skin And when you have thus done with the Apple and the pieces yet covered with the skin then draw out the ends of the thred and you shall after divide the Apple within without harming of the paring or skin into so many pieces as you list And when you have thus drawn out and taken the thred quite away you may keep the Apple so long as you think requisite A Pretty conceit how to catch Fowle without a Net To doe this take Arsenick putting the same in water and in that water boil Wheat or any other grain and cast the same forth unto Fowls and so many as eat thereof will not be able afterward to flie away And take the juyce of Gelidone and infuse Wheat in the same letting it remain there for three dayes after give the same to Fowls to eat and such as eat thereof you may after take with the hand Also take Wheat putting it in Wine-lees and let the same remain there eight dayes after that put it into the juyce of Celandine and Horehound to steep which so done then give of the same unto the Fowls to eat and such as eat thereof cannot flie away How to make a blown Bladder to dance and skip about from place to place To doe this take Quicksilver in a Bladder and lay the the Bladder in a hot place and it will after skip from place to place without handling An excellent conclusion how to put an Apple into a Viol. Hang the Vial on the twig of an Apple tree and put a young Apple in the mouth of the Vial and it will grow therein And so ye may doe with Grapes or other fruit To make fish or flesh seem raw Take the bloud of a Goat or of a Kid and dry it and keep it from the air then cast on Fish or Flesh that is hot and it will seem raw A new Receit for a Cook how with one Spit and with one fire to keep one Capon raw the second to boil and the third to roste Provide a long Spit and put thereon three Capons Chickens Pidgeons or what you please onely three then make a long fire and lay them thereto and let one turn the Spit Then on that you would keep raw pour continually cold water and on that you would boil pour scalding liquor and that which you would desire to roste baste it with Butter and so bread it A very useful secret for the making of divers Inks. 1. Golden Inke Take Chrystal beaten and temper it with the white of an Egge and write and when it is drye rub it over with a gold Ring 2. Silver Inke Take Black-lead temper it with Gum-water and write upon the black paper and when it is drie wipe it with linnen cloath and it wil shine like silver 3. Yellow Inke Take Saffron and Argil and temper them with gum-Gum-water and it wil appeare a perfect yellow 4. Green Inke Take Verdigrease Argil grinde them together on a Marble stone with a Moller then temper it it wil be a perfect green colour How to make a sportive Conclusion with a Cat by putting her into a small washing-bowle in a Pond Thames or other River Bring forth a small Washing-bowl and put therein a Cat then shove the Bowle and Cat into a great Pond the Thames or other River in a calm When you have so done manage your Spaniels or other Dogs that will take the water or be apt to bait a Cat and you shall have dainty sport for the Dogs with their feet will turne the bottome of the Bowl upwards the Cat being in the water will still flee to her little Pinnace she first boarded namely the Washing-bowl betwixt which will appear a terrible Sea-sight in fresh water How you may serve a Tapster such a trick that he shall not be able to froth his Cans or Jugs Provide but in readinesse the skin of a Red Herring and at some time or other when the Tapster is absent doe but rub a little on the inside of his Pots Cans or Jugs and he shall not in any wise be able to froth them for a long time after although he would This is a conceit to cozen the Tapster when he would cozen you How to take Crowes Kites Magpies or Iackdaws alive Take any piece of raw Flesh or Liver of a Beast and slice it into small morsels that they may swallow it then take the powder or slices of Nux Vomica and making holes in the flesh put it into the same and lay it where they haunt and presently after they have eaten of it they will take to a Tree as soon as they can suddenly totter and fall down where you may with hands easily take them but they wil quickly recover againe How to finde cut a delusion of the Vintners in mixing Water with their Clarets and Whites or Honey with their other sweet Wines If you suspect your French Wines as Clarets or Whites to be mingled with water which you may partly perceive by the thinnesse about the verge or brink of the glasse the best way to finde out the delusion thereof is to put a Pear pared into the glasse and if it doth swim aloft upon the Wine it is a pregnant evidence that the Wine is perfect and unmingled but if it sink to the bottome then of a certain water is mingled therewith If you likewise have any suspition of your sweet Wines as Canaries Maligoes c. that they should be mingled with Honey you may finde out the trick in this manner Take a few drops of the Wine and pour them on in a hot place of Iron and the Wine will soon dissolve but the Honey remain and thicken How to make a most excellent Water which I alwayes use to fasten Teeth that are loose to cleare the Gums from putrifaction to cause them to grow if need require to sweeten the breath and finally to divert away the Rheume from that place it being very astringent and cleansing Take two ounces of good White-wine vineger sour ounces of Rosemary flower water Myrrh Mastick bole Armenick fine Dragons blood in leafe of each an ounce Roch-Allum burnt and fine beaten Cinamon of each half an ounce a pint of fair water and half a pound of good honey with a little Benjamin mingle all these together and put it to boil for a quarter of an hour skimming it well then take it off let it cool and set it up in a Viol for your use gargle your mouth well with a little thereof every morning and before and after meals I cannot extol this secret too much having experimented it with good successe to many people of equality within this City of London as I can justifie Of a vessel which containes three several kinds of liquor all put in at one bung-hole and drawn out at one tap severally without mixture The Vessel is thus made it must be divided into three Sells for to contain the three liquors which admit to be
