BOOK XXII. XV. 35-xvi. 38 



praises, maintaining that either boiled or preserved 

 it is a most useful food for the trachea, eough, 

 bowel catarrh, the stomach, superficial abscesses, 

 parotid swellings and chilblains, that with oil it is 

 sudorific, boiled with shell-fish a laxative, that with 

 barley-water it clears the chest and promotes 

 menstruation, and that mixed with salt it arrests 

 creeping sores. For the juice too a use is found. 

 An extract appHed to the forehead checks bleeding 

 at the nose ; a draught is diuretic, breaks up stone 

 in the bladder, and used as a gargle reduces the 

 uvula. The seed should be gathered at harvest 

 time, that of Alexandria being most prized. For 

 all these purposes, though the milder and tender 

 nettles are efficacious, the vvell known wild variety is 

 particularly so, and it has this further merit, when 

 taken in wine, of removing leprous sores from the 

 face. We are told that should an animal resist 

 conception, its parts should be rubbed with a nettle. 



XVl. That species of nettle which I have called'' bend-veuu 

 iammm (dead-nettle), a very mild kmd with leaves rdanis. 

 that do not sting, cures with a sprinkHng of salt 

 contusions, bruises, burns, scrofulous sores, tumours, 

 gouty pains and wounds. The middle of the leaf is 

 white, and cures erysipelas. Certain of our countiy- 

 men have distinguished nettles by their season, 

 stating that the disease is cured if the root of the 

 autumn nettle is used as an amulet for tertian ague,* 

 provided that when this root is dug up the names of 

 the patients be uttered, and it be said for what man 

 it is taken up and who his parents are ; the same 

 method is effective in quartan agues. The same 

 authorities add that the root of the nettle, with salt 

 added, extracts bodies embedded in the flesh, that 



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