Chap. 7.] KEMEDIES DERIVED FROM THE MOLE. 429 



person -whom I remember seeing myself when young. He 

 tells us that the plant cynocephalia, 47 known in Egypt as 

 "osiritis," is useful for divination, and is a preservative against 

 all the malpractices of magic, but that if a person takes it out 

 of the ground entire, he will die upon the spot. He asserts, 

 also, that he himself had raised the spirits 48 of the dead, in 

 order to make enquiry of Homer in reference to his native 

 country and his parents ; but he does not dare, he tells us, 

 disclose the answer he received. 



CHAP. 7. (3.) OPINIONS OF THE MAGICIANS RELATIVE TO THE 

 MOLE. FIVE REMEDIES DERIVED FROM IT. 



Let the following stand as a remarkable proof of the frivo- 

 lous nature of the magic art. Of all animals it is the mole 

 that the magicians admire most ! a creature that has been 

 stamped with condemnation by Nature in so many ways ; 

 doomed as it is to perpetual blindness, 49 and adding to this 

 darkness a life of gloom in the depths of the earth, and a state 

 more nearly resembling that of the dead and buried. There 

 is no animal in the entrails of which they put such implicit 

 faith, no animal, they think, better suited for the rites of reli- 

 gion ; so much so, indeed, that if a person swallows the heart of 

 a mole, fresh from the body and still palpitating, he will receive 

 the gift of divination, they assure us, and a foreknowledge of 

 future events. Tooth-ache, they assert, may be cured by 

 taking the tooth of a live mole, and attaching it to the body. 

 As to other statements of theirs relative to this animal, we 

 shall draw attention to them on the fitting occasions, and shall 

 only add here that one of the most probable of all their asser- 

 tions is, that the mole neutralizes the bite of the shrew-mouse; 

 seeing that, as already 50 stated, the very earth even that is 

 found in the rut of a cart-wheel, acts as a remedy in such a 



47 See B. xxv. c. 80. 



48 Like the assertions of the famous impostor of the close of the last 

 century, Count Cagliostro. 



49 A mistake, of course ; and one for which there is little excuse, as its 

 eyes are easily perceptible. It is not improbable, however, that it was an 

 impression with the ancients that its sight is impeded by the horny covering 

 of its eyes. 50 In B. xxix. c. 27. 



