CHAP. 91.—FIVE REMEDIES DERIVED FROM THE HELENIUM.
The helenium, which springs, as we have already2336 stated, from the tears of Helena, is generally thought to have been produced for improving the appearance, and to maintain unimpaired the freshness of the skin in females, both of the face and of other parts of the body. Besides this, it is generally supposed that the use of it confers additional graces on the person, and ensures universal attraction. They say, too, that, taken with wine, it promotes gaiety of spirit, having, in fact, a similar effect to the nepenthes, which has been so much vaunted by Homer,2337 as producing forgetfulness of all sorrow. The juice of this plant is remarkably sweet, and the root of it, taken fasting in water, is good for hardness of breathing; it is white within, and sweet. An infusion of it is taken in wine for the stings of serpents; and the plant, bruised, it is said, will kill mice.