506 
pliny's NATXJEAL HISTOET. [Book XXXI. 
all effusions of wit. All the amenities, in fact, of life, supreme 
hilarity, and relaxation from toil, can find no word in our lan- 
guage to characterize them better than this. Even in the 
very honours, too, that are bestowed upon successful warfare, 
salt plays its part, and from it, our word salarium"^'' is derived. 
That salt was held in high esteem by the ancients, is evident 
from the Salarian Way, so named from the fact that, by 
agreement, the Sabini carried all their salt by that road. King 
Ancus Martins gave six hundred modii of salt as a largess 
to the people, and was the first to establish salt-works. Yarro 
also informs ns, that the ancients used salt by way of a relish- 
ing sauce ; and we know, from an old proverb,^^ that it was 
the practice with them to eat salt with their bread. But it is 
in our sacred rites more particularly, that its high importance 
is to be recognized, no offering ever being made unaccompanied 
by the salted cake.^^ 
CHAP. 42. — FLOWER OF SALT ! TWENTY REMEDIES. SALSUGO *. 
TWO REMEDIES. 
That which mainly distinguishes the produce of salt-works, 
in respect of its purity, is a sort of efflorescence,^^ which forms 
the lightest and whitest part of salt. The name flower of 
salt is given, also, to a substance of an. entirely different 
character, more humid by nature, and of a red or saffron co- 
lour ; a kind of "rust of salt,'' as it were, with an unpleasant 
smell like that of garum, and differing therein not only from 
froth of salt,^^ but from salt itself. This substance is found 
2' Literally, " salt money" — argentum being understood. The term 
was originally applied to the pay of the generals and military tribunes. 
Hence our word " salary/' 
28 Beginning at the Colline Gate. 29 u Jn congiario." 
3^ Most probably He cannot earn salt to his bread," or something 
similar, like our saying, He cannot earn salt to his porridge." The two 
Greek proverbs given by Dalechamps do not appear to the purpose. 
31 Mola salsa." ^2 "Favillam." 
33 Schroder thinks that in what Pliny says of Flos Salts, he can find 
the martial sal-ammoniac flowers of our chemists, [the double chloride of 
ammonium and iron], or the- so-called flores sales ammoniaci martiales. — 
It is certain that what Dioscorides and Pliny call Jlos salisy has never yet 
been defined. The most ingenious conjecture was that of Cordus, who 
thought that it might be Sperma ceti ; but though I should prefer this 
opinion to that of Schroder, I must confess that, on the grounds adduced 
by Matthioli and Conrad Gesner, it has too much against it to be admitted 
as truth." — Beckmann, Hist. Inv. Vol. II. p. 493. Bohn's Ed, 
3* Salt collected from the foam on the sea-shore. 
