The Natural History of Pliny, Volume 5 (of 6)Pliny, the Elder
History
The Natural History of Pliny, Volume 5 (of 6)
Pliny, the Elder
Natural history -- Pre-Linnean works
Bears’ grease is a cure for chilblains and all kinds of chaps upon
the feet; with the addition of alum, it is still more efficacious.
The same results are produced by using goat-suet; a horse’s teeth
powdered; the gall of a wild boar or hog; or else the lights of those
animals, applied with their grease; and this, too, where the soles
are blistered, or the feet have been crushed by a substance striking
against them. In cases where the feet have been frozen, ashes of burnt
hare’s fur are used; and for contusions of the feet, the lights of that
animal are applied, sliced or reduced to ashes. Blisters occasioned
by the sun are most effectually treated by using asses’ fat, or else
beef-suet, with oil of roses. Corns, chaps, and callosities of the feet
are cured by the application of wild boars’ dung or swine’s dung, used
fresh, and removed at the end of a couple of days. The pastern-bones
of these animals are also used, reduced to ashes; or else the lights
of a wild boar, swine, or deer. When the feet have been galled by the
shoes, they are rubbed with the urine of an ass, applied with the mud
formed by it upon the ground. Corns are treated with beef-suet and
powdered frankincense; chilblains with burnt leather, that of an old
shoe, in particular; and injuries produced by tight shoes with ashes of
goat-skin, tempered with oil.
The pains attendant upon varicose veins are mitigated by using ashes
of burnt calves’ dung, boiled with lily roots and a little honey: a
composition which is equally good for all kinds of inflammations and
sores that tend to suppurate. It is very useful, also, for gout and
diseases of the joints, when it is the dung of a bull-calf that is used
more particularly. For excoriations of the joints, the gall of a wild
boar or swine is applied, in a warm linen cloth: the dung, also, of a
calf that has not begun to graze; or else goat-dung, boiled in vinegar
with honey. Veal-suet rectifies malformed nails, as also goat-suet,
mixed with sandarach. Warts are removed by applying ashes of burnt
calves’ dung in vinegar, or else the mud formed upon the ground by the
urine of an ass.
CHAP. 63.—REMEDIES FOR EPILEPSY.
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