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 efificacious. 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 mediaeval 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 



