170 Pliny's katfsal histoet. [Book XXVI. 
that tlie belly should have to be indebted to the aid of medicine 
in the very highest degree ! 
Scordotis/^ fresh-gathered and beaten up, in doses of one 
drachma, with wine, arrests flux of the bowels ; an effect 
equally produced by a decoction of it taken in drink. Pole- 
monia,^* too,, is given in wine for dysentery, or two fingers' 
length of root of verbascum,^^ in water ; seed of nymphsea 
heraclia,^^ in wine ; the upper root of xiphion,^''' in doses of one 
drachma, in vinegar ; seed of plantago, beaten up in wine ; 
plantago itself boiled in vinegar, or else a pottage of alica^^ 
mixed with the juice of the plant ; plantago boiled with 
lentils ; plantago dried and powdered, and sprinkled in drink, 
with parched poppies pounded ; juice of plantago, used as an 
injection, or taken in drink ; or be tony taken in wine heated 
with a red-hot iron. For coeliac affections, betony is taken in 
astringent wine, or iberis is applied topically, as already^^ 
stated. For tenesmus, root of nymphsea heraclia is taken in 
wine, or else psyllion^^ in water, or a decoction of root of 
acoron.^^ Juice of aizoiim^^ arrests diarrhoea and dysentery, and 
expels round tape-worm. Eoot of symphytum,^^ taken in wine, 
arrests diarrhoea and dysentery, and daucus^* has a similar 
effect. Leaves of aizoiim^^ beaten up in wine, and dried 
alcea^^ powdered and taken in wine, are curative of griping 
pains in the bowels. 
CHAP. 29. THE ASTEAGALIJS: SIX EEMEDIES. 
Astragalus^' is the name of a plant which has long leaves, 
with numerous incisions, and running aslant near the root. 
The stems are three or four in number, and covered with leaves : 
the flower is like that of the hyacinth, and the roots are red, 
hairy, matted, and remarkably hard. It grows on stony local- 
23 See B. XXV. c. 27. 24 gee B. xxv. c. 28. 
25 See B. xxv. c. 73 . 26 See B. xxv. c. 37. 
27 See B. xxv. c. 89. 28 See B. xviii. c. 29. 
29 In B. xxv. c. 84. so See B. xxv. c. 90. 
31 See B. XXV. c. 100. 32 See B. xxv. c. 102. 
33 See B. xxvii. c. 24. See B. xxv. c. 84. 
35 See Note 32 above. 36 See B. xxvii. c. 6. 
37 Sprengel identifies it with the Phaca Baetica, Spanish bastard vetch ; 
but the flowers of that plant, as Fee remarks, are yellow. He considers 
it to be the Lathyrus tuberosus of Linnjeus, the Pease earth-nut. Littre 
gives the Orobus sessilifolius of Sibthorp. 
