AND ENGLISH PHYSICIAN ENLARGED. 



17 



Government and virtues J] It is a notable 

 plant of Saturn : if you view diligently its 

 effects by sympathy and antipathy, you 

 may easily perceive a reason of them, as 

 also why barley bread is so unwholesome 

 for melancholy people. Barley in all the 

 parts and compositions thereof (except 

 malt) is more cooling than wheat, and a lit- 

 tle cleansing : And all the preparations 

 thereof, as barley-water and other things 

 made thereof, give great nourishment to 

 persons troubled with fevers, agues, and 

 heats in the stomach : A poultice made of 

 barley meal or flour boiled in vinegar and 

 honey, and a few dry figs put into them, 

 dissolves all imposthumes, and assuages 

 inflammations, being thereto applied,. And 

 being boiled with melilot and camomile- 

 flowers, and some linseed, fenugreek, and 

 rue in powder, and applied warm, it eases 

 pains in side and stomach, and windiness 

 of the spleen. The meal of barley and 

 fleawort boiled in water, and made a poul- 

 tice with honey and oil of lilies applied 

 warm, cures swellings under the ears, 

 throat, neck, and such like ; and a plaister 

 made thereof with tar, with sharp vinegar 

 into a poultice, and laid on hot, helps the 

 leprosy ; being boiled in red wine with 

 pomegranate rinds and myrtles, stays the 

 lask or other flux of the belly ; boiled with 

 vinegar and quince, it eases the pains 

 of the gout ; barley-flour, white salt, honey, 

 and vinegar mingled together, takes away 

 the itch speedily and certainly. The water 

 distilled from the green barley in the end of 

 May, is very good for those that have de- 

 fluctions of humours fallen into their eyes, 

 and eases the pain, being dropped into 

 them ; or white bread steeped therein, and 

 bound on the eyes, does the same. 



GARDEN BAZIL, OR SWEET BAZIL. 



DescriptJ] The greater of Ordinary Bazil 

 rises up usually with one upright stalk, 

 diversly branching forth on all sides, with 



two leaves at every joint, which are some- 

 what broad and round, yet pointed, of a 

 pale green colour, but fresh ; a little 

 snipped about the edges, and of astrongheal- 

 thy scent. The flowers are small and white, 

 and standing at the tops of the branches, 

 with two small leaves at the joints, in some 

 places green, in others brown, after which 

 come black seed. The root perishes at 

 the approach of Winter, and therefore must 

 be new sown every year. 



Placed] It grows in gardens. 



TimeJ] It must be sowed late, and flowers 

 in the heart of Summer, being a very tender 

 plant. 



Government andvirtues ] This is the herb 

 which all authors are together by the ears 

 about, and rail at one another(like lawyers ) 

 Galen and Dioscorides hold it not fit to be 

 taken inwardly; and Chrysippus rails at it 

 with downright Billingsgate rhetoric; Pliny, 

 and the Arabian physicians defend it. 



For my own part, I presently found 

 that speech true : 



Non nostrium inter nos tantas commoner e lifes 



And away to Dr. Reason went I, who told 

 me it was an herb of Mars, and under the 

 Scorpion, and perhaps therefore called 

 Basilicon ; and it is no marvel if it carry 

 a kind of virulent quality with it. Being 

 applied to the place bitten by venomous 

 beasts, or stung by a wasp or hornet, it 

 speedily draws the poison to it ; Every like 

 draws Ms like. Mizaldus affirms, that, 

 being laid to rot in horse-dung, it will breed 

 venomous beasts. Hilarius, a French phy- 

 sician, affirms upon his own knowledge, 

 that an acquaintance of his, by common 

 smelling to it, had a scorpion bred in his 

 brain. Something is the matter ; this hei b 

 and rue will not grow together, no, nor near 

 one another : and we know rue is as great 

 an enemy to poison as any that grows. 



To conclude ; It expels both birth and 

 after-birth ; and as it helps the deficiency 



