We must also give some account of the method of preparing this medicament employed by the ancients: extracting the juice from the fruit, both ripe and unripe, they mixed it together, and then boiled it down in a copper vessel to the consistency of honey. Some persons were in the habit of adding myrrh and cypress, and then left it to harden in the sun, mixing it with a spatula three times a-day. Such was their receipt for the stomatice, which was also employed by them to promote the cicatrization of wounds. There was another method, also, of dealing with the juice of this fruit: extracting the juice, they used the dried fruit with various articles of food,[3140] as tending to heighten the flavour; and they were in the habit of employing it medicinally[3141] for corroding ulcers, pituitous expectorations, and all cases in which astringents were required for the viscera. They used it also for the purpose of cleaning[3142] the teeth. A third mode of employing the juices of this tree is to boil down the leaves and root, the decoction being used, with oil,[3143] as a liniment for the cure of burns. The leaves are also applied by themselves for the same purpose.
An incision made in the root at harvest-time, supplies a juice that is extremely useful for tooth-ache, gatherings, and suppurations; it acts, also, as a purgative upon the bowels. Mulberry-leaves, macerated in urine, remove the hair from hides.
CHAP. 72.—CHERRIES: FIVE OBSERVATIONS UPON THEM.
Cherries are relaxing to the bowels and unwholesome[3144] to the stomach; in a dried state, however, they are astringent and diuretic.[3145] I find it stated by some authors, that if cherries are taken early in the morning covered with dew, the kernels being eaten with them, the bowels will be so strongly acted upon as to effect a cure for gout in the feet.
CHAP. 73.—MEDLARS: TWO REMEDIES. SORBS: TWO REMEDIES.
Medlars, the setania[3146] excepted, which has pretty nearly the same properties as the apple, act astringently upon the stomach and arrest looseness of the bowels. The same is the case, too, with dried sorbs;[3147] but when eaten fresh, they are beneficial to the stomach, and are good for fluxes of the bowels.
CHAP. 74. (8.)—PINE-NUTS: THIRTEEN REMEDIES.
Pine-nuts,[3148] with the resin in them, are slightly bruised, and then boiled down in water to one-half, the proportion of water being one sextarius to each nut. This decoction, taken in doses of two cyathi, is used for the cure of spitting of blood. The bark of the tree, boiled in wine, is given for griping pains in the bowels. The kernels of the pine-nut allay thirst, and assuage acridities and gnawing pains in the stomach; they tend also to neutralize vicious humours in that region, recruit the strength, and are salutary to the kidneys and the bladder. They would seem, however, to exercise an irritating effect[3149] upon the fauces, and to increase cough. Taken in water, wine, raisin wine, or a decoction of dates, they carry off bile. For gnawing pains in the stomach of extreme violence, they are mixed with cucumber-seed and juice of purslain; they are employed, too, in a similar manner for ulcerations of the bladder and kidneys,[3150] having a diuretic effect.