There’s never any of these demure boys come to any proof; for thin drink doth so overcool their blood, and making many fish-meals, that they fall into a kind of male green sickness; they are generally fools and cowards. Henry IV—2d, Act IV., Sc. III.
Lepidus, Since Pompey’s feast, as Menas says, is troubled With the green sickness. Antony and Cleopatra, Act III., Sc. II.
Ben Jonson in writing of this disease has happily and properly recommended marriage as an important step toward recovery.
He would keep you * * * not alone without a husband, But with a sickness; ay, and the green sickness, The maiden’s malady; which is a sickness,— A kind of a disease, * * * * * And like the fish our mariners call remora.
I say remora, For it will stay a ship that’s under sail; And stays are long and tedious things to maids! And maids are young ships that would be sailing When they be rigg’d. * * * * * The stay is dangerous.
I can assure you from the doctor’s mouth, She has a dropsy, and must change the air Before she can recover.
Give her vent. If she do swell. A gimblet must be had; It is a tympanites she is troubled with. There are three kinds: the first is anasarca, Under the flesh a tumor; that’s not hers. The second is ascites, or aquosus, A watery humour; that is not hers neither; But tympanites, which we call the drum. A wind-bombs in her belly, must be unbraced, And with a faucet or a peg, let out, And she’ll do well: get her a husband. Magnetic Lady, Act II., Sc. I.