"Foris in collo gestatum, contra fascinationes et nocturna terriculamenta pueros tueri volunt; capitis etiam destillationibus, et tonsillarum ac faucium vitiis resistere, oculorum fluxus et ophthalmias curare."
By his account it would seem to have been received as a panacea, sovereign for asthma, dropsy, toothache, and a multitude of diseases.
"In summâ (he concludes) Balsami instar est, calorem nativum roborans et morborum insultibus resistens."—Museum Wormianum, p. 32.
Bartholomaeus Glanvilla, in his work, De Proprietatibus Rerum, has not overlooked the properties of amber, which he seems to regard as a kind of jet (book xvi., c. xlix.).
"Gette, hyght Gagates, and is a boystous stone, and never the les it is precious."
He describes it as most abundant and of best quality in Britain of two kinds, yellow and black; it drives away adders,—
"Is contrary to fendes,—helpeth for fantasies and ayenste vexacions of fendis by night.—And so, if so boystus a stone dothe so great wonders, none shuld be dispisid for foule colour without, while the vertu that is within is unknowe." (Translation by Trevisa.)
Albert Way.