CHAP. 71.—REMEDIES FOR FEVERS.
Agaric, taken in warm water, alleviates cold fevers: sideritis, in combination with oil, is good for tertian fevers; bruised ladanum1388 also, which is found in corn fields; plantago,1389 taken in doses of two drachmæ, in hydromel, a couple of hours before the paroxysms come on; juice of the root of plantago made warm or subjected to pressure; or else the root itself beaten up in water made warm with a hot iron. Some medical men prescribe three roots of plantago, in three cyathi of water; and in a similar manner, four roots for quartan fevers. When buglossos1390 is beginning to wither, if a person takes the pith out of the stem, and says while so doing, that it is for the cure of such and such a person suffering from fever, and then attaches seven leaves to the patient, just before the paroxysms come on, he will experience a cure, they say.
Fevers too, those which are attended with recurrent cold shiverings more particularly, are cured by administering one drachma of betony, or else agaric, in three cyathi of hydromel. Some medical men recommend three leaves of cinquefoil for tertian, four for quartan, and an increased number for other fevers; while others again prescribe in all cases three oboli of cinquefoil, with pepper, in hydromel.
Vervain, administered in water, is curative of fever, in beasts of burden even; but care must be taken, in cases of tertian fever, to cut the plant at the third joint, and of quartan fever at the fourth. The seed of either kind of hypericon1391 is taken also for quartan fevers and cold shiverings. Powdered betony modifies these fits, and panaces1392 is of so warming a nature that persons when about to travel amid the snow are recommended to drink an infusion of it, and to rub the body all over with the plant. Aristolochia1393 also arrests shivering produced by cold.