364 Museum News. 



be, or how far they had extended their range along the bank, 

 I had not time to ascertain, but was satisfied they had be- 

 come well established. — C. S. Carter, Louth. 



A Hon ater L. as a Wart Curer. — The Avion or Black Slug 

 has from time immemorial been believed to possess great and 

 wonderful healing properties, and its use in various forms are 

 said to have a beneficial effect upon many ailments. 



Until comparatively recent times the Slug held a notable 

 place in 'Medicine, and formerly occupied a place in the Materia 

 Medic a. 



The marvellous faith and belief in its efficacy as a specific 

 for the removal of warts was formerly widely diffused in our 

 own and other countries, and faith in the potency of the remedy 

 probably still lingers in the more secluded rural districts, while 

 the method of using the slug for this purpose being practically 

 similar in widely distant parts, points to a very ancient and 

 common origin of the belief in its efficacy. 



The rubbing of the wart with the body of the Slug, described 

 by Mr. Petty,* has for its basis the belief that the wart and the 

 Slug become thus mutually impregnated with each others 

 nature, so that when the Slug is afterwards securely impaled on 

 a thorn, and left to slowly die and waste away, the wart being 

 now, by the mingling of their humours, akin to the dying Slug, 

 is sympathetically affected, and disappears also. It may be 

 added that if the wart does not disappear simultaneouslv with 

 the desiccation of the body of the Slug, the patient has not 

 placed implicit faith in the remedy, or has failed to observe the 

 necessary secrecy ! — Jno. W. Taylor. 



The people of Maidstone are to be congratulated upon the excellent 

 museum in their midst, a portion of which is kept in the Chillingham Manor 

 House — a building which is a museum in itself. ]Mr. Allchin, the Curator, 

 has recently issued an admirable handbook, in which the building and its 

 contents are described and well illustrated (142 pp., i/-). The collection 

 is particularly rich in geological and archaeological treasures, the British, 

 Roman and mediaeval relics being unusually representative, as might be 

 expected from so interesting an area as that round Maidstone. The 

 natural history department is also very well described, and includes one 

 of the finest collections of bees in the country ; largely as a result of the 

 efforts of one of the staff. We are glad to see that an improved and en- 

 larged edition of the Guide is promised, and in this the few misprints in 

 the present edition will doubtless be corrected. Amongst these ' Concert,' 

 (p. 119) should be ' Consort ; and ' Woodcrinus ' (plate XI.) should be 

 ' Woodocrinus.' Plate XL, by the way, contains an illustration of an 

 excellent slab of crinoid ' heads ' from Richmond, Yorkshire. 



* ' Naturalist,' August, p. ^o^. 



Naturalist, 



