132 MEALS MEDICINAL. 
“used no other physick than the Cabbage.” “Cato, the 
Censor, with his strong sense, and his hard-headedness, may 
probably be taken as the representative of the best household 
mediciner known to the Romans in their brave days of old. His 
system of therapeutics was as simple as that of Sangrado, only 
he used Cabbage instead of water. This homely vegetable was 
to Cato a veritable panacea; given internally, or applied 
externally, it was ‘ ad omnes res salubris.’ It cured constipation, 
and dysentery, headache, and lumbago; retention, and incon- 
tinence of urine ; pains in the liver, and affections of the heart, 
colic, toothache, gout, and deafness, insomnia, ophthalmia, 
gangrene, abscesses, and nasal polypi. It was as efficacious in 
pulmonary consumption as the modern Lacnanthes, as potent 
in cancer as violet leaves ; in short, Cato might have anticipated 
for the Cabbage a famous epitaph, transcribing it as ‘ Nihil 
tetigit quod non curavit.’”’ But the secret of his Cabbage cure 
lay in the mode of its administration, about which he made no 
mystery. For instance, “if one was afflicted with colic, take 
a Cabbage, and, after letting it simmer well in boiling water, 
strain thoroughly ; season with salt, cumin seed, oil, and wheat- 
flour ; then put it on the fire again, and let it simmer for a time, 
after which take it off to cool. Whilst drinking this potion 
every morning, during the course of treatment, let your principal 
food be Cabbage.’ In surgery, likewise, Cabbage was esteemed 
by Cato as “the sovran’st thing on earth for bruises, ulcers, 
abscesses, fistule, and dislocations.” ‘‘ An injection of Cabbage- 
water mixed with wine restored hearing to the deaf; whilst a 
strong decoction of Cabbage, if inhaled at intervals throughout 
three days, made polypi fall out of the nose, and destroyed the 
roots of the disease.” It should be said that other writers of 
repute have regarded this vegetable with much less favour. 
Burton, (Anatomy of Melancholy), in the chapter entitled ‘‘ Bad 
diet a cause of melancholy,” disallows for eating, among other 
herbs, especially Cabbage. ‘‘ It causeth troublesome dreams, and 
sends up black vapours to the brain.’’ Galen, too, of all herbs 
condemns Cabbage. ‘‘ Anime gravitatem facit”—‘‘ it brings 
heaviness to the soul.” And, as Charles Lamb slyly adds when 
writing on the “ Melancholy of Tailors ” : “ It is well known that 
this vegetable, Cabbage, has from the earliest periods which we 
can discover constituted almost the sole food of this extraordinary 
race of people.” John Evelyn (1695), long after Cato, whilst 
