352 NATURAL HISTORY. 



We leave the description of plants, and their 

 virtues, to herbals, and other like books of natural 



history, wherein men s diligence hath been great, 

 even to curiosity : for our experiments are only such 

 as do ever ascend a degree to the deriving of causes, 

 and extracting of axioms, which we are not ignorant 

 but that some both of the ancient and modern 

 writers have also laboured ; but their causes and 

 axioms are so full of imagination, and so infected 

 with the old received theories, as they are mere in- 

 quinations of experience, and concoct it not. 



Experiment solitary touching healing of wounds. 



677. It hath been observed by some of the 

 ancients, that skins, especially of rams, newly pulled 

 off, and applied to the wounds of stripes, do keep 

 them from swelling and exulccrating, and likewise 

 heal them and close them up ; and that the whites 

 of eggs do the same. The cause is a temperate con 

 glutination, for both bodies are clammy and viscous, 

 and do bridle the deflux of humours to the hurts, 

 without penning them in too much. 



Experiment solitary touching fat diffused in flesh. 



678. You may turn almost all flesh into a fatty 

 substance, if you take flesh and cut it into pieces, and 

 put the pieces into a glass covered with parchment, 

 and so let the glass stand six or seven hours in boil 

 ing water. It may be an experiment of profit for 

 making of fat or grease for many uses ; but then it 

 must be of such flesh as is not edible ; as horses, 

 dogs, bears, foxes, badgers, &c. 



