Chap. 26.1 TEIIDIGRIS. 195 



unacquainted are they with the preparation of medicaments, 

 a thing that was formerly considered the most essential part 

 of their profession. ^^ At the present day, whenever they 

 happen to find a book of recipes, if they wish to make any 

 composition from these substances, or, in other words, to make 

 trial of the prescription at the expense of their unhappy 

 patients, they trust entirely to the druggists,^ who spoil 

 everything by their fraudulent adulterations. For this long 

 time past, they have even purchased their plasters and eye- 

 salves ready made, and the consequence is, that the spoiled or 

 adulterated wares in the druggists' shops are thus got rid of. 



Both lepis and flower of copper are calcined in shallow 

 earthen or brazen pans; after which they are washed, as 

 described above,- and employed for the same purposes ; in addi- 

 tion to which, they are used for excrescences in the nostrils and 

 in the anus, as also for dullness of the hearing, being forcibly 

 blown into the ears through a tube. Incorporated with meal, 

 they are applied to swellings of the uvula, and, with honey, to 

 swellings of the tonsils. The scales prepared from white 

 copper are much less efficacious than those from Cyprian 

 copper. Sometimes they first macerate the nails and cakes of 

 copper in a boy's urine ; and in some instances, they pound 

 the scales, when detached, and wash them, in rain water. 

 They are then given to dropsical patients, in doses of two 

 drachmas, with one semisextarius of honied wine : they are also 

 made into a liniment with fine flour. 



CHAP. 26. VEEDIGRIS; EIGHTEEN EEMEDIES. 



Verdigris^ is also applied to many purposes, and is prepared 



^^ Beckmann comments at some length on this passage ; Vol. I. p. 328. 

 Bohn^s Edition. 



^ " Seplasise." The di'uggists dwelHug in the Seplasia. See B.xxxiii. 

 c. 58. 



2 In Chapters 22 and 23, as applied to Cadmia and Cyprian copper, re- 

 spectively. — B. 



3 " iErugo." The researches of modern chemists have ascertained the 

 composition of verdigris to be a diacetete of copper; the sesquibasic 

 acetate and the triacetate are also to be considered as varieties of this 

 substance ; we have an exact analysis of these salts in the "Elements" of 

 the late Dr. Turner, the Sixth Edition, edited by Professor Liebig and Mr. 

 W. Turner, pp. 931, 2. Most of the processes described in this Chapter 

 are mentioned by Dioscorides. — B. ^Sse also Beckmann, Hist. Inv. Vol. I. 

 p. 171, ct seq.j Bohri's Edition. 



o 2 



