"Environ The man who meddles with cold iron." His hands were severely cut, insomuch that some four or five days afterwards, when he called on Sir Kenelm, with his wounds plastered and bandaged up, he said his surgeons feared the supervention of gangrene. At Sir Kenelm's request, he gave the knight a garter which was stained with his blood. Sir Kenelm took it, and without saying what he was about to do, dipped it in a solution of his powder of vitriol. Instantly the sufferer started. "What ails you?" cried Sir Kenelm. "I know not what ails me," was the answer; "but I find that I feel no more pain. Methinks that a pleasing kind of freshnesse, as it were a cold napkin, did spread over my hand, which hath taken away the inflammation that tormented me before." "Since that you feel," rejoined Sir Kenelm, "already so good an effect of my medicament, I advise you to cast away all your plaisters. Only keep the wound clean, and in moderate temper 'twixt heat and cold." Mr. Howel went away, sounding the praises of his physician; and the Duke of Buckingham, hearing what had taken place, hastened to Sir Kenelm's house to talk about it. The Duke and Knight dined together; when, after dinner, the latter, to show his guest the wondrous power of his powder, took the garter out of the solution, and dried it before the fire. Scarcely was it dry, when Mr. Howel's servant ran in to say that his master's hand was worse than ever--burning hot, as if "it were betwixt coales of fire." The messenger was dismissed with the assurance that ere he reached home his master would be comfortable again. On the man retiring, Sir Kenelm put the garter back into the solution--the result of which was instant relief to Mr. Howel. In six days the wounds were entirely healed. This remarkable case occurred in London, during the reign of James the First. "King James," says Sir Kenelm, "required a punctuall information of what had passed touching this cure; and, after it was done and perfected, his Majesty would needs know of me how it was done--having drolled with me first (which he could do with a very good grace) about a magician and sorcerer." On the promise of inviolable secrecy, Sir Kenelm communicated the secret to his Majesty; "whereupon his Majesty made sundry proofs, whence he received singular satisfaction."