BOOK VII. V. 5-8 



fodder causes emaciation, and emaciation causes the 

 scab. This disease can be diagnosed in the following 6 

 way when it begins to creep in : the sheep either 

 gnaw the part aflfected, or strike it with horn or hoof, 

 or rub it against a tree or wipe it upon the walls. 

 When you see any sheep acting in these ways, it will 

 be best to take hold of the animal and draw its wool 

 apart, for there is a rough skin underneath it and a 

 kind of crust. This must be treated at the first possi- 

 ble opportunity, lest it infect the whole flock, since, 

 while other cattle are readily attacked by contagious 

 disease, sheep are particularly so. There are, how- 7 

 ever, several remedies, which we will on this account 

 enumerate, not because it is necessary to use them 

 all at one time but in order that, since some of them 

 are not to be met with in certain regions, one out of 

 many may be found in order to effect a cure, first, 

 the preparation which I explained just now can be 

 used with advantage, namely, a mixture in equal 

 portions of crushed white hellebore with lees of 

 wine and dregs of oil and the juice of boiled lupine. 

 The juice of green hemlock can also be used to remove 8 

 scabbiness ; this plant is cut in spring-time, when it 

 is already producing stalk but not seeds, and 

 crushed, and the juice is pressed out and stored in an 

 earthenware vessel, half a modius of dried salt being 

 mixed with two urnae of the liquid. Next the vessel 

 is sealed up and buried in a dung-pit and, after having 

 matured for a whole year in the heat of the dung, it 

 is taken out and the preparation is heated and 

 smeared over the part affected by scab after it has 

 been previously reduced to a state of soreness by 

 being rubbed with a rough potsherd or a piece of 



* promittitur »S^^^. 



267 