of Harts horn and colour it with Saffron putting thereto a scruple of Amber greece and a little Musk finely powdered and dry them made up into small Trochises neither by fire nor Sun but by a dry Ayre you may give to a man twenty granes of it and to a childe twelve granes Lac virgineum Take of Allum four ounces boil it in a quart of spring-Spring-water to the third part afterwards take of Litharge beaten into fine powder halfe a pound White-wine vinegar a pint and a halfe boile it to a pint straine both the waters then mix them together and stirre them about till they are white It takes away pimples rednesse and sun-burning the face being washed with it I have some things extraordinary which I cannot communicate to any but them that have need of my help and will make use of me What I have writ here is very good and necessary yet know my manual operation excels them beyond proportion in which I presume to be as expert in as any man in Europe whatsoever he be as the approbation of some of the best Doctors of this age shall justifie if need requires I glory not in knowing or doing much but in doing well that little which I undertake and the things which I undertake are these First I draw out hollow Teeth or roots though never so short with wonderful dexterity facility and ease I make even smooth and plain Teeth that are extravagant or sharper longer or ruggeder then the rest Hollow Teeth that for some reason you would not have drawn as the falling in of the check or an invincible apprehension or fear or the like I can stop them so that they shall neither ake putrifie nor smel ill I have the best secret in the world absolutely and infallibly to make Teeth most perfectly white and clean though never so black or rusty Foreteeth that are loose I can fasten very well in lesse then halfe an hour I can set in Artificial Teeth so well that none can possibly know them from natural ones Finally I cannot choose but convince their ignorance that are against drawing hollow Teeth or roots their common foolish objection is that I doe it more for my own profit then the Patients ease I say they may as well object the same against all other Arts Sciences or Trades in the world for it is evident and cleare that the drawing of Teeth from others is as necessary for thein as the profit is for me by reason that all the Art in the world cannot make a perished Tooth sound againe nor hinder it from infecting the next adjoyning teeth in time Besides hollow teeth breed often a stinking breath a canker in the mouth and other diseases in the body and their intolerable aking is able to make a body fall into a dangerous Feavours all which inconveniences may be shunned by having such teeth and roots neatly drawn Lastly if it be true that it is good to take the broken from the whole or that one scabbed sheep may spoil a whole flock or that it is good and necessary to repair imperfections of nature with Art then all that I have said herein is true and so I rest fully satisfied To conclude as there is no man free from the aspersions and slanders of envious tongues so I shall thinke my selfe sufficiently vindicated that the discreeter sort will suspend their judgement at the first view until they heare what others will say that have been under my hands for I desire no other praise save what they can justly give me and though some out of ignorance or malice or both cannot distinguish between an Operator and a cheating Mountebanke yet none can deny but that in all vocations there are some honest men as well as knaves both which I heartily wish may prosper and fare as they deserve and no otherwise I live upon London-bride next door to the sign of the Angel and am at home all the morning till eleven a clock and from three in the afternoon til night All Souldiers troubled with the Tooth-ache I will ease in courtesie the poor for Gods sake FINIS
MELANCHOLY'S BANE OR Choice Pleasant and Profitable RECREATIONS Gathered out of many most famous and industrious searchers of Art and Natures Secrets BY EDWARD FOUNTAINE an expert Artist Living upon London-bridge next door to the Angel I 've often heard a Bow still bent grows weak And too much worldly cares the heart may break Pleasure with profit any one can brook And you may finde both in this little book If that it may your kind acceptance find These harmless lines will recreate your mind Printed at London 1654. 