_Omnibonus Ferrarius_ in mortal dysenteries of children looks for a spot behind the ear; in consumptive diseases some eye the complexion of moles; Cardan eagerly views the nails, some the lines of the hand, the thenar or muscle of the thumb; some are so curious as to observe the depth of the throat-pit, how the proportion varieth of the small of the legs unto the calf, or the compass of the neck unto the circumference of the head; but all these, with many more, were so drowned in a mortal visage, and last face of Hippocrates, that a weak physiognomist might say at first eye, this was a face of earth, and that _Morta_[CM] had set her hard seal upon his temples, easily perceiving what _caricatura_[CN] draughts death makes upon pined faces, and unto what an unknown degree a man may live backward. [CM] Morta, the deity of death or fate. [CN] When men’s faces are drawn with resemblance to some other animals, the Italians call it, to be drawn _in caricatura_. Though the beard be only made a distinction of sex, and sign of masculine heat by _Ulmus_,[CO] yet the precocity and early growth thereof in him, was not to be liked in reference unto long life. Lewis, that virtuous but unfortunate king of Hungary, who lost his life at the battle of Mohacz,[118] was said to be born without a skin, to have bearded at fifteen, and to have shown some grey hairs about twenty; from whence the diviners conjectured that he would be spoiled of his kingdom, and have but a short life; but hairs make fallible predictions, and many temples early grey have outlived the psalmist’s period.[CP] Hairs which have most amused me have not been in the face or head, but on the back, and not in men but children, as I long ago observed in that endemial distemper of children in Languedoc, called the _morgellons_,[CQ] wherein they critically break out with harsh hairs on their backs, which takes off the unquiet symptoms of the disease, and delivers them from coughs and convulsions. [CO] _Ulmus de usu barbæ humanæ._ [CP] The life of man is threescore and ten. [CQ] See _Picotus de Rheumatismo_. The Egyptian mummies that I have seen, have had their mouths open, and somewhat gaping, which affordeth a good opportunity to view and observe their teeth, wherein ’tis not easy to find any wanting or decayed; and therefore in Egypt, where one man practised but one operation, or the diseases but of single parts, it must needs be a barren profession to confine unto that of drawing of teeth, and to have been little better than tooth-drawer unto King Pyrrhus,[CR] who had but two in his head. [CR] His upper jaw being solid, and without distinct rows of teeth.