing IT may be of great use when places are besieged and in Armies and affairs of great men to know how to open letters that are sealed with the Generals Seal and signed with his Name to know what is contained within and to seal them again writing others that are contrary to them and the like I will shew how To counterfeit the Seal Melt Sulphur and cast it into powder of Ceruss while it is melted put this mixture upon the Seal but sence it about with paper or wax or chalk and press it down when it is cold take it off and in that shall you have the print of the Seal I will do it another way Fill an earthen pot with Vinegar cast Vitriol into it and a good deal of Verdigreese let it bubble on the fire put plates of iron into it after a short time take them out and from the out-side with your knife scrape off a kind of rust it hath contracted that is durty as it were and put this into a dish under it again put them into the earthen pot and scrape more off when you take them out do this so often till you have some quantity of this durty substance cast quick-silver into this and make a mixture and while it is soft and tender lay it on the Seal and press it down and let it remain in the open Air for it will grow so hard that you may almost seal with it for it will become even like to a Metal It may be also done another way Take the filings of steel and put them in an earthen Crucible at a strong fire put such things to it as will hasten the melting of it when it is melted cast it into some hollow place pownd it in a brass Mortar for it will be easily done do it so three or four times then powder it and mingle quick-silver with it and let it boil in a glazed vessel six hours till it be well mingled then press the seal upon it and let it cool and it will become exceeding hard It is possible To make a great Seal less if it should happen that we want a lesser seal we must do thus Take Isinglass and dissolve it in water anoynt the figure with oyl that it may not stick to the glew compass the seal about with wax that the matter run not about put the Isinglass to the fire and melt it pour it upon the seal after three hours when it is cold take it away and let it dry for the seal when it is dry will be drawn less equally If you will Imitate the form of a writing do thus Open the letter upon a looking-glass that wants the foyl upon the letter lay white paper and a light under the glass temper your ink as the writing is
cannot satisfie your self unless you touch it with your hands whether it truly stick without the Glass or not So Letters are truly read that they will seem to be made in Silver upon the Crystal nor is the eye so quick but it may be deceived when it looks on Nor will I omit the Artifice To see in a plain Glass that which appears no where I have often much delighted my friends and made them admire with this Glass Provide thirty or forty little Tables ready of a foot and half long and two fingers broad and a third part of a finger thick so artificially hewed that the thickness may be upon the one side and the thinness on the other side like the edge of a knife Place all these boards together that the solid parts may stand altogether as to make a perfect plain Then paint your own Picture or of some other thing upon it yet by this artifice and great observation that if the Image be neer the Glass it must be drawn as it were afar off If you would have it far distant let the forehead be unmeasurably long the nose somewhat longer and the mouth and the chin likewise The manner how to draw this Form exactly in Tables I said in my Opticks When the Image is now described fasten the little boards upon a plain Table that the head may be set downwards and the chin upwards and place the first Table after the second and the second after the third till they be all fastned Hang the Table above a mans height that no man may see into it above the degrees of the Tables and place a Glass over this distant two foot from the Table so long lifting it up and putting it down till you see the perfect Image Now when any man comes neer the Glass to see his own Image he shall see the Image of some other thing that appears no where In the breadth of the Tables you may draw some Picture lest they should give some occasion to suspect CHAP. XXI How Spectacles are made VVE see that Spectacles were very necessary for the operations already spoken of or else lenticular Crystals and without these no wonders can be done It remains now to teach you how Spectacles and Looking-glasses are made that every man may provide them for his use In Germany there are made Glass-balls whose diameter is a foot long or there abouts The Ball is marked with the Emrilstone round and is so cut into many small circles and they are brought to Venice Here with a handle of Wood are they glewed on by Colophonia melted And if you will make Convex Spectacles you must have a