Chap. 48.] SILPHIUM. 431 



is of opinion that mushrooms are good for the stomach. The 

 suilli are dried and strung upon a rush, as we see done with those 

 brought from Bithynia. They are employed as. a remedy for 

 the fluxes known as " rheumatismi," 44 and for excrescences of 

 the fundament, which they diminish and gradually consume. 

 They are used, also, for freckles and spots on women's faces. 

 A wash, too, is made of them, as is done with lead, 45 for mala- 

 dies of the eyes. Steeped in water, they are applied topically 

 to foul ulcers, eruptions of the head, and bites inflicted by 

 dogs. 



1 would here also give some general directions for the cook- 

 ing of mushrooms, as this is the only article of food that the 

 voluptuaries of the present day are in the habit of dressing 

 with their own hands, and so feeding upon it in anticipation, 

 being provided with amber-handled 46 knives and silver plates 

 and dishes for the purpose. Those fungi may be looked upon 

 as bad which become hard in cooking ; while those, on the other 

 hand, are comparatively innoxious, which admit of being tho- 

 roughly boiled, with the addition of some nitre. They will 

 be all the safer if they are boiled with some meat or the stalks 

 of pears : it is a very good plan, too, to eat pears directly after 

 thorn. Vinegar, too, being of a nature diametrically opposed 

 to them, neutralizes 47 their dangerous qualities. 



CHA.P. 48. SILPHIUM: SEVEN BEMEDIES. 



All these productions owe their origin to rain, 48 and by rain 

 is silphium produced. It originally came from Cyrense, as 

 already 4 * stated : at the present day, it is mostly imported from 

 Syria, the produce of which country, though better than that 

 of Media, is inferior to the Parthian kind. As already^ ob- 

 served, 50 the silphium of CyrenaB no longer exists. It is of 

 considerable use in medicine, the leaves of it being employed 

 to purge the uterus, and as an expellent of the dead foetus ; 

 for which purposes a decoction of them is made in white 



" Rheums, or catarrhs. 45 See B. xxxiv. c. 50. 



46 " Sucinis novaculis." This may possibly mean "knives of amber ;" 

 and it is not improbable that the use of amber may have been thought a 

 means of detecting the poisonous qualities of fungi. 



47 This, as Fee remarks, is the case. All kinds of fungi, too, it is said, 

 may be eaten with impunity, if first boiled in salt water. 



4 * In reality, rain only facilitates their developcment. 

 * 3 In B. xix. c. 15. " ^ In B. xix. c. 15. 



