Page:Chronicles of pharmacy (Volume 1).djvu/144

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To get sleep a goat's horn laid under the head turneth waking into sleep.

For sleep lay a wolf's head under the pillow; the unhealthy shall sleep.

Let those who suffer apparitions eat lion's flesh; they will not after that suffer any apparition.

For any fracture, take a hound's brain laid upon wool and bind upon the broken place for fourteen days; then will it be firmly amended, and there shall be a need for a firmer binding up.

If thou frequently smearest and touchest children's gums with bitches' milk, the teeth wax without sore.


Various Leechdoms.

Some "Fly-Leaf Leechdoms" of unknown authorship follow. In these information concerning the four humours is given, hot and cold, moist and dry remedies are distinguished, and we are told of the forty-five dies caniculares "in which no leech can properly give aid to any sick man." It is carefully noted that the same disorder may occur from different causes, and quite scientifically the practitioner is advised to vary his treatment accordingly. Thus, for example, dealing with "host" (cough) we are told that "it hath a manifold access, as the spittles are various. Whilom it cometh of immoderate heat, whilom of immoderate cold, whilom of immoderate dryness." The remedies must depend on the causes of the complaint. The "tokens" of "a diseased maw" of "a half head's ache" (megrims) and of other distempers are set forth with graphic simplicity, and often sensible advice as to diet and medicine is given. But not infrequently the remedy may not be an easily procurable one. For