286 
pliny'o katueal histoky. 
[Book XXVIII. 
to be a preventive of baldness and of head-ache, to cut the hair 
on the seventeenth and twenty-ninth*^ days of the moon. 
A rural law obsersred in most of the farms of Italy, forbids^^ 
w^omen to twirl their distaffs, or even to carry them uncovered, 
while walking in the public roads ; it being a thing so pre- 
judicial to all hopes and anticipations, those of a good harvest^^ 
in particular. It is not so long ago, that M. Servilius 
Nonianus, the principal citizen at Eome,^^ being apprehensive 
of ophthalmia, had a paper, with the two Greek letters P and 
A^^ written upon it, wrapped in linen and attached to his neck, 
before he would venture to name the malady, and before any 
other person had spoken to him about it. Mucianus, too, who 
was thrice consul, following a similar observance, carried about 
him a living fly, wrapped in a piece of white linen ; and it 
was strongly asserted, by both of them, that to the use of these 
expedients they owed their preservation from ophthalmia. 
There are in existence, also^ certain charms against hail- storms, 
diseases of various kinds, and burns, some of which have been 
proved, by actual experience, to be effectual; but so great is the 
diversity of opinion upon them, that T am precluded by a 
feeling of extreme diffidence from entering into further par- 
ticulars, and must therefore leave each to form his own con- 
clusions as he may feel inclined. 
CHAP. 6. (3.) — TWO HUNDEED AND TWENTY-SIX OBSERVATIONS 
ON EEMEDIES DERIVED FROM MAN. EIGHT REMEDIES DERIVED 
EROM CHILDREN. 
"We have already, when speaking of the singular peculiar- 
ities of various nations, made mention of certain men of a 
monstrous nature, whose gaze is endowed with powers of 
fascination ; and we have also described properties bt^longing to 
numerous animals, which it would be superfluous here to repeat. 
In some men, the whole of the body is endowed with remark- 
able properties, as in those families, for instance, which are a 
terror to serpents ; it being in their power to cure persons 
when stung, either by the touch or by a slight suction of the 
wound. To this class belong the Psylii, the Marsi, and the people 
Twenty-eighth, according to our reckoning. 
6^ Probably from their ominous resemblance to the Parcae, or Fates, with 
their spindles. ^'Frugum." 
" Princeps civitatis «^ '*Iiho'' and "Alpha." 
63 In B. vii. c. 2. 