hollow irondish that is a portion of a great Sphaere as you will have your Spectacles more or less Convex and the dish must be perfectly polished But if we seek for Concave Spectacles let there be an Iron-ball like to those we shoot with Gun-powder from the great Brass Canon the superficies whereof is two or three foot about Upon the Dish or Ball there is strewed white-sand that comes from Vincentia commonly called Saldame and with water it is forcibly rubbed between our hands and that so long until the superficies of that circle shall receive the Form of the Dish namely a Convex supreficies or else a Concave superficies upon the superficies of the Ball that it may fit the superficies of it exactly When that is done heat the handle at a soft fire and take off the Spectacle from it and joyn the other side of it to the same handle with Colophonia and work as you did before that on both sides it may receive a Concave or Convex superficies then rubbing it over again with the powder of Tripolis that it may be exactly polished when it is perfectly polished you shall make it perspicuous thus They fasten a woollen-cloth upon wood and upon this they sprinkle water of Depart and powder of Tripolis and by rubbing it diligently you shall see it take a perfect Glass Thus are your great Lenticulars and Spectacles made at Venice CHAP. XXII How upon plain Concave and Convex Glasses the foils are laid on and they are bâ—â—â—ed NOw it remains that I speak of some few things not to be overpassed of the banding of Convex Glasses and of foiling plain Glasses and Convex Glasses that so I may set down the perfect Science of Looking-glasses First for the terminating of Looking glasses that are made of Crystal and Glass then of other mixtures and polishings that a knowing Artificer may know and know how to make them For though amongst many things that shew the Images of things as water some Jewels and polished Metal do it yet nothing doth so plainly represent Images as Lead foil'd upon Glass Plain Looking-glasses are prepared of Crystal and of Glass those of Crystal are polished by wheels and require another Artifice But at Venice How Glass Looking-glasses are made I have seen it They take the melted Glass out with an Iron with their blast they frame an empty Pillar they open it on one side with their tongs and whilst it is red hot they lay it upon a plain plate of Iron that is equally made and they put it into the furnace again to make it softer and that it may get the perfect plainness of the iron plate they leave it over the furnace to cool by degrees When it is cool they do thus Polish plain Glasses They fasten it upon a plain Table with Gyp underneath lyeth a most polite plain plate of iron they cast upon it the foresaid sand they rub it with water by a stick leaning thereon until it be perfectly plain they take it from the Table and glew it on the other side to polish them both then they make them perspicuous as I said they did Now will I shew To terminate plain Glass Looking-glasses Glass or Crystal Looking-glasses when they are made plain and equal the Artist makes a foil of the same bigness of Tin that is level and thin as perfectly as he can For if Crystal or Glass had no foil of Lead behind it by its strength and thickness it could never terminate our sight nor stay the Image Printed upon it but it would let it slip away for Glass is pure and transparent and so would not contain it by reason of its brightness and so the Image would vanish in it as light in the Sun Wherefore upon this foil you shall wipe over with Quick-silver by the means of a Hares foot that it may appear all as Silver and when you see it fast on the superficies you shall put it upon a fair white paper and so upon the Glass but first made clean with a linen clout and polished for if you handle it with your hands the foil will not stick to it with your left hand press down the Glass and with the right take away the Paper that the foil may cleave every where and they bind fast together laying a weight upon it for
the Crown than for the Gold lump he reasoned that there must be a mixture in the Crown This was the Greeks invention that is worthy of praise but the operation is difficult for in things of small quantity the theft cannot be discerned nor can this reason appear so clear to the eye where the obsolute fashion of the vessel was wanting Now a way is invented how for all money be it never so small we can tell presently and we want not many instruments that we may cry We have overfounded Vpereureka Vpereureka we have gone beyond Archimedes his Eureka The way is this To know any part of Silver mingled with Gold Take a perfect ballance and put in one scale any Metal in the other as much of the same Metal but the purest of its kind and when the scales hang even in the Air put them into a vessel full of water and let them down under water about half a foot