126 



HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



Rising, Southing, and Setting of the Principal Planets, 

 at intervals of Seven Days, for June. 



of spot-groups was ten days ; in 1887 seven days ; 

 in 1888 six days ; in 1889 it was twelve days. 



On June 17th there will be an annular eclipse of 

 the sun, which will be partially visible at Greenwich 

 as a partial eclipse, beginning at 8 hrs. 20 min. 

 morn., greatest phase at 9 hrs. 14 min. morn, and 

 ending at 10 hrs. 31 min. morn. 



On June 29th there will be an occultation of /3 1 

 Scorpii, a star of the second magnitude. The 

 disappearance takes place at 9 hrs. 59 min. aft., the 

 reappearance at II hrs. 13 min. aft. 



In June, Mercury is a morning star in Taurus. 



Venus is an evening star. 



ANIMALS AND MEDICINE. 

 By Hulwidgeon. 

 II.— Insectivora. 



HEDGEHOG.— Although I cannot find this 

 animal mentioned in accredited prescriptions, 

 there can be little doubt of its having been pressed 

 into the service of pathology. It was regarded as 

 edible, if not delectable, and the subject of many 

 peculiar recipes among country people ; while the 

 favour in which it has been held by gypsies from time 

 immemorial, as a dietary tit-bit, is perfectly well 

 known. It was, moreover, of some esteem in 

 farrier)'. 



Horse-doctoring I must acknowledge to be outside 

 the limit of my subject (or the theme would be 

 endless), but I shall take the liberty of quoting a 

 remedy therefrom, for want of a better illustration 



of this creature's repute in human doctoring. For 

 horses whose wind is broken, Howard bids us : 

 " Take the guts of a hedgehog, dry them, and pound 

 them to powder, and give the horse two or three 

 spoonfuls of it in a pint of wine or strong ale ; then 

 mix the rest with anise-seed, liquorice and sweet 

 butter, of which make round balls or pills and give 

 him two or three of them after drink." * 



Shrew.— Gilbert White has told us with what 

 detestation the shrew was regarded in his time, and 

 how it was immolated to furnish the vaunted shrew- 

 ash "whose twigs or branches, when gently applied 

 to the limbs of cattle, will immediately relieve the 

 pains which a beast suffers from the running of a 

 shrew-mouse over the part affected." 



Of most animals, justly or unjustly, deemed to be 

 venomous, the favourite method of curing the wounds 

 they •inflicted was by the application in some more or 

 less ludicrous and irrational manner of a portion of 

 the creature's own body. The cruel stigma that wao 

 attached to the little shrew, therefore, although we 

 do not find it enumerated in the Materia Medica, 

 introduced it into the common practice of medicine. 

 The shrew-ash was probably as frequently called into 

 requisition by simple rustics for their own cure as for 

 that of their cattle. But there were other shrew- 

 charms of equal reputed efficacy. According to the 

 late Rev. J. G. Wood, in those bygone days "a 

 shrew cut in half and placed on a wound supposed to 

 be caused by its bite, was considered a certain 

 remedy." This seems to have been the favourite 

 mode of application ; its simplicity no doubt 

 recommending it. 



in.— Carnivora. 



Cat. — Of the curative virtues of puss we cannot 

 deduce much from medical treatises and pharma- 

 copoeias ; for, like her other qualities, these, although 

 many, seem to have been of a domestic nature and of 

 renown chiefly within the limits of the home circle. 

 They were far from insignificant, however. A 

 writer recently suggested that these may possibly have 

 gained for puss the veneration she received from the 

 ancient Egyptians.! At any rate, they "were 

 believed in, not so many years ago, even in England. 

 A whitlow on the finger could be cured by putting it 

 for a quarter of an hour in a cat's ear. Or, if you 

 suffered from epilepsy, all you had to do was to take 

 three drops of blood, obtained from a vein under a 

 cat's tail, in a glass of water, and you would be 

 healed. The burnt ashes of a black cat's head were 



ew Royal Cyclopaedia" (embracing " every 

 notice in ' Chambers's Cyclopaedia,' the 



* Howard's "Nev 

 article worthy of 



' Encyclopxdia Britannica,' and every other dictionary of 

 science in the English or French languages, and all the 

 valuable new discoveries in the ' Philosophical Transactions,' " 

 &c), London, 1790, vol. i., p. 398. 



•J- "Evening Standard," 19th March, 1890. 



