As to the produce of the various trees, the resin of the terebinth is held in high esteem, as being the most odoriferous and the lightest, the kinds[107] which come from Cyprus and Syria being looked upon as the best. Both these kinds are the colour of Attic honey; but that of Cyprus has more body, and dries with greater rapidity. In the dry resins the qualities requisite are whiteness, purity, and transparency: but whatever the kind, the produce of mountainous[108] districts is always preferred to that of champaign countries, and that of a north-eastern aspect to that of any other quarter. Resins[109] are dissolved in oil as a liniment and emollient cataplasm for wounds; but when they are used as a potion, bitter almonds[110] are also employed. The curative properties of resins consist in their tendency to close wounds, to act as a detergent upon gatherings and so disperse them, and to cure affections of the chest. The resin of the terebinth * * * it is used too, warmed, as a liniment for pains in the limbs, the application being removed after the patient has taken a walk in the sun. Among slave-dealers too, there is a practice of rubbing the bodies of the slaves with it, which is done with the greatest care, as a corrective for an emaciated appearance; the resin having the property of relaxing the skin upon all parts of the body, and rendering it more capable of being plumped out by food.[111] Next after the resin of the terebinth comes that of the lentisk:[112] it possesses astringent properties, and is the most powerful diuretic of them all. The other resins are laxative to the bowels, promote the digestion of crudities, allay the violence of inveterate coughs, and, employed as a fumigation, disengage the uterus of foreign[113] bodies with which it is surcharged: they are particularly useful too as neutralizing the effects of mistletoe; and, mixed with bull suet and honey, they are curative of inflamed tumours and affections of a similar nature. The resin of the lentisk is very convenient as a bandoline for keeping stubborn eyelashes in their place: it is useful also in cases of fractures, suppurations of the ears, and prurigo of the generative organs. The resin of the pine is the best of them all for the cure of wounds in the head. CHAP. 23. (7.)—PITCH: TWENTY-THREE REMEDIES. We have also stated on a previous occasion[114] from what tree pitch is extracted, and the methods employed for that purpose. Of this also there are two kinds; thick pitch and liquid pitch.[115] Of the several varieties of thick pitch the most useful for medicinal purposes is that of Bruttium;[116] for being both extremely unctuous and very resinous, it reunites the properties both of resin and of pitch, that of a yellow reddish colour being the most highly esteemed. As to the statement made in addition to this, that the produce of the male tree is the best, I do not believe that any such distinction is at all possible.