406 



NATURAL HISTORY OF ARABIA. 



in the serpent, which had a most ingenious method of 

 preserving it from the song of the charmer. The distinc- 

 tion of sex was also ascribed to it ; the females threw out 

 their radiance, while the males appeared within like bril- 

 liant and burning stars.* 



It was customary with the Arabian physicians, during 



* The historian De Thou mentions a marvellous carbuncle that 

 was brought by an Eastern merchant to Bologna. Among its sur- 

 prising properties, he states, " that being most impatient of the 

 earth, ir it was confined it would force its way, and immediately fly 

 aloft. Certain shape it had none, for its figure was inconstant, and 

 momentarily changing ; and though at a distance it was beautiful 

 to the eye, it would not suifer itself to be handled with impunity, 

 but hurt those who obstinately struggled with it, as many persons, 

 before many spectators, experienced. If by chance any part of it 

 was broken off, for it was not very hard, it became nothing less." 

 ThuanuS) lib. viii. ix. Besides the power of charming against 

 spells, some of them were believed to have the virtue of rendering 

 their possessor invisible or invulnerable, of enabling him to see 

 through rocks, and to discover hidden treasures. Of their medicinal 

 properties, we are told that the amethyst could remove the effects 

 of intoxication ; " for being bound on the navel, it restrains the va- 

 pours of the wine, and so dissolves the inebriety." The borax or 

 crapondinus was reckoned of unfailing efficacy in poisons. It was 

 said to be extracted from a dead toad, and described as of a black 

 or dun colour, with a cerulean glow, having in the middle the si- 

 militude of an eye. The kinocteus was employed to cast out de- 

 vils ; and the corvina, a stone of a reddish colour, found in crows' 

 nests, was supposed to make boiled or addled eggs fresh and pro- 

 lific ; besides having the virtue " to increase riches, bestow honours, 

 and foretell many future events." The alectoria, a stone of a darkish 

 crystalline colour, was said to be found in the intestines of capons 

 that had lived seven years. Its size was no bigger than a bean ; 

 but its qualities are represented as of a very potent and miscellane- 

 ous nature. " It could render the person who carried it invisible ; 

 being held in the mouth it allays thirst, and therefore is proper for 

 wrestlers; it makes a wife agreeable to her husband; bestows 

 honours, and preserves those already acquired ; it frees such as are 

 bewitched ; it renders a man eloquent, constant, and amiable ; it 

 helps to regain a lost kingdom and acquire a foreign one." Mir- 

 rour of Stones. " In the countrey called Panten or Tathalamasin, 

 there be canes, called cassan, which overspread the earth like 

 grasse, and out of every knot of them spring foorth certaine branches, 

 which are continued upon the ground almost for the space of a mile. 

 In the sayd canes there are found certaine stones, one of which stones 

 whosoevercarryeth about with him cannot be wounded with any 

 yron ; and by the vertue of these stones, the people aforesaid doe 

 for the most part triumph both on sea and land." Otloncnx in 

 Hakluyt. This evidently refers to the Tabasheer, a siliceous 

 substance found in the joints of the bamboo, and to which great 

 Tirtues are attributed in India. 



