86 LITERATURE OF THE ARABS. 



diseases, and the third of luxations, together with 

 some miscellaneous particulars. * 



Abulcasis is the only ancient writer on anatomy 

 that has described the instruments used in each par- 

 ticular operation. To him we owe the invention 

 of the pro^ang, an elastic rod tipped with sponge, 

 for dislodgmg extraneous substances from the gullet. 

 Another instrument of his own, was that for ope- 

 rating in fistula lachrj'malis, which he has explained, 

 as also the needle used by the oriental surgeons for 

 cataract. The knife, which he calls alnessil, and 

 used in the section of a vein, as distinct from punc- 

 ture, is by some presumed to be our common lancet 

 — a term which the French borrowed from the an- 

 cient Gauls- The myrtle and olive knives, so called 

 from resembling in shape the leaves of these plants, 

 were employed for blood-letting by incision. For 

 opening veins in the forehead, use was made of the 

 fosserium, said to resemble the phl^me for bleeding 

 cattle, and which required percussion to make it 

 penetrate the skin. We jearn"?rom Casiri, that 

 among the Escurial manuscripts there is a treatise 

 in the Cufic character, which contains a collection 

 of plates of surgical instruments. 



Botany, as subsidiary to medicine, was cultivated 

 by the Arabs with considerable success. This sci- 

 ence they advanced far beyond the state in which it 

 had been left by Dioscorides, who flourished about 

 the commencement of the Christian era. His herbal 

 they enriched by the addition of 2000 plants ; and 

 their knowledge of the vegetable world enabled 

 them to insert in their pharmacopoeias several ' 

 remedies which had been unknown to the Greeks. 

 Rhazes, Ali Abbas, and Avicenna are names that 

 adorn the annals of this elegant and useful study ; 

 but the most distinguished of all the Arabian bota- 

 nists was Ibn al Beithar, a native of Malaga. In his 

 zeal for herborizing, he travelled over every part of 

 Europe, Africa, and Asia ; inspected and analyzed 

 every thing that was rare, curious, or valuable in the 



