290 PLINY'S NATURAL HISTORY. [Book XXVIII. 



is quite sufficient to spit into that organ, to make it come out. 

 Among the counter-charms too, are reckoned, the practice of 

 spitting into the urine the moment it is voided, of spitting into 

 the shoe of the right foot hefore putting it on, and of spitting 

 while a person is passing a place in which he has incurred any 

 kind of peril. 



Marcion of Smyrna, who has written a work on the virtues 

 of simples, informs us that the sea scolopendra will burst 

 asunder if spit upon ; and that the same is the case with bram- 

 ble-frogs, 84 arid other kinds of frogs. Opilius says that serpents 

 will do the same, if a person spits into their open mouth ; and 

 Salpe tells us, that when any part of the body is asleep, the 

 numbness may be got rid of by the person spitting into his 

 lap, or touching the upper eyelid with his spittle. If we are 

 ready to give faith to such statements as these, we must be- 

 lieve also in the efficacy of the following practices : upon the 

 entrance of a stranger, or when a person looks at an infant 

 while asleep, it is usual for the nurse to spit three times upon 

 the ground ; and this, although infants are under the especial 

 guardianship of the god Fascinus, 85 the protector, not of infants 

 only, but of generals as well, and a divinity whose worship is 

 entrusted to the Yestal virgins, and forms part of the Roman 

 rites. It is the image of this divinity that is attached beneath 

 the triumphant car of the victorious general, protecting him, 

 like some attendant physician, against the effects of envy ; 86 

 while, at the same time, equally salutary is the advice of the 

 tongue, which warns him to be wise in time, 87 that so Fortune 



84 "Rubetas." See B. viii. c. 48, B. xi. cc. 19, 76, and 116, and B. 

 xxv. c. 76. 



85 This divinity was identical with Mutinus or Tutinrs, and was 

 worshipped under the form of a phallus, the male generative organ. As 

 the guardian of infants, his peculiar form is still unconsciously represented 

 in the shape of the coral bauble with which infants are aided in cutting 

 their teeth. 



b6 Hence the expression " prsefiscini," " Be it said without envy," sup- 

 posed to avert the effects of the envious eye, fascination, or enchantment. 



7 " Resipiscere " seems to be a preferable reading to "respicere," adopted 

 by Sillig. This passage is evidently in a very corrupt state ; but it is most 

 probable that reference is made to the attendant who stood behind the 

 general in his triumph, and reminded him that he was a man or, according 

 to Tzetzes, bade him look behind him. Pliny speaks of a servant attending 

 the triumphant general, with a golden crown, in B. xxxiii. c. 4. liardouiii 

 attempts another explanation, but a very confused and improbable one. 



