ASAFCETIDA. 47 
C. Valerius and M. Herennius brought thirty pounds weight 
of it to Rome from Cyrene, and that it was set abroad to 
show to all comers; and that Cesar, at the beginning of 
the civil war, took forth openly from the chamber of the city, 
with other treasure both of gold and silyer, 111 pounds of 
the best Laser.” 
He also records the mode in which it originated in the fol- 
lowing words:— The most renowned Greek authors have left 
in writing, that seven years before the foundation of the city 
Cyrene, which was built 143 years after our city of Rome, 
this plant Laserpitium was engendered in one instant by 
occasion of a certain thick, gross, and black shower of rain, in 
manner of pitch, which suddenly fell and drenched the ground. 
“That the herb will not choose to be cultivated, but dies if 
taken from barren soil. 
“That cattle are first scoured by it, and then, after rid of 
humour, grow fat, and in flesh taste most delicate.” ‘ 
Geoffroy, Millar, and F ourcroy find a resemblance between 
the Cyrenaica and Asafcetida, and consider that it is without 
doubt the Z:Agiv of Dioscorides, the Laserpitium of Pliny, 
the Asafcetida disgunensis of Kempfer, and the Ferula Asafce- 
tida of Linneus. Captain Beechey, a modern traveller, found 
in the region of Cyrene a plant three feet high, resembling 
the hemlock, which he supposed the same as the ancient 
2rgiv. It has been a matter of uncertainty from what source 
the Asafcetida was procured, till within the last few years ; 
the Ferula Persica having been given and figured as the plant 
from which the gum-resin proceeded, since Dr. Hope’s cultiva- 
tion of that plant in the Botanical Garden of Edinburgh. Dr. 
Hugh Falconer, however, in his late researches in Central Asia, 
has set the question at rest, and proves that the true Ferula is 
that which was described so accurately by Kempfer. 
Asafcetida has been used extensively in allopathic medicine. 
In spasmodic and convulsive diséases. Hysteria, Infantine 
convulsions, Epilepsy. Pure spasmodic asthma. Hooping- 