Then will it be a strange wonder for the ballances that hang equal in the Air will change their nature in the water and will be unequal for the impure Metal will be uppermost and the pure will sink to the bottom The reason is because pure Gold compared with that kind is heavior than all impure Gold because pure Gold taketh less place wherefore it will way heavior by the former reason If then we would know how much Silver is in that Gold put as much pure Gold in the other scale as will make the ballances equal under the waters when they are equal take them up and the weight you added under water will be the weight of the mixture If you would know how much Gold is upon a vessel Gilded put the Cup in one scale and as much pure Silver in the other that the scales may hang equal in the Air then put them into the water and the vessel will sink down put into the other scale as much pure Gold as will make them equal under water draw them forth and that is the weight of the Gilt of the plate You shall do the same for Silver Brass Iron white or black Lead But would you know whether in Money Brass be mingled with Silver or Coin be adulterated with Copper put the Money into one scale and as much of the finest Silver into the other ballance them equal then put them under the water the Money will go down adde as much Brass as will make the scales equal then take them forth and it will be the weight of the mixture Now will I set the weighâ—s of Metals how much they weigh more in the waters than in the Air whereby without any other experiment we may know mixtures An Iron-ball that weighed nighteen ounces in the Air will weigh fifteen in the waters whence it is that a Ball of the same magnitude must owe three ounces to the water wherefore the proportion of Iron in the Air to the same in the waters is as fifteen to nineteen A Leaden Bullet of the same magnitude weighs 31 ounces in the Air in the water but 27 A Marble Bullet little less for bulk weighs 7 in the Air and 5 in the water Copper weighs 16 in the Air and 12 in the waters Silver weighs in the Air 125 in the waters 113 Brass in the Air weighs 65 Karats and one grain in the waters 50 Karats and two grains Crown Gold in the Air weighs 66 grains in the waters 6â— Gold called Zechini in the Air weighs 17 Karats under water 16 Karats Tâ—rkish Ducat Gold weighs in the Air 34 under waters 32 Common French Crown Gold weighs in the Air 67 under waters 60 Common Crown Gold of Hungary that is old in the Air weighs 17 in the water 16 Crown Gold of Tartary weighs 16 in the Air and 14 under water THE NINETEENTH BOOK OF Natural Magick Concerning VVind-Instruments THE PROEME I Have spoken concerning light and heavy now follow experiments by wind for these seem to follow the reasons of Mathematicks and of the Air and water and a Philosopher who seeks to find things profitable and admirable for mans use must insist on these things contemplate and search them out in no thing doth the Majesty of Nature shine forth more There are extant the famous Monuments of the most learned Heron of Alexandria concerning wind Instruments I will adde some that are new to give an occasion to search out greater matters CHAP. I. Whether material Statues may speak by any Artificial way I Have read that in some Cities there was a Colassus of Brass placed on a mighty high Pillar which in violent tempests of wind from the nether parts received a great blast that was carried from the mouth to a Trumpet that it blew strongly or else sounded some other Instrument which I believe to have been easie because I have seen the like Also I read in many men of great Authority that Albertus Magnus made a head that speak Yet to speak the truth I give little credit to that man because all I made trial of from him I found to be false but what he took from other men I will see whether an Image can be made that will speak Some say that Albertus by Astrological elections of times did perform this wonderful thing but I wonder how learned men could be so guld for they know the Stars have no such forces Some think he did it by Magick Arts. And this I credit least of all since there is no man that professeth himself to know those Arts but Impostors and Mountebanks whilst they cheit ignorant men and simple women nor do I think that the Godly man would profess ungodly Arts. But I suppose it may be done by wind We see that the voice or a sound will be conveighed entire through the Air and that not in an instant but by degrees in time We see that Brass-guns which by the force of Gun-powder make a mighty noise if they be a mile off yet we see the flame much before we hear the sound So hand-Guns make a report that comes at a great distance to us but some minutes of time are required for it for that is the nature of sounds Wherefore sounds go with time and are entire without interruption unless they break upon some place The Eccho proves this for it strikes whole against a wall and so rebounds back and is reflected as a beam of the Sun Moreover as I said in this work words and voices go united together and are carried very far entire as they are spoken at first These therefore being laid down for true grounds if any man shall make leaden Pipes exceeding long two or three hundred paces long as I have tried and shall speak in them some or many words they will be carried true through those Pipes and be heard at the other end as they came from the speakers mouth wherefore if that voice goes with time hold entire if any man as the words are spoken shall stop the
