CHINA. 427 



of Unicorns', Elks', and Deers' horns, and their effect on epilepsy 

 when taken as medicine.* 



In 1593, a committee of Doctors of Medicine of Augsburg, 

 after a careful examination of a specimen of the very rare drug, 

 the Unicorn's horn (Narwhal's tusk in this instance) in order to 

 confirm their conclusion that the horn was real Monoceros horn 

 and not a forgery, gave an infusion of some of it to a dog 

 poisoned with arsenic, and on the recovery of the animal were 

 thoroughly convinced of the authenticity of the specimen. Their 

 report, duly signed, commences, " Quin etiam visum est nobis, 

 ad experientiam, rerum magistram tanquam KpiT^piov descen- 

 dere."| In the work in which this experiment is recorded, 

 follows an account of another, in which a dram of nux vomica 

 was rendered harmless to a dog, by the action of 12 grains 

 of the precious horn, whilst an exactly similar dog died in half 

 an hour, from the same dose without the antidote. 



My friend, Dr. J. F. Payne, has pointed out to me, that Uni- 

 corn's horn, and the skull of a man who has died by a violent 

 death, appear as medicines in the Official Pharmacopoeia of the 

 College of Physicians of London, of 1678. Unicorn's horn, 

 human fat and human skulls, dogs' dung, toads, vipers and 

 worms, are retained in the same Pharmacopoeia for 1724. A 

 Committee revised the Pharmacopoeia in 1742. They still 

 retained in the list, centipedes, vipers, and lizards. The use of 

 grated human skull as medicine, by unihstructed persons, sur- 

 vived in England as late as 1858 at least. j 



The idea that PJiinoceros horn acted as an antidote to 

 poisons, was ancient in India. No doubt hence arose the belief 

 that the Narwhal ivory, supposed to be that of the Unicorn, 

 which beast was in reality the PJiinoceros, had the same proper- 

 ties. The story no doubt travelled together with that of the 

 animal. Drinking-cups, elaborately carved out of PJiinoceros 

 horn, were used in the East, and were supposed to detect or 



* Sir T. Browne's Works, edited by Wilkin, Vol. II, p. 503. London, 



Pickering, 1836. . . 



f « Museum Wormianum sen Historia Rerum Rariorum, pp.280----. 



Olao Worm, Med. Doct. Amstelodami, 1655. 



X Rev. T. F. Thiselton Dyer, " English Folk Lore. London, 18/8. 



