The dung of geese, old or young, was employed in the treatment of yellow jaundice, for which it was believed to be a specific. The dose was one scruple. The geese should have been fed on “herba chelidonii.” Next to the yellow jaundice, it was of special value in scurvy, taken either in the form of a powder or a decoction. For the cure of dropsy it was the main ingredient in several of the remedies prescribed. It was also the principal component in the manufacture of “aqua ophthalmica Imperatoris Maximiliani,” to prepare which, the dung of young geese was gathered in the months of April and May (vol. ii. p. 287).
Stork-dung, stercus ciconiæ. Believed to be potential in epilepsy and diseases of the same type. “Stercus, si ex aqua hauritur, comitialibus aliisque morbis capitis prodesse credunt.”—(Etmuller, vol. ii. p. 287.)
The laxative properties of mouse-dung were extolled by Dr. Jacob Augustine Hunerwolf, in “Ephemeridum Physico-Medicarum,” Leipzig, 1694, vol. i. p. 189.
Rosinus Lentilius relates that there was a certain old hypochondriac, of fifty or more, who, in order to ease himself of an obstinate constipation, for more than a month drank copious draughts of his own urine, fresh and hot, but with the worst results, “Per mensem circiter urinam suam statim a mictu calentem ipsa matuta hauriret.”—(In “Ephem. Physico-Medicarum,” Leipzig, 1694, vol. ii. p. 169.)
On the page just cited and those immediately following, can be found some ten or twelve pages of fine print, quarto, elucidative of the uses of the human excreta, medicinally, and as a matter of morbid appetite.
To the Ephemeridum, Dr. Lentilius also contributed a careful résumé of all that was at that time known of the medicinal or other form of the internal employment of the human excreta; he premised his remarks by saying that while some persons sent to foreign countries and ransacked their woods and forests for medicines, there were others who sought their remedies nearer home, and did not disdain the employment of the vilest excrements. “I am not speaking now,” he remarks, “of the excrements of animals, but of human ordure and human urine. We know,” he continues, “that horse-dung is used for the cure of colic, pig-dung for checking internal hemorrhages, dog-dung or album Græcum for angina, goose-dung for yellow jaundice, peacock-dung for vertigo, and goat-dung, in Courland beer, for malignant fevers.” The Mexicans used human ordure as an antidote against serpent bites in two-scruple doses, drunk in some convenient liquor: “De homerda contra venenatos Mexicano—serpentis ictus—ad ʒ ii. in convenienti liquore hausta” (p. 170). The same mixture was drunk by the Japanese, as a remedy against the wounds made by poisoned weapons: “De eadem mixtura sed e stercore proprio confusa contra telorum venena Japonensibus pota.” Observe that in this last case the ordure had to be that of the wounded man himself.
Etmuller recommends its use in expelling from the system the virus of “napelli” whatever that may have been. To cure the plague, the patient was to consume a quantity equal in size to a filbert. To frustrate the effects of incantation and witchcraft, it had to be drunk in oil. Used in the same manner, it was supposed to be of use in expelling worms: “De eadem mixtura, sed a stercore proprio,” etc., as already quoted. “De stercore humano, seu recente seu arido, adsunto ad expugnandum napelli virus, etiam a nostratibus commendato, de quo vid. Etmuller, etc.... In peste fuganda mane ad avellanas quantitatem devorando, ... ad morbos e fascino ex aceto propinato ... ad expellendos vermes eodem modo usurpato.” He alludes also to “Oletum” and the medicines made with it, as an ingredient; but says he will leave “Zibethum” and “Occidental Sulphur” to Paracelsus and the members of his school. He quotes Galen as recommending the drinking of the urine of a stout, healthy boy, as a preventive of the plague. “Urina pueri sani bibita ... preservans a peste,” quoting Galen, lib. x. “De Simp. Med. Fac.” A draught of her husband’s urine was of great assistance to a woman in uterine troubles: “Sic, in δυσοχία urinæ maritalis haustum concelebrant alii.” The urine of a chaste boy was much commended by many writers for internal use in dropsy, splenic inflammation, etc. “Sic urinam impolluti pueri quotidie potum, esse medicamentum laudabile et præsentaneum, ad lienis morbos et hydropem.” It would be useless to quote further in the words of the original. Lentilius goes on to say that a potion of one’s own urine was extolled in the treatment of the bites of snakes, wounds by deadly weapons, incipient dropsy and consumption.
To drink one’s own urine for the space of three days was a sure cure for the yellow jaundice, also in preserving from the plague. But Von Helmont was of the opinion that in this last case its virtues were derived from the fact that it was a stimulant and served to keep up the spirits. By Etmuller, its use was strongly recommended in the treatment of the yellow jaundice, etc. (citing Etmuller). It was likewise highly extolled by Avicenna.