CHAP. 6. (3.)—TWO HUNDRED AND TWENTY-SIX OBSERVATIONS
ON REMEDIES DERIVED FROM MAN. EIGHT REMEDIES DERIVED,
FROM CHILDREN.
We have already,
1 when speaking of the singular peculiarities of various nations, made mention of certain men of a
monstrous nature, whose gaze is endowed with powers of
fascination; and we have also described properties belonging to
numerous animals, which it would be superfluous here to repeat.
In some men, the whole of the body is endowed with remarkable properties, as in those families, for instance, which are a
terror to serpents; it being in their power to cure persons
when stung, either by the touch or by a slight suction of the
wound. To this class belong the Psylli, the Marsi, and the people
called "Ophiogenes,"
2 in the Isle of Cyprus. One Euagon,
a member of this family, while attending upon a deputation at
Rome, was thrown by way of experiment, by order of the consuls, into a large vessel
3 filled with serpents; upon which,
to the astonishment of all, they licked his body all over with
their tongues. One peculiarity of this family—if indeed it is
still in existence—is the strong offensive smell which proceeds
from their body in the spring; their sweat, too, no less than
their spittle, was possessed of remedial virtues. The people
who are born at Tentyris, an island in the river Nilus, are
so formidable
4 to the crocodiles there, that their voice even is
sufficient to put them to flight. The presence even, it is well
known, of all these different races, will suffice for the cure of
injuries inflicted by the animals to which they respectively
have an antipathy; just in the same way that wounds are
irritated by the approach of persons who have been stung by
a serpent at some former time, or bitten by a dog. Such
persons, too, by their presence, will cause the eggs upon which
a hen is sitting to be addled, and will make pregnant cattle
cast their young and miscarry; for, in fact, so much of
the venom remains in their body, that, from being poisoned
themselves, they become poisonous to other creatures. The
proper remedy in such case is first to make them wash their
hands, and then to sprinkle with the water the patient who is
under medical treatment. When, again, persons have been
once stung by a scorpion they will never afterwards be attacked
by hornets, wasps, or bees: a fact at which a person will be
the less surprised when he learns that a garment which has
been worn at a funeral will never be touched by moths;
5 that
it is hardly possible to draw serpents from their holes except
by using the left hand; and that, of the discoveries made by
Pythagoras, one of the most unerring, is the fact, that in the
name given to infants, an odd number of vowels is portentous
of lameness, loss of eyesight, or similar accidents, on
6 the right
side of the body, and an even number of vowels of the like
infirmities on the left.
(4.) It is said, that if a person takes a stone or other missile
which has slain three living creatures, a man, a boar, and a
bear, at three blows, and throws it over the roof of a house
in which there is a pregnant woman, her delivery, however
difficult, will be instantly accelerated thereby. In such a case,
too, a successful result will be rendered all the more probable,
it a light infantry lance
7 is used, which has been drawn from
a man's body without touching the earth; indeed, if it is
brought into the house it will be productive of a similar result.
In the same way, too, we find it stated in the writings of
Orpheus and Archelaiis, that arrows, drawn from a human
body without being allowed to touch the ground, and placed
beneath the bed, will have all the effect of a philtre; and,
what is even more than this, that it is a cure for epilepsy if
the patient eats the flesh of it wild beast killed with an iron
weapon with which a human being has been slain.
Some individuals, too, are possessed of medicinal properties
in certain parts of the body; the thumb of King Pyrrhus, for
instance, as already
8 mentioned. At Elis, there used to
be shown one of the ribs
9 of Pelops, which, it was generally
asserted, was made of ivory. At the present day even, there
are many persons, who from religious motives will never clip
the hair growing upon a mole on the face.