BOOK XXVI. xLviii. 75-77 



XLVIII. Agavic taken in drink, the dose being Splmic 

 three oboli in one cyathus of old vrine, is good for '™" **' 

 disorders of the spleen, as is the root in honey wine 

 of all kinds of panaces, but best of all is teucria, dried 

 and taken in drink by boihng down to one hemina * 

 a handful of it with three heminae of vinegar. In 

 vinegar it is also used as a Hniment, or, if that cannot 

 be borne, in figs or water. Polemonia is taken in 

 wine, or a drachma of betony in three cyathi of 

 oxymel, or aristolochia as used for snake bite. 

 Argemonia, taken in food on seven consecutive days, 

 is said to reduce the spleen, and so are two oboli of 

 agaric in oxymel. It is reduced also by the root of 

 nymphaea heracHa taken in wine or by itself. Ciss- 

 anthemus, if a drachma is taken twice daily in two 

 cyathi of white wine for forty days, is said to carry off 

 the spleen gradually in the urine. Useful too is a 

 decoction of hyssop with fig, or of the root of lonchitis 

 before it sheds its seed, while a decoction of root of 

 peucedanum is good for both spleen and kidneys. 

 The spleen is reduced by the juice of acoron taken 

 by the mouth — the roots are very useful for trouble 

 of the hypochondria and groin * — by the seed of 

 clymenus taken in drink for thirty days, the dose 

 being a denarius by weight in white wine, by 

 powdered betony taken in honey and squill vinegar, 

 and by root of lonchitis in water. Teucrium <^ is used 

 as Uniment, Ukewise scordium with wax, or agaric 

 with powdered fenugreek. 



* It seems most natural to mend the grammar of this 

 passage by making praecordiis . . . radices a parenthesis, a 

 favourite trick of Pliny, and understanding consumit or utile 

 before clymeni. 



"^ Notice both forms, teucria and teucrium, in the same 

 chapter. 



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VOL. VII. M 



