Is held full good, such virtue is in brine,
And ’tis approved to drink your fill of wine.
“And Macer writes of houseleek thus:
Men say that houseleek hath so soveraign a might,
Who carries but that, no Scorpion can him bite.”[1105]
The natives of South Africa, when bitten by a Scorpion, apply, as a remedy, a living frog to the wound, into which animal it is supposed the poison is transferred from the wound, and it dies; then they apply another, which dies also: the third perhaps only becomes sickly, and the fourth no way affected. When this is observed, the poison is considered to be extracted, and the patient cured. Another method is to apply a kidney, scarlet, or other bean, which swells; then apply another and another, till the bean ceases to be affected, when they consider the poison extracted.[1106]
There is a vast desert tract, says Pliny, on this side of the Ethiopian Cynamolgi—the “dog-milkers”—the inhabitants of which were exterminated by Scorpions and venomous ants.[1107]
Navarette tells us, in the account of his voyage to the Philippine Islands, that there was there in practice a good and easy remedy against the Scorpions which abound in that country. This was, when they went to bed, to make a commemoration of St. George. He himself, he says, for many years continued this devotion, and, “God be praised,” he adds, “the Saint always delivered me both there and in other countries from those and such like insects.” He confesses, however, they used another remedy besides, which was to rub all about the beds with garlic.[1108]
Navarette[1109] and Barbot[1110] both tell us that a certain remedy against the sting of a Scorpion, is to rub the wound with a child’s private member. This, the latter adds, immediately takes away the pain, and then the venom exhales. The moisture that comes from a hen’s mouth, Barbot says, is also good for the same.
The Persians believe that Scorpions may be deprived of the power of stinging, by means of a certain prayer which they make use of for that purpose. The person who has the power of “binding the Scorpion,” as it is called, turns his