Latin Texts & Translations

According to the prescriptions given by the magicians, a fresh sheep's milt is the best application for pains in the spleen, the person who applies it uttering these words: "This I do

for the cure of the spleen." This done, it is enjoined that the milt should be covered up with mortar in the wall of the patient's sleeping-room, and sealed with a ring, a charm ^[Note] being repeated thrice nine times. A dog's milt, removed from the animal while still alive, taken with the food, is a cure for diseases of the spleen: some, again, attach it fresh to that part of the patient's body. Others give the patient—without his knowing it—the milt of a puppy two days old, to eat, in squill vinegar; the milt, too, of a hedge-hog is similarly used. Ashes of burnt snails are employed, in combination with linseed, nettle-seed, and honey, the treatment being persisted in till the patient is thoroughly cured.

A green lizard has a remedial effect, suspended alive in an earthen vessel, at the entrance of the sleeping-room of the patient, who, every time he enters or leaves it, must take care to touch it with his hand: the head, too, of a horned owl, reduced to ashes and incorporated with an unguent; honey, also, in which the bees have died; and spiders, the one known as the "lycos" ^[Note] in particular.