154 NATURAL HISTORY. 



tently : and so do the dregs, or powder of blood, 

 severed from the water, and dried. 



981. It hath been practised, to make white swal 

 lows, by anointing of the eggs with oil. 1 Which effect 



~O 



may be produced by the stopping of the pores of the 

 shell, and making the juice, that putteth forth the 

 feathers afterwards, more penurious. And it may 

 be, the anointing of the eggs will be as effectual as 

 the anointing of the body ; of which vide the ex 

 periment 93. 



982. It is reported that the white of an egg, or 

 blood, mingled with salt-water, doth gather the salt- 

 ness, and maketh the water sweeter. This may be 

 by adhesion ; as in the sixth experiment of clarifica 

 tion : it may be also, that blood, and the white of 

 an egg, (which is the matter of a living creature,) 

 have some sympathy with salt : for all life hath a 

 sympathy with salt. We see that salt laid to a cut 

 finger healeth it ; so as it seemeth salt draweth blood, 

 as well as blood draweth salt. 



983. It hath been anciently received that the sea- 

 hare hath an antipathy with the lungs, (if it cometh 

 near the body,) and erodeth them. Whereof the cause 

 is conceived to be, a quality it hath of heating the 

 breath and spirits ; as cantharides have upon the wa 

 tery parts of the body, as urine and hydropical water. 

 And it is a good rule, that whatsoever hath an opera 

 tion upon certain kinds of matters, that, in man s body, 

 worketh most upon those parts wherein that kind of 

 matter aboundeth. 



984. Generally, that which is dead, or corrupted, or 

 excerned, hath antipathy with the same thing when it 



1 Cardan, De Rerum Varietate, xvi. 90. p. 311. 



