Cyclaminus, _Sow-bread_, is possessed of various powers; for it cleanses, incides, opens the mouths of vessels, and discusses; the juice of it, therefore, when applied to hemorrhoids opens them, and it discusses hardness along with other things. Along with honey it agrees with suffusions and purges by the nose. When rubbed into the epigastrium, it loosens the belly and kills the fœtus. The whole root, though weaker than the juice, is also strong, so that when drunk with honeyed water to the amount of three drachms, it purges the internal parts. To the skin it also proves detergent. The root of the other species of sow-bread (called Cissanthemon) is of no medicinal use, but its fruit is drastic, so that when drunk it acts like the former. * * * * * COMMENTARY. Dioscorides treats at considerable length of the medicinal virtues of the former species, which was the _Cyclamen Europæum_, recommending it as being phlegmagogue, hydragogue, emmenagogue, and alexipharmic; as an errhine in diseases of the head, and a suppository per vaginam. His other species, which he describes as having leaves like the ivy, and which some of the commentators set down as being the _Lonicera Periclymenum_, and others as the _Solanum Dulcamara_ he recommends in splenic affections, in orthopnœa, and retention of the lochial discharge. (ii, 193, 194.) Pliny recommends also the second species as a remedy for coughs (H. N. xxv, 68.) Harduin agrees with Dodonæus in holding it to be the _Dulcamara_. The scholiast on Theocritus recommends the cyclaminus as an application to chilblains. (Ad Idyll, v.) Galen writes of it in such terms as shows that he looked upon it as a very important article. He says it promotes menstruation, both when taken internally and when applied per vaginam; and that it cures jaundice, not only by purging the viscus, but by evacuating the whole body with sweats; he also recommends it as an external application in hardness of the spleen. The other species he praises in asthma. The other Greek authorities supply nothing of much interest under this head. The Arabians treat of it largely, but somewhat confusedly. See Avicenna (ii, 2, 6, 61, 271); Rhases (Cont. l. ult. 281); Mesue (De Simpl. 26); Serapion (c. 259.) Avicenna directs it to be given to the extent of three drachms with wine or mulse in cases of jaundice, and the patient is to be then covered up with many clothes, when he will sweat out the bile from his body. He says it purges the body, not only when given by the mouth, but in a suppository, and when rubbed into the skin. Rhases (l. c.) describes it under the names of _Falamios_, or Panis porcinus, whence the English name Sow-bread. His extracts from Dioscorides, Galen, Oribasius, and Bimasay comprise all the information on the subject possessed by his Grecian masters and his countrymen. Mesue gives a very elaborate article on the Sow-bread, which, like Avicenna, he praises as a general purger of bile,