Schurig recommends an application of bull-dung to the genitalia of women to facilitate pregnancy. (“Chylologia,” vol. ii. p. 602.) The woman drank her own urine to ease the pains of pregnancy. (Idem, p. 535.) There is a method of inducing conception outlined in vol. ii. p. 712, by the use of a bath of urine poured over rusty old iron. Mouse-dung was applied as a pessary in pregnancy. (Idem, pp. 728, 729.) Hawk-dung drunk by a woman before coitus insured conception. (Idem, p. 748.) Goose or fox dung rubbed upon the pudenda of a woman aided in bringing about conception. (Idem, p. 748.) Leopard-dung was also supposed to facilitate conception; pastilles were made of it, and the sexual parts fumigated therewith; or a pessary was inserted and kept in place for three days and three nights: “Ea quamvis antea sterilis fuit, deinceps tamen concipiet.”—(Idem, p. 820.) But Schurig warns his readers that care must be exercised in the use of such remedies. He gives an instance of a woman who applied the dung of a wolf to her private parts, and soon after bearing a child, found him possessed of a wolfish appetite.—(Idem, lib. i. cap. 1, article “De Bulimo Brutorum,” p. 24.) “When ladies desire to know whether or not they are enceinte, Paullini recommends that they urinate in an earthen vessel wherein a needle has been thrown. Let it stand over night; should the needle become covered with small red spots, the woman is enceinte; but should it be black or rusty, she is not. To determine whether she is to have a son or daughter, dig two small pits; put barley in one, and wheat in the other; let the enceinte lady urinate into both; then cover up the vessels with earth; if the wheat sprout first, it is to be a son; if the barley sprout before the wheat, it is to be a daughter.”—(Paullini, p. 163.) Or, throw a pea into each parcel of urine; then the pea which germinates first, etc., etc. “Aut injiciatur lens in unius cujusque urina et cujus efflorescit, ille culpa caret,” is the method suggested by Danielus Beckherius.—(“Med. Microcos. aut Spagyria Microcosmi,” pp. 60, 61, quoting from still older authorities.) He gives still another plan: “If you wish to determine whether a woman is to bear children, pour some of her urine upon marsh-mallows; if they be found dry on the third day, she’ll not conceive.” “Si explorare volueris, utrum mulier ad concipiendam sit idonea, tunc super malvam sylvestram urinam ejus funde; si ille tertio die arida fuerit, omnino minus idoneam illam habeto.”—(Idem, p. 61.) Paullini urges that the excrements of goats, hawks, horses, geese, and the urine of camels be taken to remedy sterility (p. 161). And the very same remedies are given by Beckherius and still older writers. English women, in some localities, drank the urine of their husbands to assist them in the hour of labor.