TELA ARANE^. 



various opinions among medical men as to the modus operandi of the 

 cobweb, some attributing it entirely to the control of the imagination, while 

 others view it in a different light, and entertain favorable opinions of it 

 as a powerful therapeutic agent. 



"Properties and Uses. — Febrifuge, sedative, and antispasmodic. Said 

 to have been found useful in the cure of intermittents when all other agents 

 have failed; also recommended in various nervous and spasmodic diseases, 

 for the purpose of controlling and tranquilizing irregular nervous action, 

 exhilarating the spirits, and disposing to sleep, without any narcotic action 

 on the brain, as in periodical headache, hysteria, asthma, chorea, hectic 

 fever, and nervous irritations attended with morbid vigilance and irregular 

 muscular action. Dose, is five or six grains, every three or four hours, 

 in the form of pill. Externally, it is asserted to have been advantageously 

 employed as a styptic in wounds, and a healing application in superficial 

 ulcers. I 



"The small silver-headed spider, given in a dough pill, is said to be a 

 prompt and efficacious cure for ague." — King's Eclectic Dispensatory, 1852. 



Mr. Thomas J. Graham, London, in his Modern Domestic Medi- 

 cine states: 



"The cobweb of cellars, barns, and stables, is a valuable remedy for 

 ague (see Ague); and it also allays diseased irritability, and calms irrita- 

 tion, both of body and mind, often in a surprising manner. If it operates 

 well, when the pulse is quick, frequent, irregular, and irritated, it becomes 

 by its influence, slow, calm, and regular. Some American physicians who 

 have taken it, say it produces a calm and delightful state of feeling, suc- 

 ceeded by a disposition to sleep. It will thus often tranquilize much better 

 than opium or henbane, and its soothing properties point it out as a valu- 

 able palliative in the advanced stage of consumption — in asthma — in chronic 

 hysterics, and in other spasmodic complaints. 



"Cobweb is an old and popular remedy for the present fever, and it is 

 as efficacious as popular. Some writers speak of it as a mere dirty object 

 of vulgar superstition; but they are much mistaken, for ten grains of cob- 

 web given twice or thrice before the expected time of each paroxysm, and 

 continued in this way for three or four days, or longer, as circumstances 

 indicate, will be found a powerful means of putting an immediate and 

 permanent stop to the recurrence of the ague. The patient should, however, 

 be prepared for its use by the previous employment of emetic, and purga- 

 tive, as prescribed before beginning the bark. The only valuable cobweb 

 is that produced by the black spider, which inhabits cellars, barns, and 

 stables. It is sometimes very eflfectual in arresting the progress of the 

 febrile symptoms in every other kind of fever. Dr. Jackson (Dr. Jackson 

 on Fever, p. 241), a physician of acknowledged 'accuracy, and great expe- 

 rience in the treatment of fevers, observes, that it is more abrupt and effi- 

 cient in its operation than bark, or arsenic, or any other remedy employed 

 for the purpose, with which he is acquainted." — Graham's Modern Domestic 

 Medicine, 1858. 



The foregoing summarizes the therapeutic progress of cobweb, 

 from the day of Dioscorides to and into the last century. The works 

 of a multitude of authors might have been cited, each being about 

 the same as the others. In it all, excepting in Homeopathic therapy 

 and pharmacy, which are to be credited with much literature coh.- 

 cerning spiders and their webs, as well as with explicit differentiation 

 as regards the species to be used, it will be observed that (even by 

 Dr. Jackson), the cobweb, itself, in substance, was used, in the form 

 of a pill, or powder. 



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