CHAPTER XV. 



DISEASES AND CURES. 



[SEVERAL passages may have been noticed in the preceding pages, calculated to shew the 

 ignorance which prevailed in Aubrey's time on medical subjects, and the absurd remedies which 

 were adopted for the cure of diseases. In the present chapter this topic is further illustrated. It 

 contains a series of recipes of the rudest and most unscientific character, amongst which the following 

 are the only parts suited to this publication. Aubrey describes in the manuscript an instrument made 

 of whalebone, to be thrust down the throat into the stomach, so as to act as an emetic. He states that 

 this contrivance was invented by " his counsel learned hi the law," Judge Rumsey ; and proceeds to 

 quote several pages, with references to its advantages, from a work by W. Rumsey, of Gray's Inn, 

 Esq., entitled, " Organon Salutis, an instrument to cleanse the stomach : with new experiments on 

 Tobacco and Coffee." The work quoted seems to have been popular in its day, for there were three 

 editions of it published. (London, 1657, 1659, 1664, 12mo.) J. B.] 



THE inscription over the chapell dore of St. Giles, juxta Wilton, sc. " 1624. This hospital! of St. 

 Giles was re-edified by John Towgood, Maior of Wilton, and his brethren, adopted patrons thereof, 

 by the gift of Queen Adelicia, wife unto King Henry the first." This Adelicia was a leper. She 

 had a windowe and a dore from her lodgeing into the chanccll of the chapell, whence she heard 

 prayers. She lieth buried under a plain marble gravestone ; the brasse whereof (the figure and 

 inscription) was remaining about 1684. Poore people told me that the faire was anciently kept here. 



At Maiden Bradley, a maiden infected with the leprosie founded a house for maidens that were 

 lepers. [See a similar statement in Camden's "Britannia," and Gough's comments thereon. J. B.] 



Ex Registro. Anno Domini 1582, May 4, the plague began in Kington St. Michaell, and lasted 

 the 6th of August following; 13 died of it, most of them being of the family of the Kington's ; which 

 name was then common, as appeared by the register, but in 1672 quite extinct. 



[The words " here the plague began," and " here the plague rested," appear in the parish register 

 of Kington St. Michael, under the dates mentioned by Aubrey. Eight of the thirteen persons who 

 died during its continuance were of the family of the Kingtons. J. B.] 



May-dewe is a very great dissolvent of many tilings with the sunne, that will not be dissolved any 

 other way ; which putts me hi mind of the rationality of the method used by Win. Gore of Clapton, 

 Esq). for his gout; which was, to walke in the dewe with his shoes pounced ; he found benefit by it. 

 I told Mr. Wm. Mullens, of Shoe Lane, Cliirurgion, tliis story ; and he sayd this was the very 

 method and way of curing that was used in Oliver Cromwell, Protectour. [See " Observations and 

 Experiments upon May-Dew," by Thomas Henshaw, in Philosophical Transactions, 1665. Abbr. i. 

 13 J. B.] 



For the gowte. Take the leaves of the wild vine (bryony, vitis alba) ; bruise them and boyle 

 them, and apply it to the place grieved, lapd in a colewort-leafe. This cured an old man of 84 yeares 

 of age, at Kilmanton, in 1669, and he was well since, to June 1670 : which account I had from Mr. 

 Francis Potter, the rector there. 



L 



