[988] Either the Thapsia garganica of Willdenow, or the Thapsia villosa, found in Africa and the south of Europe, though, as Pliny says, the thapsia of Europe is mild in its effects compared with that of Africa. It is common on the coast of Barbary.
[989] Pastillos.
[990] Nocturnis grassationibus.
[991] It is still used in Barbary for the cure of tetter and ringworm.
[992] The story was, that Prometheus, when he stole the heavenly fire from Jupiter, concealed it in a stalk of narthex.
[993] The “caper-tree,” the Capparis spinosa of Linnæus. Fée suggests that Pliny may possibly allude, in some of the features which he describes, to kinds less known; such, for instance, as the Capparis inermis of Forskhal, found in Arabia; the Capparis ovata of Desfontaines, found in Barbary; the Capparis Sinaica, found on Mount Sinai, and remarkable for the size of its fruit; and the Capparis Ægyptiaca of Lamarck, commonly found in Egypt.
[994] The stalk and seed were salted or pickled. The buds or unexpanded flowers of this shrub are admired as a pickle or sauce of delicate flavour.
[995] Fée remarks that this is not the truth, all the kinds possessing the same qualities. There may, however, have been some difference in the mode of salting or pickling them, and possibly productive of noxious effects.
[996] Probably from its thorns, that being the name of the sweet-briar, or dog-rose.
[997] “Serpent grapes.”