788 
Notes  on  Ancient  Medicine. 
(  Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
\       Nov.,  1921. 
tus  said,  "That  stones  can  work  any  wonders,  let  them  believe  that 
list;  no  man  shall  perswade  me:  for  my  part,  I  have  found  by  ex- 
perience that  there  is  no  vertue  in  them." 
Potable  gold,  mercury,  arsenic,  and  antimony  were  used  to  a  cer- 
tain extent,  and  Matthiolus  holds  "No  man  can  be  an  excellent  phy- 
sician that  hath  not  some  skill  in  chymisticall  distillations,  and  that 
chronick  diseases  can  hardly  be  cured  without  minerall  medicines." 
Regarding  antimony,  a  case  is  cited  of  a  parish  priest  in  Prague,  Bo- 
hemia, who  "was  so  far  gone  with  melancholy  that  he  doted  and 
spake  he  knew  not  what;  but.  after  he  had  taken  twelve  grains  of 
stibium  (as  I  saw  myself  and  can  witness,  for  I  was  called  to  see 
this  miraculous  accident)  he  was  purged  of  a  deal  of  black  choler 
*  *  *  yet  it  did  him  so  much  good  that  the  next  day  he  was  per- 
fectly cured." 
Among  the  Romans  who  were  high  livers  emetics  were  very 
popular  and  the  taking  of  an  emetic  was  frequently  the  prelude  to  a 
banquet. 
Amulets  and  charms  were  much  in  vogue.  Regarding  the  topaz 
it  was  said,  "If  it  be  either  taken  in  a  potion  or  carried  about,  it  will 
increase  wisdom,  expell  fear/"  Cardan  brags  that  he  hath  cured 
many  men  with  it  which,  "when  they  laid  by  the  stone  were  as  mad 
again  as  ever  they  were  at  first." 
"In  the  belly  (gizzard  I)  of  the  swallow,"  says  Burton,  "there 
is  a  stone  found,  called  chelidonius  which,  if  it  be  lapped  in  a  fair 
cloth,  and  tied  to  the  right  arm,  will  cure  lunaticks,  mad  men,  make 
them  amiable  and  merry." 
The  carbuncle  and  coral  were  believed  to  "drive  away  childish 
fears,  divels,  overcome  sorrows,  and  hung  about  the  neck,  repress 
troublesome  dreams."  Ruess  ascribes  the  same  qualities  to  the  dia- 
mond. 
Classified  under  precious  stones  are  "the  bone  in  the  stag's 
heart,"  a  "moncerot's  horn,"  and  the  "Bezoar's  stone."  This  latter 
is  "found  in  the  belly  of  a  little  beast  in  the  East  Indies"  and  "Rho- 
deus  saith  he  saw  two  of  these  beasts  alive  in  the  castle  of  the  Lord 
of  Vitry  at  Coubert." 
Among  amulets,  the  following  were  guaranteed  to  give  satisfac- 
tion: "A  ring  made  of  the  hoofe  of  an  asses  right  fore  foot,  car- 
ried about."  The  carrying  of  a  spider  in  a  nutshell  wrapped  in  silk 
was  thought  "to  keep  off  ague." 
