Arnald was the first great representative of the school of Montpellier. He devoted much time to the study of chemicals, and was active in attempting to re-establish the teachings of Hippocrates and Galen. He was one of the first of a long line of alchemists who, for several succeeding centuries, expended so much time and energy in attempting to find the "elixir of life." The Arab discovery of alcohol first deluded him into the belief that the "elixir" had at last been found; but later he discarded it and made extensive experiments with brandy, employing it in the treatment of certain diseases--the first record of the administration of this liquor as a medicine. Arnald also revived the search for some anaesthetic that would produce insensibility to pain in surgical operations. This idea was not original with him, for since very early times physicians had attempted to discover such an anaesthetic, and even so early a writer as Herodotus tells how the Scythians, by inhalation of the vapors of some kind of hemp, produced complete insensibility. It may have been these writings that stimulated Arnald to search for such an anaesthetic. In a book usually credited to him, medicines are named and methods of administration described which will make the patient insensible to pain, so that "he may be cut and feel nothing, as though he were dead." For this purpose a mixture of opium, mandragora, and henbane is to be used. This mixture was held at the patient's nostrils much as ether and chloroform are administered by the modern surgeon. The method was modified by Hugo of Lucca (died in 1252 or 1268), who added certain other narcotics, such as hemlock, to the mixture, and boiled a new sponge in this decoction. After boiling for a certain time, this sponge was dried, and when wanted for use was dipped in hot water and applied to the nostrils. Just how frequently patients recovered from the administration of such a combination of powerful poisons does not appear, but the percentage of deaths must have been very high, as the practice was generally condemned. Insensibility could have been produced only by swallowing large quantities of the liquid, which dripped into the nose and mouth when the sponge was applied, and a lethal quantity might thus be swallowed. The method was revived, with various modifications, from time to time, but as often fell into disuse. As late as 1782 it was sometimes attempted, and in that year the King of Poland is said to have been completely anaesthetized and to have recovered, after a painless amputation had been performed by the surgeons.