the very first cause to these inferiours deriving her force into them like as it were a cord platted together and stretched along from heaven to earth in such sort as if either end of this cord be touched it will wag the whole therefore we may rightly call this knitting together of things a chain or link and rings for it agrees fitly with the rings of Plato and with Homers golden chain which he being the first author of all divine inventions hath signified to the wise under the shadow of a fable wherein he feigneth that all the gods and goddesses have made a golden chain which they hanged above in heaven and it reacheth down to the very earth But the truth of Christianity holdeth that the Souls do not proceed from the Spirit but even immediately from God himself These things a Magician being well acquainted withal doth match heaven and earth together as the Husband-man plants Elmes by his Vines or to speak more plainly he marries and couples together these inferiour things by their wonderful gifts and powers which they have received from their superiours and by this means he being as it were the servant of Nature doth bewray her hidden secrets and bring them to light so far as he hath found them true by his own daily experience that so all men may love and praise and honour the Almighty power of God who hath thus wonderfully framed and disposed all things CHAP. VII Of Sympathy and Antipathy and that by them we may know and find out the vertues of things BY reason of the hidden and secret properties of things there is in all kinds of creatures a certain compassion as I may call it which the Greeks call Sympathy and Antipathy but we term it more familiarly their consent and their disagreement For some things are joyned together as it were in a mutual league and some other things are at variance and discord among themselves or they have something in them which is a terror and destruction to each other whereof there can be rendred no probable reason neither will any wise man seek after any other cause hereof but only this That it is the pleasure of Nature to see it should be so that she would have nothing to be without his like and that amongst all the secrets of Nature there is nothing but hath some hidden and special property and moreover that by this their Consent and Disagreement we might gather many helps for the uses and necessities of men for when once we find one thing at variance with another presently we may conjecture and in trial so it will prove that one of them may be used as a fit remedy against the harms of the other and surely many things which former ages have by this means found out they have commended to their posterity as by their writings may appear There is deadly hatred and open enmity betwixt Coleworts and the Vine for whereas the Vine windes it self with her tendrels about every thing else she shuns Coleworts only if once she come neer them she turns her self another way as if she were told that her enemy were at hand and when Coleworts is seething if you put never so little wine unto it it will neither boil nor keep the colour By the example of which experiment Aâ—drocides found out a remedy against wine namely that Coleworts are good against drunkennesse as Theophrastus saith in as much as the Vine cannot away with the savour of Coleworts And this herbe is at enmity with Cyclamine or Sow-bread for when they are put together if either of them be green it will dry up the other now this Sow-bread being put into wine doth encrease drunkennesse whereas Coleworts is a remedy against drunkennesse as we said before Ivy as it is the bane of all Trees so it is most hurtful and the greatest enemy to the Vine and therefore Ivy also is good against drunkennesse There is likewise a wonderful enmity betwixt Cane and Fern so that one of them destroyes the other Hence it is that a Fern root powned doth loose and shake out the darts from a wounded body that were shot or cast out of Canes and if you would not have Cane grow in a place do but plow up the ground with a little Fern upon the Plough-shear and Cane will never grow there Strangle-tare or Choke-weed desires to grow amongst Pulse and especially among Beans and Fetches but it choaks them all and thence Dioscorides gathers That if it be put amongst Pulse set to seethe it will make them seethe quickly Hemlock and Rue are at enmity they strive each against other Rue must not be handled or gathered with a bare hand for then it will cause Ulcers to arise but if you do chance to touch it with your bare hand and so cause it to swell or itch anoint it with the juice of Hemlock Much Rue being eaten becometh poison but the juice of Hemlock expels it so that one poison poisoneth another and likewise Rue is good against Hemlock being drunken as Dioscorides saith A wilde Bull being tyed to a Fig-tree waxeth tame and gentle as Zoroaster saith who compiled a book called Geoponica out of the choice writings of the Antients Hence it was found out that the stalks of a wilde Fig-tree if they be put to Beef as it is boiling make it boil very quickly as Pliny writeth and Dioscorides ministreth young figs that are full of milky juice together with a portion of water and vinegar as a remedy against a draught of Bulls blood The Elephant is afraid of a Ram or an engine of war so called for as soon as ever he seeth it he waxeth meek and his fury ceaseth hence the Romans by these engines put to flight the Elephants of Pyrrhus King of the Epyrotes and so got a great victory Such a contrariety is there betwixt the Elephants members and that kind of Lepry which makes the skin of a man like the skin of an Elephant and they are a present remedy against that disease The Ape of all other things cannot abide a Snail now the Ape is a drunken beast for they are wont to take an Ape by making him drunk and a Snail well washed is a remedy against drunkennesse A man is at deadly hatred with a Serpent for if he do but see a Serpent presently he is sore dismaid and if a woman with child meet a Serpent her fruit becometh abortive hence it is that when a woman is in very sore travel if she do but smell the fume of an Adders hackle it will presently either drive out or destroy her child but it is better to anoint the mouth of the womb in such a case with the fat of an Adder The sight of a Wolfe is so hurtful to a man that if he spie a man first he takes his voice from him and though he would fain cry out yet he cannot speak but if he perceive that the man hath first espied him he
