BOOK XXII. XXVI. 53-xxvii. 55 



blossom ; they are no taller than a span, with small 

 leaves like those of rue, and vvith blossom " that is 

 white or apple-yellow or purple. It is gathered in 

 spring on thin soils or near foot-paths, and put by for 

 niaking chaplets. At the same season plivsicians also 

 make up into lozenges the pounded leaves, as well as 

 the blossom and the root. All three are mixed and 

 given in doses of one drachma for the bites of every 

 kind of snake. Taken in drink they bring away 

 the dead foetus, are emmenagogues and diuretic, 

 as well as good for stone, flatulence,'' aifections of 

 the Uver, for excessive secretion of bile and for fistula 

 of the eye ; chewed it heals running sores. Of all 

 these kinds the most efficacious for stone in the 

 bladder is that which has a purple flower, the leaves 

 and stem of which are of a rather larger size. Sonie 

 jieople give the name eranthemis exchisively to this 

 variety. 



XXVII. Those who think that the lotus is only a igt,,., ond 

 tree can be refuted even by the authority of Homer,*^ *'* vaneties. 

 who among the plants that grow up to serve the 

 pleasure of the gods mentions the lotus first. Its 

 leaves with honey cause to disappear scars on the 

 eyes, fihiis on the eyes and argema. 



to do so, but wlien the language of two authoritiea is so 

 strikingly similar, too great or too many differences are sus- 

 picious. The worst difficulty is the strange assignment of 

 white, yellow and purple to leaves. But Warmington points 

 out that if, in Dioscorides (see critical note), we take dv9vWi,ov 

 to mean the yelkw central disk of the flower, and 4>vXXapLa as 

 outer ray-petals of the flower, the Greek description fits 

 chamomile. 



*> Probably Pliny forgot to write inlita, " applied locally," 

 here. 



' See Iliad XIV. 347. 