1. How to make haire to grow Take halfe a pound of Aqua Melles in the spring time of the yeare warm a little of it every morning when you rise in a sauser or such a thing and tye a little spunge to a fine Box Combe and dip it in the said water and therewith moisten the very roots of your hair in combing it and it will help it to grow long thick and curled in a very short space How to write letters of secrets severall ways that can be read by none without this instruction following Take fine allom beat it small and put a reasonable quantity of it into a little water then write with the said water the which writing cannot be read but by steeping your paper afterwards in faire water You may likewise write with Vinegar or Joyce of a Lemon or of an Onyon then when you would read the same you must heat your paper against the fire Moreover if you will anoynt a piece of paper with Candle-greace and lay it upon an other white Paper then wright thereon next open your Paper asunder strew a little Powder upon your Paper and whatsoever colour your Pouder be of your writing wil appear of the same colour How to make Haire of any colour to become black Take a little Aqua fortis put therein a groat or six pence according to the quantity of the foresaid water then set both to dissolve before the fire Lastly dip a little spung in the said water wet your beard or haire therewith but touch not the skin How to make a Candle burn in water and endure a long time Take a Candle and stick at the bottom of it as much Lead as will make it stand upright in a pale of water and not sink and the said candle wil endure burning therein a wonderfull long time How to take out spots of Oyle or Greace Take the Bones of Sheeps feet burnt hem almost to ashes then bruise them to Powder and put of it upon your spots and lay all before the Sunne when it shines hottest when the Powder becomes black lay on fresh in the place till it suck out the spots which is done in very short time How to keep Meat fresh and sweet a long time without Salt Put your Meat in Flower Meale or Bran and therein it will keep fresh and sweet along time or else cast beaten Coriander seed and Vinegar on it and it will do the same How to make a Powder that will make good Inke in an instant Take Gall and Coperas as much of the one as of the other beat this into Powder mingle it and put it into a little water and on the present it wil be very good Inke Likewise if you strew of the same Powder upon white paper and write thereon with a little faire water the letters will appear presently black An experienced conceit how to make Hens lay Eggs all Winter thorow Take the tops of the Nettles when they begin to come unto seed and dry them which so dryed give a little of the same with Bran and Hempseed mingled together to your Hens and they shall every day after lay you an Egge a piece To make flesh seem to crawle full of Wormes And to doe this take Harp-strings and cut them into very short pieces which strew upon meat being taken hot out of the Pot and those pieces will then move and stir about like unto living wormes How to make Roots to have what proper forme you will on them To doe this take such green Roots which be big like as be the Briony-roots Radish-roots and Rape or Navew-roots and of any of these Roots carve and cut as you list and after put the same into the Earth letting it there so long remain until the same carving be covered with a skin And on such wise may you make the counterfeit Mandrakes in fashioning in the Briony-root as both Mattheolus and Cardane doe write the forme of a man with a Pen-knife and setting the same Root againe into the Earth with the head of the Root turned downward and a little Barley put under it which after will cleare and hang fast into the head of the Root and appear like unto the hair growing out of the same To write what you list on a Steel Dagger or Knife To doe this take an Ounce of Salt-peter and an Ounce of green Copperas beat these grosly together and after put the same into a strong bottle of glasse distilling a water of it which water use on this wise First take yellow or red Wax stretching the same upon the Dagger or Knife so far as you will draw or write thereupon unto the thicknesse of a paper lease and somewhat more after draw or write therein what you list drawing or writing unto the Steel and then fill that hollow drawing or holes with the distilled water which within a day and a night will have eaten it sufficiently And the like may you draw and doe on any other piece of Steel How to make a hollow Ring to dance by it selfe a proper secret To doe this take a Ring round about hollow into which put Quick-silver and stop the same fast that it run not forth After heat the Ring somewhat in the fire or let it lye neer unto the fire and being hot lay the same on a Table or Stool which by and by after will begin to dance of it selfe until it be cold againe How to make an Apple to move on the Table a proper secret To doe this take an Apple and cut the same in the midst and in the one halfe make a round hole putting therein a black Beetle and so lay the halfe on the Table and it will then move How to eut an Apple into many pieces without harming of the skin or paring To doe this take a most fine Needle with a smal thred and thrust the same by little and little under the paring and thrust it in againe right against the place until you have so gone round about the outside of the Apple And this also remember that you thrust the Needle thorow the paring at strait corners one against the other of the Apple and this so often doe until you come again unto the first place where you began And if so be you would divide the same in six or eight pieces then draw the thred again by a like distance alwayes taking heed to divide the Apple under the