oils, was a name for the balsam tree. Paracelsus taught that the human body contained a natural balsam which tended by itself to heal wounds.
Basilicon ointment is first met with in Celsus. It means royal ointment but no explanation of the origin of the term is given. He compounded it of panax, (perhaps opopanax), galbanum, pitch, resin, and oil. Mesué made a basilicon minus, composed of wax, resin, pitch, and oil. This he also called unguentum tetra-*pharmacum, because it was made from four drugs. Both of these were black ointments. Later the pitch was omitted and the ointment was then named yellow basilicon. A green basilicon ointment was also formulated in the early London Pharmacopœias, containing verdigris, and used as a detergent. It is sometimes stated that the ointment acquired its name because it contained the plant basil (Ocimum basilicum) among its ingredients; but I find no authority for this statement.
Baths. The most usual form of digesting substances in a gentle heat was in a Balneum Mariæ, Bain-Marie, or as old English writers translated it a St. Mary's bath. It was supposed to have been derived from balneum maris, as if sea water was used; but there is no justification for this guess. Littré thinks it was called the bath of Mary because of its gentleness. Sand-*baths, cinder-baths, horse-dung baths, and iron-filings baths were also ordered.
Bezoards. Mineral bezoard was diaphoretic antimony. Silician earth was also called mineral bezoar.
Blisters. Freind says these were introduced into medicine in Venice and Padua during the plague of 1576. Jerome Mercuriali wrote about them. They superseded dropaxes and metasyncretics.
Bolus was a medicine of the consistence of an elec-
