926 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol. XIX. 



Glusius^ in the year 1567. This work went through many editions, 

 and it is in the one of 1605 that we read the following account of the 

 " Coccus de Maldiva". ^ " This nut, and especially the kernel, are re- 

 commended by the inhabitants of those Islands CMaldive Islands) 

 as a remedy against poison. I have been told by many trustworthy 

 people that it proved useful in colic, paralysis, epilepsy, and other 

 nervous diseases, and that the sick become immune against other 

 diseases, if they drink water that has been kept in the shell for some 

 time, and to which has been added a piece of the kernel. But as I have 

 no personal experience I am not inclined to believe in these things. I 

 had no time to make experi nents and I prefer to use medicaments 

 whose virtues are known to me and shown by experience, as, eg., the 

 bezoar stone, theriac, and many other medicines, than new ones which 

 are less relijible, because I do not know whether I have to adscribe to 

 imagination only what people say about the beneficent effects of that 

 nut. If, however, in the course of time, some facts will be verified, I 

 shall not feel ashamed to change my opinion. The skin of the nut is 

 black and smoother than that of the common Cocoa-nut, mostly ovate 

 and not quite as round as the common nut. The kernel or inner pulj) 

 is hard and white when dry, sometimes slightly pallescent, full of 

 cracks and very porous. The dose of the kernel is about 10 grains, 

 taken in wine or water, according to the nature of the disease. 

 The nuts are sometimes very large, sometimes small but they aro 

 always found thrown upon the shore. There is, besides, the common 



* ClnsiuB, CaroluB (De le Clnse, Charles) was born at Antwerp in 1556 and died in 1609 

 Hie works are very numerous, for he not only published original descriptions of new plants, 

 bnt he translated into Latin works from the French, Spanish, and PortugBese, thus render- 

 ing a most important -service in the diflEusion of a knowledge of the plants that were known 

 in his day. Few men have suffered more in following a favourite pursuit than Clusius. He 

 has on this acco ant been called '* The Martyr of Botany". As early as hie twenty f urth 

 year, by excessive fatijrue he contracted a dropsical disease. At the age of thirty-nine he 

 broke hie right thigh during one of his botanical rambles, and a short time after his right 

 arm. Whilst at Vienna, he dislocated his left ankle, and eight years after this accident he 

 dislocated his right hip. For this he was treateil unskilfully, and ever after he was obliged 

 to use crutches for support. During bis exertions in the early part of his life he also con- 

 tracted a hernia, which troubled him 'o the end of his day?. Bat his bodily infiririties 

 never diminished his mental activity, and he continued teaching and writing to the very 

 last. 



^ " Aromatum et Simplicium aliquot medicament orum apnd Tndoa naacentinm Hiatoria 

 conBcripta a D. '-arcia ab florto, Proregis Indiae Medico" in •' Carol i Clusii Atrebatis 

 Exoticornm Libri Decern", pp. 190-192 (IGOf)). 



