PEDICULID^ — LICE. 319 



against the jaundice."^ As a specific against this disease, 

 Beaumont and Fletcher thus allude to them : 



Die of the jaundice, yet have the cure about you; lice, Large lice, 

 begot of your own dust and the heat of the brick kilns ^ 



Lice were also made use of in eases of Atropliy, and 

 Dioscorides says they were employed in suppressions of 

 urine, being introduced into the canal of the urethra.'^ 



In the Gentleman's Magazine for 1746, there is a curious 

 letter on *'a certain creature, of rare and extraordinary 

 qualities" — a Louse, containing many humorous observa- 

 tions on this " lover of the human race." and concluding 

 with some queries as to its origin and pedigree. "Was it," 

 the writer asks, "created within the six days assigned by 

 Closes for the formation of all things ? If so, where was 

 its habitation ? We can hardly suppose that it was quar- 

 tered on Adam or his lady, the neatest, nicest pair (if we 

 believe John 3IiUon) that ever joyned hands. And yet, as 

 it disdained to graze the fields, or lick the dust for suste- 

 nance, where else could it have had its subsistence ?"* 



In a modern account of Scotland, written by an English 

 gentleman, and printed in the year 1670, we find the follow- 

 ing: " In that interval between Adam and Moses, when the 

 Scottish Chronicle commences, the country was then bap- 

 tized (and most think with the sign of the cross) by the 

 venerable name of Scotland, from Scota, the daughter of 

 Pharaoh, King of Egypt. Hence came the rise and name 

 of these present inhabitants, as their Chronicle informs us, 

 and is not to be doubted of, from divers considerable cir- 

 cumstances; the plagues of Egypt being entailed upon 

 them, that of Lice (being a judgment unrepealed) is an 

 ample testimony, these loving animals accompanied them 

 from Egypt, and remain with them to this day, never forsaking 

 them (but as rats leave a house) till they tumble into their 

 graves."^ 



Linnaeus, seemingly very anxious to become an apologist 

 for the Lice, gravely observes that they probably preserve 



1 Southey's Com. Place Bk., 4th S. p. 439. 



2 Thierry and Theod., A. v. Sc. 1. 



3 James's Med. Diet. 



* Gent. Mag., xvi. 534. 



5 Harleian MisceL, vii. 435. 



