We have seen that it was a necessary condition in the preparation of the receipt that we have given that the sun should be in a particular position in the heavens prior to gathering one of the ingredients, and the saturnine, jovial, martial, or mercurial qualities of various substances employed in the healing art owed their potency to a due regard to the starry influences. In a quaint old book “Imprinted in London at Flete Streate, nyghe unto Saint Dunstones Churche,” by one Thomas Marshe, and published by him in the year 1565, we have “goodlye Doctrine and Instruction necessarye to be marked and folowed of all true chirurgeons, gathered and diligently set forth by John Halle, Chyrurgeon,” under the title of “An Historicall Expostulation against the Beastlye Abuses, both of Chyrurgerie and Physicke in oure tyme.”[2] He sums up the requirements of the “chyrurgeon” properly equipped for his work in the following lines— “Not onlye in chirurgery Thou oughtest to be experte, But also in astronomye Bothe prevye and aperte. In naturall philosophye Thy studye shoulde be bente: To knowe eche herbe, shrubbe, root, and tree, Muste be thy good intente. Eche beaste and foule, wyth worme and fishe, And all that beareth lyfe: Their vertues and their natures bothe With thee oughte to be rife.” The acquisition of this varied fund of knowledge shall prove itself enjoyable, helpful, and profitable, for— “Whereby of knowledge and greate skill Thou shalt obteine the fruit: And men to thee in generall, For helpe shall make their sute.” One interesting result of searching in these old tomes is that amidst much that the world has now outlived one often finds interesting references that show how unchanging some customs are, and how some of the things that we have regarded as recent discoveries were, after all, well known centuries ago. It is somewhat startling, for instance, to see the great African lakes—the Victoria and Albert Nyanza, and others that have only comparatively lately been rediscovered—quite clearly marked in some ancient maps; and the whole course of the Nile, from source to sea, as definitely given as that of Thames or Tiber.