[Footnote E: The previous arguments can of course have no weight in our day, but this tendency to imitate others is as true now as then. Evidently, if the Darwinian theory holds good, a matter of three centuries is not sufficient to cause any perceptible diminution in the strength of original instinct inherited from the ape.] [Footnote F: Time has taken upon itself to upset this argument; for though the novelty may certainly be said to have worn off, the habit itself is more firmly rooted than ever.] [Footnote G: This shows that so late as the 17th century the influence of the planets on the body was an article of firm belief, even amongst the learned. The following recipes may be of interest to the reader. They are taken from a manuscript volume which belonged to and was probably written by Sir John Floyer, physician to King Charles II., who practised at Lichfield, in the Cathedral library of which city the volume now is:--"An antidote to ye plague: take a cock chicken and pull off ye feathers from ye tayle till ye rump bee bare; you hold ye bare of ye same upon ye sore, and ye chicken will gape and labour for life, and in ye end will dye. Then take another and do ye like, and so another still as they dye, till one lives, for then ye venome is drawne out. The last chicken will live and ye patient will mend very speedily." "Madness in a dog: 'Pega, Tega, Sega, Docemena Mega.' These words written, and ye paper rowl'd up and given to a dog, or anything that is mad, cure him."] [Footnote H: Or Camisado. A night attack on horseback, wherein the attacking party put their shirts on over their armour, in order to recognise each other in the darkness. Charles II. attempted a Camisado at Worcester, which did not succeed, owing to treachery.] [Footnote I: Our royal author would no doubt have been astonished to see English officers smoking on the field of battle, which I am told is now a common occurrence.] [Footnote J: It was not dreamt of in James's philosophy, that the price of tobacco might fall to 5s. 6d. and less a pound.] [Footnote K: They still say in Scotland, "To feel a smell."] End of Project Gutenberg's A Counter-Blaste to Tobacco, by King James I.