COMMENTARY. This plant, which is certainly the _Asarum Europæum_, or common Asarabacca, is said by Dioscorides to be diuretic, heating, and emetic, answering well with dropsical cases and chronic sciatica and promoting menstruation; its roots drunk with mulse to the amount of six drachms, he says, purge like white hellebore. (i, 9.) Galen seems to have overlooked the importance of this article, for he is nearly as brief as our author in treating of it; and Aëtius and Oribasius follow him. Serapion, Rhases, and Avicenna recommend it in the same cases as Dioscorides, and also in obstructions of the liver and spleen, and as a stimulant ingredient in collyria. Modern authorities confirm the character of this medicinal article given it by Dioscorides. See Lewis (Mat. Med. i, 178); Rutty (Mat. Med. 43); Gray (Suppl. to Pharmacop. p. 38.) Although not excluded from our Dispensatories, less attention is now bestowed on the asarabacca than it would seem to deserve. See Royle (M. M. p. 548.) Ipecacuanha has nearly superseded it as an emetic in this country. The asarum is still retained in the modern Greek Pharmacopœia (p. 22.) Ἀσβόλη, Fuligo, _the Soot_ which painters use. It is taken from glassworks, and is possessed of discutient and acrid powers, so as to burn and occasion putrefaction. It cures burns, with rose-cerate. * * * * * COMMENTARY. Dioscorides and some of the other authorities mention the _Fuligo_, or _soot_ of glassworks, in nearly the same terms as Paulus. Ἀσκαλαβώτης, Stellio, _the Swift_; this animal is useless for all other purposes, but they say that it is a good application to persons bitten by a scorpion. It is mixed also with venereal excitants. * * * * * COMMENTARY. We have treated of this reptile in the Fifth Book. It is the spotted lizard, _Lacerta stellio_ L. Its aphrodisiacal faculty is alluded to by our author in another place. (B. III, 58.) Ἀσκληπιάς, Asclepias, _Swallow-wort_, being hot and dry as to its powers, and consisting of subtile particles, agrees well with tormina when drunk with wine, and in the form of a cataplasm it is a good application to the bites of venomous animals, and malignant ulcers in the uterus and breasts. * * * * * COMMENTARY. There appears little reason to doubt that it is the _Asclepias vincetoxicum_, or Swallow-wort. Our author borrows its medicinal characters from Dioscorides. (iii, 96.) Galen candidly admits, that he had no experience of it as a medicine. Pliny, like Dioscorides and our author, recommends it for the cure of tormina and the bites of serpents. (H. N. xxvii, 18.) Until lately it held a place in our modern Dispensatories, with the characters given it by the ancients. See Quincy (p. 59); Rutty (Mat. Med. p. 44); Gray (Suppl. to Pharmacop. p. 57.) Ἄσκυρρον is treated of under Androsæmon. * * * * *