carefully closed up must needs last unputrified even for a whole age nay for all eternity At Rome I saw a fish that was drenched in the water that had been distilled out of the Vine and she was preserved five and twenty years as fresh as while she was alive and at Florence I saw the like of fourty years continuance the vessel was made of glass and made up with the seal of Hermes And I make no question but that all things that are sowced in this kind of liquor will last sound and good for many ages How many sorts of things I have preserved by this one means it were too long here to rehearse CHAP. XI That fruits may be very well preserved in salt-waters NExt after wine salt-water is of special use for preserving from putrefaction for such things as have been drenched therein have lasted long very sound and good The Ancients saw that whatsoever was preserved in salt was kept thereby from putrifying wherefore that they might preserve fruits from corruption they have used to drench them in salt-waters Homer calls salt a divine thing because it hath a special vertue against putrefaction and by it bodies are preserved to all eternity Plato calls it the friend of God because no sacrifices were welcome to him without salt Plutark saith that the Antients were wont to call it a divine influence because the bodies of creatures that were seasoned with salt from above were thereby acquitted from corruption Salt binds and dries and knits together and doth priviledge bodies from putrefaction that in their own nature must needs putrifie as the Aegyptians custome manifestly sheweth who were wont to season their dead bodies with salt as Herodotus writeth But let us come to examples Beritius saith that Pomegranates are preserved in salt-waters You must take sea-water or else brine and make it boil and so put your Pomegranates into it and afterward when they are thorough cold dry them and hang them up in the Sun and whensoever you would use them you must steep them in fresh-water two dayes before Columella rehearses the opinion of a certain Carthaginian touching this matter Mago would have saith he that Sea-water should be made very hot and Pomegranates being tied together with thread or broom-twigs to be drenched in it till they change their colour and then to be taken forth and dried in the Sun for three dayes and afterward to be hanged up and when you would use them you must steep them in fresh and sweet water for the space of four and twenty hours before and so they will be fit for your use Pliny also reports out of the same Author that Pomegranates are first to be hardened in hot Sea-water and then to be dried in the Sun three dayes and so to be hung up that the evening dew come not at them and when you would use them to steep them first in fresh-water Palladius writes the same out of Pliny and he sheweth also that Damosins may be preserved in salt-waters They must be fresh gathered and then drenched either in brine or else in sea-water scalding hot and then taken forth and dried either in the Sun or else in a warm Oven Columella would have them drenched in new wine sodden wine and vineger but he gives a special charge also to cast some salt amongst them lest the worm or any other hurtful vermine do grow in them Palladius likewise sheweth that Pears will last long in salt-water first the water is to be boiled and when it begins to rise in surges you must skim it and after it is cold put into it your Pears which you would preserve then after a while take them forth and put them up in a pitcher and so make up the mouth of it close and by this means they will be well preserved Others let them lie one whole day and night in cold salt-salt-water and afterward steep them two dayes in fresh-water and then drench them in new wine or in sodden wine or in sweet wine to be preserved Others put them in a new earthen pitcher filled with new wine having a little salt in it and so cover the vessel close to preserve them Likewise Modlars may be preserved in salt-water They must be gathered when they are but half ripe with their stalks upon them and steeped in salt-water for five dayes and afterward more salt-water poured in upon them that they may swim in it Didymus sheweth also that Grapes may be preserved long in salt-water You must take some sea-water and make it hot or if you cannot come at that take some brine and put wine amongst it and therein drench your clusters of grapes and then lay them amongst Barley straw Some do boil the ashes of a Fig-tree or of a Vine in water and drench their clusters therein and then take them out to be cooled and so lay them in Barley straw The grape will last a whole year together if you gather them before they be thorough ripe and drench them in hot water that hath Allome boiled in it and then draw them forth again The Antients were wont To put salt to Wine to make it last the longer as Columella sheweth They took new wine and boiled it till the third part was wasted away then they put it into vessels there to preserve it for their use the year following they put