Aqua Fortis 5s. 4d. per lb. Ol. Cinnamon £1 12s. per oz. Ol. Vitrioli 5s. 4d. per lb. Besides the above, precious stones in powder, and diamond powder, which was regarded as a powerful poison, commanded very high prices. CHAPTER XIX. PHARMACY IN THE TIME OF QUEEN ELIZABETH. To obtain a clear conception of the great advance that has been made in medicine and pharmacy, it is necessary to look back through the vista of centuries at the Elizabethan apothecary. In doing so, we should note how the influence of superstition and charlatanry, with which the art of healing was surrounded and intermixed, has been gradually dispersed under the searching light of science. One can picture the apothecary’s shop in the days of “good Queen Bess”. Up a narrow winding street, paved with round cobble stones, and no pathway to protect you from the jostling and nudges of the passing chair-bearers, French pages, and watermen who throng the thoroughfares, his abode may be denoted perhaps by the gilded crocodile which hangs over the doorway, accompanied by a pole from which depends a pair of brightly-burnished metal pans, denoting the practice of the chirurgical art. The overhanging gables of the half-timbered houses darken the low-roofed shop, through whose small windows filled with little panes of bottle glass, a very dim light penetrates. A mysterious odour permeates the interior and strange things are seen hanging from the rafters,—flying fish, tortoises, and a long alligator float mid-air. Strings of poppy-heads, bunches of chamomile and centuary, also glass jars containing adders and worms adorn the counter. On one shelf an array of bright brass mortars, and round about on others, a great collection of quaint bottles and earthen pots, containing electuaries, unguents, and lohochs; syrup bottles with long curved spouts, and bladders full of seeds and wax. In the corner stands the great iron mortar, whose heavy pestle is suspended from a spring beam, and another is filled with little drawers to hold the gums and spices. [Illustration: AN APOTHECARY. From an engraving, 1517.]