HEBENON OR HEBONA.[118:1]
| Ghost. | Upon my secure hour thy uncle stole, With juice of cursed Hebenon in a vial, And in the porches of my ear did pou The leperous distilment; whose effect Holds such an enmity with blood of man That swift as quicksilver it courses through The natural gates and alleys of the body, And with a sudden vigour it doth posset And curd, like eager droppings into milk, The thin and wholesome blood; so did it mine; And a most instant tetter bark'd about, Most lazar-like, with vile and loathsome crust, All my smooth body. | |
| Hamlet, act i, sc. 5 (61). | ||
Before and in the time of Shakespeare other writers had spoken of the narcotic and poisonous effects of Heben, Hebenon, or Hebona. Gower says—
"Ful of delite,
Slepe hath his hous, and of his couche,
Within his chambre if I shall touche,
Of Hebenus that slepy tre
The bordes all aboute be."
Conf. Aman., lib. quart. (ii. 103, Paulli).
Spenser says—
"Faire Venus sonne, . . .
Lay now thy deadly Heben bow apart."
F. Q., introd., st. 3.
"There (in Mammon's garden) Cypresse grew in greatest store,
And trees of bitter gall and Heben sad."