descend down to the water beneath and be set under it but fastned that it take no air let the vessel above be made hot by the Sun or fire for the air that is contained in the vessel rarefies and breathes forth whereupon we shall see the water rise into bubbles when the Sun is gone and the vessel grows cold the air is condensed and because the air included cannot fill up the vacuity the water is called in and ascends thither CHAP. IV. A discription of water Hour-glasses wherein Wind or Water-Instruments for to shew the Hours are described THe Antients had Hour-Dials made by water and Water-Dials were usual and famous Heron of Alexandria writ Books of Water-Dials but they are lost I have writ a Book of them and that this part may not be deficient I shall shew two that are made by contraries one by blowing in the air the other by sucking it out This shall be the first A Water-Dial Take a vessel of Glass like a Urinal it is described by the letters AB On the top is A where there is a very small hole that the point of a needle can scarce enter it at the bottom neer the mouth let there be set a staff EF that in the middle hath a firm Pillar going up to the very top of the vessel let the Pillar be divided with the Hour-lines Let there be also a wooden or earthen vessel GH full of water Upon the superficies of that water place the Glass vessel AB that by its weight will press toward the bottom but the air included within the vessel keeps it from going down then open the little hole A whereby the air going forth by degrees the vessel will gradually descend also Then make by another Dial the marks on the staff CD which descending will afterwards shew the Hourmarks When therefore the vessel goes to the bottom of the wooden vessel the Dial is done and it is the last Hour But when you would have your Dial go again you must have a crooked empty pipe OK the upper mouth K must be stopt with the finger K so K being stopt with the finger that the air may not enter sink it under the water that it may come within the vessel AB then put your mouth to K and blow into it for that will raise the vessel upward and it will come to its former place and work again I shall also describe for my minds sake Another Water-Dial contrary to the former namely by sucking in the air Let there be a Glass vessel like to a Urinal as I said AB and being empty set fast on it the vessel CD that it cannot sink down then fill it with water as far as B Let there be a hole neer the top E wherefore sucking the air by the hole E the water comes into the vessel AB from the vessel CD and will rise as high as FG when therefore AB is full of water stop the hole E that no air enter and the water will fall down again In the top of the vessel AB let there be another very small hole that the air may come in by degrees and so much as there comes in of air so much water will go forth On the superficies of the vessel make Hour-lines that may snew the Hours marked 1 2 3 c. or if you will let the Still fastned to a Cork swim on the top of the water and that will shew the Hours marked on the outside of the vessel CHAP. V. A description of Vessels casting forth water by reason of Air. NOw I will describe some Fountains or Vessels that by reason of air cast forth water and though Heron ingeniously described some yet will I set down some others that are artifically found out by me and other men Here is described A Fountain that casts forth water by compression of the Air Let there be a vessel of water-work close every where AB make a hole through the middle and let a little pipe CD go up from the bottom of the water-work vessel D so far from the bottom that the water may run forth Upon the superficies of the Tympanum let there be C a very little hole with a cover to it or let it have as the Greeks call it Smerismation to shut and open it handsomely and in the upper surface of the Tympanum bore the basis quite through with a little pipe which enters into the hollow of the Tympanum and having in the hole beneath a broad piece of leather or brass that the air coming in may not go back wherefore pour in water at E that it may be three fingers above the bottom then blow in air as vehemently as you can when it is well pressed in shut the mouth then opening the