in the contest eats this herb as a medicine. The _yçipo moroti_, and _bejuco de Guayaquil_, have the same property. The roots of the _urucuȳ_, _jurepeba_, _jaborandi_, &c. are highly conducive to excite perspiration, by which the poison is expelled. I do not deny the validity of these remedies, but, with the leave of physicians, ancient as well as modern, I still think nard root preferable to them all, for it has been the salvation of numbers, not only of men, but of beasts. As the cattle feed in the open air, day and night, every part of the year, they are not unfrequently bitten by serpents, scolopendras, and spiders. Blood dropping from the nostrils is the sign of a poisonous wound. Brandy mixed with nard root poured in time down their throats was of great use, but after the poison had diffused itself over all the members of animals we generally found medicine unavailing. CHAPTER XXXI. OF OTHER NOXIOUS INSECTS, AND THEIR REMEDIES. You might swear that Egypt, and the whole plague of insects with which divine vengeance afflicted that land, had removed into Paraguay; nay, you will find many here more mischievous and troublesome than Egypt ever beheld. I have always thought common house-flies, resembling ours in external appearance, more to be dreaded and shunned than serpents, scorpions, scolopendras, hairy spiders, &c. Do not imagine this to be an hyperbole: I declare it as my serious opinion. Swarms of these insects are always flying up and down. At home and abroad you will see yourself surrounded by these hungry little animals, which, though a hundred times repulsed, will return as often. They enter the ears of persons when they are asleep, and creeping to the interior of the head, lay great numbers of eggs, which breed quantities of worms; these insects hourly increase in number, and gnaw all the flesh and moisture in the head, so that delirium and final death are the inevitable consequence, unless a remedy be applied. I knew a Spaniard whose whole face together with the nostrils was consumed, the forepart of his head being made as hollow as a gourd by worms. One fly, which had crept into his nose whilst he slept, was the origin of the worms and of his misfortune. This is no rare occurrence. That worms are expelled by the application of tiger's fat you have already learnt from the twenty-second chapter of this history: but hear further. In the town of the Rosary, one of the Abipones swarmed with worms to a shocking degree; but these insects, unable to endure the tiger's fat which I applied to them, gnawed open two outlets, and all burst away, leaving the sick man in perfect health, and ascribing his recovery to this potent medicine; by the aid of which I cured a female captive of the Spaniards, whose head had been grazed by a bullet. The bloody and lacerated skin as usual attracted these flies, which, making a passage to the interior of the head, greatly endangered