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CHAP. 40.—MURIA.

In one part of Spain, they draw a brine for this purpose from deep—sunk pits, to which they give the name of "muria;" being of opinion, also, that it makes a considerable difference upon what kind of wood it is poured. That of the quercus they look upon as the best, as the ashes of it, unmixed, have the pungency of salt.1 In other places, again, the wood of the hazel is held in high esteem; and thus, we see, by pouring brine upon it, charcoal even is converted into salt. All salt that is thus prepared with burning wood is black. I find it stated by Theophrastus, that the Umbri2 are in the habit of boiling ashes of reeds and bulrushes in water, till there remains but little moisture unconsumed. The brine, too, of salted provisions is sometimes boiled over again, and, as soon as all the moisture has evaporated, the salt resumes its original form. That prepared from the pickle of the mæna3 has the finest flavour.

1 "The water, eraporating, would leave the salt behind, but mixed with charcoal, ashes, earth, and alkaline salts; consequently it must have been moist, or at any rate nauseous, if not refined by a new solution."—Beck- mann's Hist. Inv. Vol. II. p. 493. Bohn's Ed.

2 Not improbably a people of India so called, and mentioned in B. vi. c. 20.

3 See B.C. .42.

The Natural History. Pliny the Elder. John Bostock, M.D., F.R.S. H.T. Riley, Esq., B.A. London. Taylor and Francis, Red Lion Court, Fleet Street. 1855.

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