mouth A the water will fly up aloft until the air be weak I at Venice made a Tympanum with pipes of Glass and when the water was cast forth very far the Lord Estens much admired it to see the water fly so high and no visible thing to force it I also made another place neer this Fountain that let in light and when the air was extenuated so long as any light lasted the Fountain threw out water which was a thing of much admiration and yet but little labor To confirm this there is An Artifice whereby a hand-Gun may shoot a bullet without fire For by the air onely pressed is the blast made Let there be a hand Gun that is made hollow and very smooth which may be done with a round instrument of lead and with Emril-powder beaten rubbing all the parts with it Then you must have a round Instrument that is exactly plained on all parts that may perfectly go in at the mouth of the wind Gun and so fill it that no air may come forth let it be all smeer'd with oyl for the oyl by its grossness hinders any air to come forth So this lead Bullet being put into the Guns mouth and thrust down with great force and dexterity then presently take away your hands but you must first shut the little hole that is in the bottom of the hole and the bullet and little stick will fall to the bottom and by the violence of the air pressed together it will cast out the Bullet a great way and the stick too which is very strange Also I will make A Vessel wherewith as you drink the liquor shall be sprinkled about your face Make a vessel of Pewter or Silver like to a Urinal then make another vessel in the fashion of a Tunnel or a round Pyramis let their mouths be equal and joyn'd perfectly together for they must be of the same bredth let the spire of it be distant from the bottom of the Urinal a fingers breadth and let it be open then pour water into the vessel and fill the Urinal unto the hole of the spire end and fill the Tunnel to the top and the rest of the Urinal will be empty
him but if he let his ears down he is easily slain Aristotle and Pliny from him When they raise their ears they hear quickly when they let them fall they are afraid and not to go over all Creatures that have large right up open ears I say those that have such ears they raise them and direct them forward when they would hear afar off and they are of most perfect hearing I shall shew now by the contrary that such Creatures which have short small ears and not so visible are of dull hearing Great part of Fishes want ears and such as have onely holes and no ears must needs hear more deafly for the outward ears are made by Nature that the sounds might be conveyed to the ears by them Adrianus Consul of Rome is a most clear witness of this who having this sense hurt made hollow catches to hear better by and these he fastned to his ears looking forward And Aristotle saith That Horses Asses Dogs and other Creatures that have great ears do always stir them about and turn them to hear noise Nature teaching them the use of those parts and we finde that they hear less that have their ears cut off wherefore it is fit that the Form of the Instrument for hearing be large hollow and open and with screws inwardly For the first if the sound should come in directly it would hurt the sence for the second the voice coming in by windings is beaten by the turnings in the ears and is thereby multiplied as we see in an Eccho The sea-Periwinkle is an argument to prove it which being held to the eare makes a light noise Now it remains to speak of what matter it must be made I think of porous Wood for the holes and pores are passable every way and being filled with air they sound with every small stroke and amongst the porous Wood is the Ivy and especially the tree called Smilax or Woodbind for a Dish made with Ivy will let out the water as I said Wherefore Pliny speaking of the Woodbind saith It is proper to this matter that being set to the ears it will make a small noise And in another place I said that the Woodbind-Ivy would sound if set to the ear Therefore fit your Instrument to put into your ear as Spectacles are fitted to the eyes CHAP. VI. How by some Impostures we may augment weight I Have set down some Impostures here that such as handle with wicked men may take heed that they be not deceived As To augment the weight of Oyl water is mingled with the Oyl that the fraud may not be known let it be done with troubled waters as with the decoction of Wood Rapes Asphodills that it may the harder be discerned from it Or else they put the choisest Gumtragant into water for two days then they bray it in a Mortar always putting water to it to melt the Gum adde these to the Oyl dropping forth and they will be turn'd to Oyl By the like fraud almost Silk is made to weigh more They put it upon the vapour that riseth from boiling water and this makes it swell with moisture and grow heavier Others bray one