BOOK XXII. XXXII. 72-xxxiii. 75 



unpleasant odour from armpits and thighs, and that 

 the hair grows again more curly if the scalp be first 

 shaved and then rubbed with this root ; Simos says 

 that a draught of the decoction in wine removes 

 stone of the kidneys. Hippocrates holds that for 

 attacks of the spleen it shoukl be given in the form 

 of seed. When beasts of burden too have sores or 

 itch-scab, an application of the root or of a decoction 

 of it restores the hair that has been lost. The root 

 keeps away mice, which also die if their holes be 

 closed up with it. 



XXXIII. Some have thought that Hesiod means naHmon 

 halimon when he speaks of asphodel, but this view I 

 think is wrong. For halimon is a separate plant witli 

 a name of its own, which itself has been the cause 

 of no small confusion among our authorities. For 

 some describe it as a thick shrub, pale, free from 

 thorns, with the leaves of an olive, only softer, 

 saying that these are boiled to be used as food, and 

 that the root, taken in hydromel, the dose being a 

 drachma by weight, is good for coHc, and also for 

 ruptures and convulsions. Others have said that it 

 is a salty vegetable of the sea-shore " (hence its name), 

 with long, rounded leaves, and highly esteemed as a 

 food. They add that of the two kinds, wild and 

 cultivated, both are good, taken with bread, for 

 dysentery, even with ulceration, and also, in vinegar, 

 for the stomach ; that it is appUed raw to chronic 

 ulcers, soothes the smart * of recent wounds and of 

 sprained ankles, as well as pains of the bladder ; that 

 the wild kind has thinner leaves, but greater effects 

 when used for the same purposes as the other, and 

 in healing itch in both man and beast ; moreover 

 that the skin becomes clearer and the teeth whiter, 



345 



