220 PLINlV NATUKAL HISTORY. [Book XX. 



Among other vegetables, tKat country produces one very 

 similar to the staphylinos, and known to some persons as 

 "gingidion," 89 only that it is smaller than the staphylinos and 

 more bitter, though it has just the same properties. Eaten 

 either raw or boiled, it is very beneficial to the stomach, as it 

 entirely absorbs all humours with which it may happen to be 

 surcharged. 



CHAP. 17. THE SKIRRET: ELEVEN REMEDIES. 



The wild 90 skirret, too, is very similar to the cultivated kind, 91 

 and is productive of similar effects. It sharpens 92 the stomach, 

 and, taken with vinegar flavoured with silphium, or with 

 pepper and hydromel, or else with garum, it promotes the 

 appetite. According to Opion, it is a diuretic, and acts as 

 an aphrodisiac. 93 Diocles is also of the same opinion ; in ad- 

 dition to which, he says that it possesses cordial virtues for 

 convalescents, and is extremely beneficial after frequent vo- 

 mitings. 



Heraclides has prescribed it against the effects of mercury, 94 

 and for occasional impotence, as also generally for patients 

 when convalescent. Hicesius says that skirrets would appear 

 to be prejudicial 95 to the stomach, because no one is able to eat 

 three of them following ; still, however, he looks upon them as 

 beneficial to patients who are just resuming the use of wine. 

 The juice of the cultivated skirret, taken in goats' -milk, arrests 

 looseness of the stomach. 



89 The Caucus visnaga of Linnaeus, the Daucus gingidium of Sprengel, 

 the Visnagha, or Bisnagha of other botanists. It is also known as the 

 "wild carrot," or "French carrot." 



90 Or " erratic." 91 See B. xix. c. 28. 



92 The root and seed, Fee observes, really are stimulants : there is no 

 perceptible difference between the wild and cultivated plants. For sil- 

 phium, see B. xix. c. 15. 



93 Fee thinks that it may be so in a slight degree. 



94 Pliny often speaks of persons having swallowed quicksilver, but never 

 lets us know under what circumstances. As Fee remarks, it could not be 

 accidentally ; nor yet, on the other hand, could it have been done purposely, 

 with the object of committing suicide, it not being an active poison. He 

 concludes that it must have been taken medicinally, and that part of it 

 becoming absorbed in the system, other remedies were resorted to, to coun- 

 teract its noxious effects. 



y5 " Inutile," and not "utile," is evidently the correct reading here. 



