410 PLINt's NATTJBAL HISTOEY. [Book XXIX. 
the snail, it is attached to the patient, the smaller snails being 
pounded and applied to the forehead. "Wool-grease, too, is 
used for a similar purpose ; the bones of a vulture's head, worn 
as an amulet ; or the brains of that bird, mixed with oil and 
cedar resin, and applied to the head and introduced into the j 
nostrils. The brains of a crow or owlet, are boiled and taken 
with the food : or a cock is put into a coop, and kept without 
food a day and a night, the patient submitting to a similar 
abstinence, and attaching to his head some feathers plucked 
from the neck or the comb of the fowl. The ashes, too, of a 
weasel are applied in the form of a liniment ; a twig is taken 
from a kite's nest, and laid beneath the patient's pillow ; or a 
mouse's skin is burnt, and the ashes applied with vinegar : 
sometimes, also, the small bone is extracted from the head of 
a snail that has been found between two cart ruts, and after 
being passed through a gold ring, with a piece of ivory, is 
attached to the patient in a piece of dog's skin ; a remedy 
well known to most persons, and always used with success.^ 
For fractures of the cranium, cobwebs are applied, with oil 
and vinegar ; the application never coming away till a cure 
has been effected. Cobwebs are good, too, for stopping the 
bleeding of wounds made in shaving. Discharges of blood 
from the brain are arrested by applying the blood of a goose 
or duck, or the grease of those birds with oil of roses. The 
head of a snail cut off with a reed, while feeding in the 
morning, at full moon more particularly, is attached to the 
head in a linen cloth, with an old thrum, for the cure of head- 
ache ; or else a liniment is made of it, and applied with white 
wax to the forehead. Dogs' hairs are worn also, attached to 
the forehead in a cloth. 
CHAP. 37. KEMEDIES FOE AFFECTIONS OF THE EYELIDS. 
A crow's brains, taken with the food, they say, will make 
the eyelashes grow ; or else wool-grease, applied with warmed 
myrrh, by the aid of a fine probe. A similar result is pro- 
mised by using the following preparation: burnt flies and 
ashes of mouse-dung are mixed in equal quantities, to the 
amount of half a denarius in the whole ; two sixths of a dena- 
8* He does not appear to state this on hearsay only ! 
Cobwebs are still used for this purpose, as also the fur fram articles 
made of beaver. Ajasson mentions English taffeta. 
