Of the jasper, De Boot relates,[289] from his own experience, that for checking hemorrhages the red variety is the most effective, and, in this connection, he describes the case of a young woman in Prague, who had suffered for six years from hemorrhages. Many different remedies had been tried without avail, and when De Boot was called in to attend the case, he advised the woman to wear a red jasper. As soon as this stone was attached to her person the hemorrhage ceased. After wearing the jasper for some time, the woman thought she could safely lay it aside, but whenever she did so the hemorrhage returned after a longer or shorter interval, while it always ceased immediately she resumed wearing the stone. This seemed to prove conclusively that it checked the flow of blood. Eventually the woman was so effectively cured that she was able to give up wearing the stone. Green jasper, if worn attached to the neck so as to touch the gastric region, was, according to De Boot, a cure for all diseases of the stomach. The same writer alludes to the belief that the virtue of this stone was enhanced if it were engraved with the image of a scorpion while the sun was entering the constellation Scorpio, but he rejects this belief as entirely superstitious and futile, while admitting that, to obtain the best results, the jasper should always be set in silver. Pear-shaped pieces of red jasper seem to have been more especially favored for use as amulets. Italian amulets of to-day show this, and Bellucci finds that the form is chosen as representing a drop of blood, and thus aiding, by sympathetic magic, in the cure of hemorrhages or wounds, and preventing the infliction of the latter. Sometimes such amulets of red jasper are attached to the bed-post by a red ribbon. In the case of a particularly valued amulet of this type, Bellucci was informed by the peasant owner that it owed its great virtue to having been blessed by the parish priest. Thus the traditional power of a pagan amulet received the sanction of the church and the object was associated with purely Christian amulets.[290] Jet Jet, the _gagates_ of the ancients, was said to have been first found in the river Gagates in Lycia, whence its name was derived. Galen, the greatest physician of ancient times, reports, however, that he searched in vain for this river, although he sailed in a small vessel along the whole coast of Lycia, so that he might closely observe it. Still, he did not give up his search for the material, even when he failed to find its reputed source, and in Cælo-Syria, on a hill on the eastern shore of the Dead Sea, he came across certain black, crustaceous stones, which emitted a slender flame when placed in the fire. These must have been small masses of bitumen, and, according to Galen, they were used for chronic swellings of the knee-joint “which are difficult to cure.”[291]