ounce of Gum Arabick and being well passed through a sieve they mingle it with the decoction of Honey they dissolve this mixture into water and wet the Silk with it and then let it dry Others keep it in the green leaves of Walnut-tree If you will Increase the quantity of Honey Adde to it the Meal of Chestnuts of Millet and that augments it and it cannot be known So you may Increase the weight of Wax Adde to the Wax Bean-meal excellent well beaten and this will burn in Candles without any excrement for it increaseth the weight and bigness and the fraâ—d is scarce discerned So you may Augment Sope. If you mingle the Ashes of Oxens shank-bones well burnt it Potters ovens or white Brimstone For you shall augment the weight and quantity without and distinction of it If you would Counterfeit Pepper You may gather green Juniper-berries and let them dry till they shrivel then mix them with grains of Pepper Others gather great black Vetches and first they boil them with wilde Pepper for swelling in the water when they come to be dried they become wrinkled I did sophisticate them so that I deceived in sport the best Apothecaries and afterwards I did in mirth discover the fraud Take the Berries of the ripe red Sanguinaria these when they are dried will be so shriveled and like to Pepper that any man almost may be deceived by it unless he tasts of it So we may Increase the weight of Wheat By setting a vessel of Wood within it full of water or vinegar For as Pliny saith It will drink it in CHAP. VII Of the Harp and many wonderful properties thereof THe Harp hath some properties in it and things worthy to be observed which I shall propound here First I shall mention some wonderful effects that the Antients speak of then how they may be done or how the Antients did then Since Musick is now more Adorned and Noble than it was amongst the Antients for then it was more rude and imperfect and yet in our days it doth not perform those operations It is certain that Musical Tunes can do much with men and there is no heart so hard and cruel but convenient and sweet harmony will make it yield and on the otherside harsh Musick will vex and harden a mans minde Musaeus discovers that Verse and Songs are a most delightful thing to Mortal man and the Platonists say That all things living are charmed by Musick and there are many effects observed of it Drums sound in the wars to provoke those that are slow to fight and we read that the Antients did such like things One Timotheus a Musician as oft he he pleased would play a Phrygian Tune and so enrage the mind of Alexander that he râ—n presently to the wars and when he would do otherwise he changed his tune and took off all his courage making him lasie and would then draw him being grown effeminate to Banquets and Feasts And Plutarch saith That when he heard Antigenida playing Melodies with a Pipe that they called Harmatii he was so inflamed that he rose in his Arms and laid hold of him that sat next to him Cicero reports That Pythagoras made a yong man more calm by a slower tune who was a Tancomonite and was whitled with wine and mad for a whore and spurred forward by a Phrygian tune for being a corrival he sought to set the house on fire where the whore was And the same Author saith If yong men are provoked by the sound of Flutes to commit any wickedness if the Piper play but a slower tune they are called off again for by the gravity of the Musick their petulant fury is alayed Empedocles when one set upon his Host that provoked him with reproaches and ill language turned the burden of his
be made softer now I will shew the tempering of it how it may be made to cut sharper For the temper of it is divers for divers uses For Iron requires several tempers if it be to cut Bread or Wood or Stone or Iron that is of divers liquors and divers ways of firing it and the time of quenching it in these Liquors for on these doth the business depend When the Iron is sparkling red hot that it can be no hotter that it twinkles they call it Silver and then it must not be quenched for it would be consumed But if it be of a yellow or red colour they call it Gold or Rose-colour and then quenched in Liquors it grows the harder this colour requires them to quench it But observe That if all the Iron be tempered the colour must be blew or Violet colour as the edge of a Sword Rasor or Lancet for in these the temper will be lost if they are made hot again Then you must observe the second colours namely when the Iron is quenched and so plunged in grows hard The last is Ash colour and after this if it be quenched it will be the least of all made hard For example The temper of a Knife to cut Bread I have seen many ingenious men that laboured for this temper who having Knives fit to cut all hard substances yet they could scarce fall upon a temper to cut Bread for the Table I fulfilled their desire with such a temper