44 THE LORE OF THE HONEY-BEE 
some of the quaintest notions are to be found, 
We are told that honey, well rubbed into the 
scalp night and morning, is a sovereign remedy 
for baldness, and if it was mixed with a few dead 
bees and a little old comb well pounded, it was 
still more efficacious. Dead bees, dried and re- 
duced to a powder, form a principal ingredient in 
all sorts of nostrums of the time. This powder, 
mixed with water and drunk every morning, is 
recommended as an unfailing cleanser to the 
system, And if the heads of a large number of 
bees are collected, burned, and the ashes com- 
pounded with a little honey, it makes an excellent 
salve for all sorts of eye disorders. 
There was a famous preparation called Oxymel, 
which was in great vogue in medieval times. It 
seems to have been nothing more than a mixture 
of honey, water, and vinegar; but it was accre- 
dited with extraordinary virtues. It was an in- 
fallible cure for sciatica, gout, and kindred ail- 
ments; and one writer also tells us that it was 
‘good to gargarize with in a Squinancy.” 
But honey and dead bees were not the only 
products of the hives which were pressed into 
medical service. Wax also was believed to have 
exceptional curative powers in all sorts of human 
ills. It had the faculty of curing ulcers, and “ if 
the quantity of a Pease in Wax be swallowed 
down of Nurces, it doth dissolve the Milke curdled 
in the paps.” It was also used as an embrocation 
