170 PLIGHT'S NATURAL HISTORY. [Book XXVI. 



that the belly should have to be indebted to the aid of medicine 

 in the very highest degree ! 



Scordotis, 23 fresh-gathered and beaten up, in doses of one 

 drachma, with wine, arrests flux of the bowels ; an effect 

 equally produced by a decoction of it taken in drink. Pole- 

 monia, 24 too, is given in wine for dysentery, or two fingers' 

 length of root of verbascum, 25 in water ; seed of nyruphsea 

 heraclia, 26 in wine ; the upper root of xiphion, 27 in doses of one 

 drachma, in vinegar ; seed of plantago, beaten up in wine ; 

 plantago itself boiled in vinegar, or else a pottage of alica 28 

 mixed with the juice of the plant; plantago boiled with 

 lentils ; plantago dried and powdered, and sprinkled in drink, 

 with parched poppies pounded ; juice of plantago, used as an 

 injection, or taken in drink ; or be tony taken in wine heated 

 with a red-hot iron. For cceliac affections, betony is taken in 

 astringent wine, or iberis is applied topically, as already 29 

 stated. For tenesmus, root of nymphaea heraclia is taken in 

 wine, or else psyllion 30 in water, or a decoction of root of 

 acoron. 31 Juice of aizotim 32 arrests diarrhoea and dysentery, and 

 expels round tape-worm. Eoot of symphytum, 83 taken in wine, 

 arrests diarrhoea and dysentery, and daucus 34 has a similar 

 effect. Leaves of aizoiim 35 beaten up in wine, and dried 

 alcea 36 powdered and taken in wine, are curative of griping 

 pains in the bowels. 



CHAP. 29. THE ASTRAGALUS: six REMEDIES. 



Astragalus 37 is the name of a plant which has long leaves, 

 with numerous incisions, and running aslant near the root. 

 The stems are three or four in number, and covered with leaves : 

 the flower is like that of the hyacinth, and the roots are red, 

 hairy, matted, and remarkably hard. It grows on stony local- 



23 See B. xxv. c. 27. 24 See B. xxv. c. 28. 



25 See B. xxv. c. 73. 26 See B. xxv. c. 37. 



27 See B. xxv. c. 89. 28 See B. xviii. c. 29. 



29 In B. xxv. c. 84. 30 See B. xxv. c. 90. 



31 See B. xxv. c. 100. 32 See B. xxv. c. 102. 



33 See B. xxvii. c. 24. 34 See B. xxv. c. 84. 



35 See Note 32 above. S6 See B. xxvii. c. 6. 



37 Sprengel identifies it with the Phaca Baetica, Spanish bastard vetch ; 

 but the flowers of that plant, as Fee remarks, are yellow. He considers 

 it to be the Lathyrus tuberosus of Linnaeus, the Pease earth-nut. Littre 

 gives the Orobus sessilifolius of 3ibthorp. 



