[2728] In B. xxi. c. 105.
[2729] Mead, or metheglin.
[2730] This is, perhaps, the meaning of “nervis” here, but it is very doubtful. See Note [a]312], in p. 77 of Vol. III.
[2731] “Mulsum.”
[2732] “Dulci.” Fée thinks, but erroneously, that by this word he means “must,” or grape-juice, and combats the assertion. Honied wine, he says, is used at the present day (in France, of course,) as a popular cure for recent wounds and inveterate ulcers. As a beverage, it was very highly esteemed by the ancients. See B. vii. c. 54.
[2733] “Hospes.” It may possibly mean his “guest,” but the other is more probable.
[2734] “Intus mulso, foris oleo.” The people of Corsica were famous for being long-lived, which was attributed to their extensive use of honey.
[2735] “Regius morbus.”
[2736] Honied wine being considered so noble a beverage, Celsus says, that “during its cure, the patient must be kept to his chamber, and the mind must be kept cheerful, with gaiety and pastimes, for which reason it is called the ‘royal disease,’” B. iii. c. 24. In the text Pliny calls it “arquatorum morbus,” the “disease of the bow-like,” if we may be allowed the term. The origin of this term, according to Scribonius Largus, is the word “arcus,” the rainbow, from a fancied resemblance of the colour of the skin, when affected with jaundice, to the green tints of the rainbow.
[2737] In B. xiv. c. 11.