400 PLINY'S NATURAL HISTORY. [Book XXII. 



allaying hunger and thirst : hence it is that some authors 

 have given it the name of adipsos," 62 and have prescribed it 

 for dropsical patients, to allay thirst. It is for this reason, 

 too, that it is chewed as a stomatic, 63 and that the powder of it 

 is often sprinkled on ulcerous sores of the mouth and films on 

 the eyes : it heals, too, excrescences 65 of the bladder, pains m 

 the kidneys, condylomata, 66 and ulcerous sores of the genitals. 

 Some persons have given it in potions for quartan fevers, the 

 doses being two drachmae, mixed with pepper in one heinina 

 of water. Chewed, and applied to wounds, it arrests haemorr- 

 hage : 67 some authors have asserted, also, that it expels calculi 

 of the bladder. 



CHAP. 12. (10.) TWO VARIETIES OF THE TRIBTJLTJS ; TWELVE 



REMEDIES. 



Of the two 69 kinds of tribulus, the one is a garden plant, 

 the other grows in rivers only. There is a juice extracted from 

 them which is employed for diseases of the eyes, it being of a 

 cool and refreshing nature, and, consequently, useful for in- 

 flammations and abscesses. Used with honey, this juice is 

 curative of spontaneous ulcerations, those of the mouth in par- 

 ticular ; it is good also for affections of the tonsils. Taken in 

 a potion, it breaks calculi of the bladder. 



The Thracians who dwell on the banks of the river Strymon 

 feed their horses 69 on the leaves of the tribulus, and employ the 

 kernels as an article of food, making of them a very agreeable 

 kind of bread, which acts astringently 70 upon the bowels. The 



62 The Greek for " without thirst," 



63 Or "mouth medicine." Beyond being a bechic, or cough-medicine, 

 it has no medicinal properties whatever. 



64 "Pterygiis." The word " pterygia" has been previously used as 

 meaning a sort of hang-nail, or, perhaps, whitlow. 



es " Scabiem." 



66 Swellings of the anus more particularly. 



67 It has in reality no such effect. 



63 Probably the Fagonia Cretica and the Trapa natans of Linnaeus. See 

 B. xxi. c. 58. The first, Fee remarks, is a native of Candia, the ancient 

 Crete, and a stranger to the climates of Greece and Italy. This may ac- 

 count for Pliny calling it a garden plant. * 



69 This is said, Fee remarks, in reference to the Trapa natans, the seec 

 of which is rich in fecula, and very nutritious. 



70 " Contrahat ventrem." It would not act, Fee says, as an astringentj 



