Chap. 33.1 THE CABBAGE. 235 



the preceding odg, is useful for ruptures and spnsinodic con- 

 tractions, and relieves persons who are suffering from sperma- 

 torrhoea. 



CHAP. 32. SF.RIS, THREE VARIETIES OF IT : SEVEN EEMEDIE5 



BORROWED FROil IT. 



The vegetable, too, called " seris,"'- which bears a consi- 

 derable resemblance to the lettuce, consists of two kinds. The 

 wild, which is of a swarthy colour, and grows in summer, is 

 the best of the two ; tbe winter kind, which is whit^T tlian 

 the other, being inferior. They are both of ihera bitter, but 

 are extremely beneficial to the stomach, when distressed by 

 humours more particularly. Used as food ^^'ith vinegar, they 

 are cooling, and, employed as a liniment, they dispel other 

 humours besides those of the stomach. The roots of the wild 

 variety are eaten with polenta for the stomach : and in cardiac 

 diseases they are applied topically above the left breast. Boiled 

 in vinegar, all these vegetables are good for the gout, and for 

 patients troubled with spitting of blood or spermatorrhoea ; the 

 decoction being taken on alternate days. 



Petronius Diodotus, who has ^-ritten a medical Anthology,'^ 

 utterly condemns seris, and employs a multitude of arguments 

 to support his views : this opinion of his is opposed, however, 

 to that of all other writers on the subject. 



CHAP. 33. (9). THE cabbage: EIGHTT-SEVEX REMEDIES. Bl> 



CIPES MESTIOXED BY CATO. 



It would be too lengthy a task to enumerate all the praisi s 

 of the cabbage, more particularly as the physician Chrysippus 

 has devoted a whole volume to the subject, in which its vir- 

 tues are described in reference to each individual pai't of the 

 human body. Dieuches has done the same, and Pythagoras 

 too, in particular. Cato, too, has not been more sparing in its 

 praises than the others ; and it will be only right to examine 

 the opinions which he expresses in relation to it, if for no 

 other purpose tliau to learn what medicines the Eoman people 

 made use of for six hundred years. 



The most ancient Greek writers have distinguished three'* 

 varieties of the cabbage : the curly'^ cabbage, to which they 



'2 Tlie kind known as garden endive, the Cichorinm endina of Linnaeus. 

 ■3 " Anthologtiineua." "* See U. xix. c. 41. - ^^ '' Crispaiu." 