Wherefore to cut Bread let the Steel be softly tempered thus Heat gently Steel that when it s broken seems to be made of very small grains and let it be excellent well purged from Iron then strike it with a Hammer to make a Knife of it then work it with the File and frame it like a Knife and polish it with the Wheel then put it into the Fire till it appear Violet-colour Rub it over with Sope that it may have a better colour from the Fire then take it from the Fire and anoynt the edge of it with a Linen-cloth dipt in Oyl of Oâ—ives until it grow cold so you shall soften the hardness of the Steel by the gentleness of the Oyl and a moderate heat Not much differs from this The temper of Iron for Wood. Something harder temper is fit to cut wood but it must be gentle also therefore let your Iron come to the same Violet-colour and then plunge it into waters take it out and when it appears Ash-colour cast it into cold water Nor is there much difference in The temper for Instruments to let blood It is quenched in Oyl and grows hard because it is tender and subtile for should it be quenched in water it would be wrested and broken The temper of Iron for a Sythe After that the Iron is made into a Sythe let it grow hot to the colour of Gold and then quench it in Oyl or smeer it with Tallow because it is subtile Iron and should it be quenched in waters it would either crumble or be wrested CHAP. IV. How for all mixtures Iron may be tempered most hard NOw I will shew some ways whereby Iron may be made extream hard for that Iron that must be used for an Instrument to hammer and polish and fit other Iron must be much harder then that The temper of Iron for Files It must be made of the best Steel and excellently tempered that it may polish and fit other Iron as it should be Take Ox hoofs and put them into an Oven to dry that they may be powdered fine mingle well one part of this with as much common Salt bearen Glass and â—himney-foot and beat them together and lay them up for your use in a wooden Vessel hanging in the smoak for the Salt will melt with any moisture of the place or Air. The powder being prepared make your Iron like to a file then cut it chequerwise and crosswayes with a sharp edged tool having made the Iron tender and soft as I said then make an Iron chest fit to lay up your files in and put them into it strewing on the powders by course that they may be covered all over then put on the cover and lute well the chinks with clay and raw that the smoak of the powder may not breath out and then lay a heap of burning coals all over it that it may be red-hot about an hour when you think the powder to be burnt and consumed take the chest out from the coals with Iron pinchers and plunge the files into very cold water and so they will become extream hard This is the usual temper for files for we fear not if the files should be wrested by cold waters But I shall teach you to temper them excellently Another way Take the pith out of Goats horns and dry it and powder it then lay your files in a little Chest strewed over with this Powder and do as you did before Yet observe this That two files supernumerary must be laid in so that you may take them forth at pleasure and when you think the Chest covered with burning coals hath taken in the force of the Powder take out one of the supernumerary Files and temper it and break it and if you finde it to be very finely grain'd within and to be pure Steel according to your desire take the Chest from the fire and temper them all the same way or else if it be not to your minde let them stay in longer and resting a little while take out the out the other supernumerary File and try it till you have found it perfect So we may Temper Knives to be most hard Take a new Ox hoof heat it and strike it with a Hammer on the side for the pith will come forth dry it in an Oven and as I said put it into a pot alwayes putting in two supernumeraries that may be taken forth to try if they be come to be pure Steel and doing the same as before they will be most hard I will shew How an Habergeon or Coat of Arms is to be tempered Take soft Iron Armour of small price and put it into a pot strewing upon it the Powders abovesaid cover it and lute it over that it have no vent and make a good Fire about it then at the time fit take the Pot with iron pinchers and striking the Pot with a Hammer quench the whole Herness red hot in the foresaid water for so it becomes most hard that it will easily resist the strokes of Poniards The quantity of the Powder is that if the Harness be ten or twelve pounds weight lay on two pounds and a half of Powder that the Powder may stick all over wet the Armour in water and rowl it in the Powder and lay it in the pot by courses But because it is most hard lest the rings of a Coat of Male should be broken and flie in pieces there must be strength added to the hardness Workmen call it a