LITMIR.BIZ

82

This information is to be found in Hellot’s Art of Dyeing, into which it has been copied, as appears by the Dictionnaire d’Histoire Naturelle, par Valmont de Bomare, from an account written by M. Porlier, who was consul at Teneriffe in 1731.

83

As the archil grows in the African islands, and on the coast of Africa, Glass supposes that the Getulian purple of the ancients was dyed with it; but this opinion is improbable, for Horace praises “Gætula murice tinctas vestes.”

84

Lettres sur l’Histoire Naturelle de l’Isle d’Elbe, par Koestlin. Vienne, 1780, 8vo, p. 100.

85

Lib. xxvii. c. 9.

86

Nova Plantarum Genera. Flor. 1729.

87

Some translate this word lacca musica, musiva.

88

[According to Dr. Ure, the Dutch first reduce the lichen to a fine powder by means of a mill, then mix a certain proportion of potash with it. The mixture is watered with urine and allowed to undergo a species of fermentation. When this has arrived at a certain degree, carbonate of lime in powder is added to give consistence and weight to the paste, which is afterwards reduced into small parallelopipeds, which are carefully dried.]

89

This plant grows in the neighbourhood of Montpelier, and above all, in the flats of Languedoc. In harvest, the time when it is collected, the peasants assemble from the distance of fifteen or twenty leagues around, and each gathers on his own account. It is bruised in a mill, and the juice must be immediately used; some mix with it a thirtieth part of urine. It is poured over pieces of canvas, which they take care to provide, and which they rub between their hands. These rags are dried in the sun, and then exposed, above a stone stove, to the vapour of urine mixed with quick-lime or alum. After they have imbibed the juice of the plant, the same operations are repeated till the pieces of cloth appear of a deep blue colour. They are called in commerce tournesol en drapeaux. Large quantities of them are bought up by the Dutch, who make use of them to colour wines and the rinds of their cheese. – Trans.

90

[Lacmus or litmus is now prepared from Lecanora tartarea, the famous Cudbear, so called after a Mr. Cuthbert, who first brought it into use. It is imported largely from Norway, where it grows more abundantly than with us; yet in the Highland districts many an industrious peasant gets a living by scraping off this lichen with an iron hoop, and sending it to the Glasgow market.]

91

Linn. Mantissa Plantarum, i. p. 132.

92

See Wallis’s Natural History and Antiquities of Northumberland, 1769, 2 vols. 4to, i. p. 279.

93

In his Kollektaneen. Berlin, 1790, ii. p. 117.

94

Aëtii Op. 1. ii. c. 25.

95

In Stephani Artis Med. Princip. ii. p. 253.

96

De Lapidibus, lib. ii. p. 131.

97

J. J. Wecker, De Secretis.

98

I took the trouble to search for this passage in Jac. Hollerii lib. de morbis internis, Parisiis 1711, 4to, but I could not find it, though the beginning of the book treats expressly of head-aches.

99

Magia Naturalis, lib. vii.

100

Kircheri Magnes, sive De Arte Magnetica, lib. iii. c. i.

101

P. Borrelli, Hist. et Observ. Medico-physic. cent. 4. obs. 75.

102

Observations sur l’usage de l’aimant en médecine, par MM. Audry et Thouret.

103

Heberden in the Neue Hamburg. Mag. xvii. p. 219. I am convinced that many of the accounts we have of the extraordinary effects of poison are fabricated, like those mentioned in Frid. Hoffmanni Dissert. de Læsionibus externis, abortivis Venenis ac Philtris. Francof. 1729, et recusa Lips. 1755. That author, however, denies some which are true. It is, for example, certain that camphor and rue do not produce the effects ascribed to them by Dioscorides, Paulus Ægineta, and others; but there are without doubt other substances which will produce these effects.

104

Sennerti Instit. Med. ii. 2, 12.

105

He gave to Aratus a poison, not speedy and violent, but of that kind which at first occasions a slow heat in the body, with a slight cough, and then gradually brings on a consumption. One time, when Aratus spat up blood, he said, “This is the effect of royal friendship.” See Plutarch, Vit. Arati.

106

Quint. Declamat. xvii. 11.

107

With the poison of the Indians, however, the ancients could not be acquainted, as it is prepared from a plant unknown in Europe before the discovery of America. Kalm, in his Travels, does not name it, and in that he has done right; for, as the plant is now to be found everywhere, no government could guard against a misapplication of it, were it publicly known.

108

They say a poison can be prepared from aconite so as to occasion death within a certain period, such as two, three, or six months, a year, and even sometimes two years. Those, we are told, whose constitutions are able to hold out longest, die in the greatest misery; for the body is gradually consumed, and must perish by continual wasting. Those die easiest who die speedily. No remedy has been found out for this poison. – Theophr. Hist. Plant. ix. c. 16.

109

Livius, lib. viii. c. 18.

110

Taciti Annal. lib. iv. c. 8.

111

The account given by Tacitus deserves to be read; see lib. xii. c. 66.

112

The history of this horrid affair may be found both in Tacitus, Annal. xiii. c. 15 and 16, and in Suetonius, vi. cap. 33. Respecting Locusta, see also Juvenal, sat. i. 71.

113

This account is given by Aulus Gellius from the now lost works of Tuditanus. – Noct. At. lib. vi. cap. 4. Cicero often speaks of the magnanimity of Regulus; as, for example, in his Oration against Piso, and in his Offices, book iii. chap. 27; but he makes no mention of his having been poisoned. Valerius Maximus also, book i. chap. i. 14, says nothing of poison.

114

Apollonii Vit. lib. vi. c. 14.

115

Histor. Animal. lib. ii. c. 45.

116

Lib. ix. c. 48, and lib. xxxii. c. 1.

117

In Linnæi Systema Nat., through an error of the press, stands Laplysia, which word has since become common. Ἀπλυσία signifies an uncleanness which cannot be washed off; and in Aristotle’s History of Animals, b. v. ch. 15, and Pliny, b. ix. ch. 45, it is the name of a zoophyte. In the like manner other errors in the System of Linnæus have been copied into the works of others, such as Dytiscus instead of Dyticus, &c.

118

J. B. Bohadsch De quibusdam animalibus marinis. Dresdæ, 1761, 4to, p. 1–53. In this work there is a full description, with a figure of this animal, under the name of Lernæa, which was used in the first editions of Linnæus.

119

The accounts given by the ancients of the sea-hare have been collected in Grevini Lib. de Venenis, Antverpiæ 1571, p. 209. In the Annals of Glycas, iii. (Script. Byz.), it is said that Titus was despatched by this poison; and in the first book, b. 27, he says the sea-hare occasions speedy and inevitable destruction to man.

120

See Stenzelii Diss. de venenis terminatis et temporaneis, quæ Galli les poudres de succession vocant; resp. J. G. Arnold. Vitebergæ, 1730. This tract contains several historical relations; but the reader is often referred to authors who either do not say that for which they were quoted,

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