DIVI BOTANICI. 31 



there are facts which support the belief that the flesh of Vipers was 

 freely administered as an effectual remedy for the leprous, scorbutic, 

 scrofulous and similar affections resulting from a degenerate consti- 

 tution. Antonius Musa had recourse methodically to the same expe- 

 dient, with astonishing success in the treatment of Ulcers which were 

 deemed incurable : " that renowned physitian," says Pliny,* " having 

 certain patients in cvre vnder his hand, for svch he prescribed them 

 to eat Vipers' flesh, and wonderfull it was how soon he healed them 

 cleane by that means.' At Rome among an inquisitive people, this 

 method would naturally produce the effect of an extrordinary innova- 

 tion ; but, with the physician to whom it was peculiar, it must have 

 emanated from his profound reflection on the experience of those 

 barbarous tribes who regale themselves with the flesh of Vipers as 

 an exquisite aliment. By its proper qualities, combined with the nu- 

 trition of fibrous structure, it exerts invigorating influences on the 

 animal economy : it quickens the circulation of blood and the ner- 

 vous energy, purifies the secretions, increases perspiration, and thus 

 improves or renovates the constitution : so thought the doctors, of 

 old. 



This practice of Musa's was resumed by Galenf and Aretaeus, 

 about two hundred years afterwards ; and, to very recent times, it 

 has been in use under various modifications. Nearly cotemporary 

 with him, was Craterus, an Athenian physician, who, according to a 



• Holland's Plinivs' Natural Historie, the thirtieth Book, chapter xii. ; 

 voll. ii. p. 394. 



f There is an amusing if not edifying natural and medical history of the 

 Viper, with illustrations from ancient and modern authorities in the " His- 

 tory of Four-footed Beasts and Serpents ; interwoven with a curious variety 

 of historical narrations out of the scriptures, fathers, philosophers, physicians 

 and poets ; collected out of the writings of Conrad Gesner and others, by 

 Edward Topsel ; folio, London, 1658; p. 799 — 810. In the volume of his 

 immense Natural History, which contains his " Serpentum el Draconum His- 

 torte libri duo, folio, Bononits, 1640," Aldrovandi has a comprehensive chapter 

 on the Viper ; and in this, he treats of the Reptile's various names, syno- 

 nymes and their etymology, kinds and diversities, figure and description, 

 physionomy and anatomy, nature and propagation, sympathy and antipa- 

 thy ; the situations it haunts; its food and temperament ; methods of dis- 

 lodging and capturing it ; peculiarity of its poison and the symptoms it pro- 

 duces, with the remedies; treatment of cattle bitten by the viper; precau- 

 tions against its venom ; its epithets and appellations ; moral drawn from 

 its habits; proverbs and miracles connected with its history; its use in 

 hieroglyphicks, coins, emblems and symbols; its employment in " phrenos- 

 chemes ;" its monstrosities; its figurative representations; and its uses as 

 food and physic, and in the composition of drugs : p. 108—167. 



