BOOK XX. xxxiv. 86-89 



women's purgings. The stalk indeed eaten raw 

 brings out the dead unborn baby. Apollodorus 

 holds that its seed should be eaten, or its juice drunk, 

 to counteract poisonous fungi ; PhiHstion prescribes 

 it to be taken in goat's milk, with salt and honey, for 

 opisthotonic tetanus. I hnd that gout has been 

 cured by eating cabbage and drinking cabbage water ; 

 the latter has been given with the addition of salt for 

 heart-burn also" and epilepsy, and with white wine for 

 a period of forty days for diseases of the spleen, as 

 well as for jaundice and phrenitis. For hoarseness 

 he prescribes the juice of the raw cabbage as a gargle 

 or drink, but for hiccoughs he recommends it to be 

 taken in vinegar with coriander, dill, honey and pep- 

 per. An application of it is good for flatulence of the 

 stomach, snake bite and putrid sores of long standing ; 

 if 3'ou hke, the mere water may be used with barley 

 meal, the juice in vinegar or with fenugreek. In this 

 way some apply it to aching joints and gouty Hmbs. 

 An apphcation of it relieves epinyctis* and every 

 other kind of spreading eruption, and also sudden 

 dimness of sight ; the last too is benefited by eating 

 it in vinegar, but for bruises and other hvid marks the 

 appUcation should be of cabbage alone, for leprous 

 sores and itch, of cabbage in vinegar with a ball 

 of alum. AppHed in this way it also prevents the 

 hair from falling out. Epicharmus says that a local 

 application of cabbage is very good for troubles of 

 the testes and genitals, that cabbage and crushed 

 beans are more efficacious still, and Hkewise for con- 

 vulsions ; that with rue it reheves high fever and 

 stomach troubles, and with the seed of rue it brings 



See p. viii. 



53 