a pinte and a half of this liquor thus boiled into nine gallons of new wine unboiled and after two dayes when these liquors are incorporated together they wax hot and begin to spurge then they cast into them half an ounce of salt beaten small and that made the wine last till the next year Theophrastus and Pliny write that The fruits of those Palm-trees which grow in salt places are fittest to be preserved as those which grow in Judaea and Cyrenian Africk because those Countries especially do afford salt and sandy grounds for salt is a great nourisher of these kinds of fruits and they are preserved long even by their own saltnesse so that the salter the places are where they grow the better will the fruit be preserved So likewise that kind of Pulse which is called Cicer is preserved by its own saltness without any other dressing for the nature thereof is to have a saltish juice within it whereby it cometh to pass that whereas all other Pulse are subject to corruption and have some vermine or other breeding in them onely this kind doth not engender any at all because of the bitter and sharp saltish juice that is in it as Theophrastus writeth Didymus likewise writeth that Beans will last long in salt-water for if they be sowced in sea-water they will continue long without any blemish Pliny also sheweth that Garlick may be preserved in salt-water for if you would have Garlick or Onions to last long you must dip the heads thereof in warm salt-water so will they be of longer continuance and of a better taste So Cucumbers are preserved in
brine as the Quintiles affirm for if you preserve either Gourds or Cucumbers in brine they will last long So Apples and Myrtles may be preserved by lapping them up in Sea-weed one by one so that they may be covered all over with it and not touch one another as Apuleius sheweth If you have no Sea-weed then you must lay them up close in Coffers Aristotle is of opinion that the fruits of the Myrtle-tree need not to be lapped up in Sea-weed thereby to keep them from falling off from the Tree because they will stick on of themselves till they be thoroughly ripe but the blades of them are preserved by wrapping Sea-weed about them and the vapour of the Sea-weed thus wrapped about the blades will keep the juice of the fruit from being changed to any further maturity and cause it to continue long at one stay and this is by reason of the saltness of the Sea-weed whereby it doth intercept and dry up that moisture which should be derived into the fruit to ripen it We may learn also to preserve Olives in brine to have them good a year after Marcus Cato saith that those kinds of Olives which are called Orchites may be well preserved if they be laid up in brine while they are green or else if they be powned with Mâ—stick Columella saith that the Olives which are called Orchites and those which are called Pansiae and the little round Olive called Radiolus are to be knocked and beaten and so cast into brine and then to be taken out of the brine and squeezed and so cast into a vessel together with the blanched seeds of Mastick and Fennel then take a good quantity of new wine and half so much strong brine or pickle and put it into the vessel and so the fruit will be preserved Or else you may cast your Olives whole into a vessel and put in strong brine amongst them till the vessel be brim-full and so take them out for your uses when occasion serveth There are a certain kind of black Olives called also Orchites which Cato saith are thus to be preserved When they be dry cast them into salt and there let them lie for the space of two dayes afterward take them forth and shake off the salt and set them in the Sun two dayes together and so they will be preserved Marcus Varro reports the very same experiment out of Cato Columella saith while Olives be yet black and unripe you must tuck them off the Tree with your hand in a fair Sun-shining day and cull out the sound ones from those that have any blemish and into every peck and and an half of Olives put a quart and somewhat more of whole salt then put them into wicker baskets and there let them lie in salt thirty dayes together that the Lees or dregs may be still dropping forth afterward put them into some trey or such like vessel that you may wipe away the salt with a spunge and when you have done so barrel them up into a Hogs-head full of new wine or else of sodden wine and by this means they will be long preserved Didymus teacheth to make condite or preserved Olives on this manner When Olives are almost ripe you must gather them with their stalks and all then wash or steep them a whole day in cold water and afterward lay them a drying upon wicker Lattises handling them very gently then put them in the bottom of a vessel and cast good store of salt amongst them and into five pecks of Olives you must put in four gallons and two quarts of brine and two pints and a half of vineger And when you have filled up the vessel shake them together that the liquor may swim on the pot Columella Palladius and divers others do cast the Olives into Sea-water and there steep them seven dayes together and when they have taken them forth they condite them with brine and so put them up into some other vessel CHAP. XII That things may be specially well preserved in Oyl and Lees of Oyl OYl and especially Lees of Oyl do excellently conserve things defending them both from the injuries of the Air and of Animals Cato doth in short enumerate the faculties of Lees of Oyl he subacts the Barn-flores with Lees of Oyl that Mice may not eat his Corn. That also He may preserve his Grain in his Garner he dawbes the Pavement and Walls thereof with clay confected with Lees of Oyl That also Moths may not eat his clothes he be sprinkles them with Lees of Oyl as also that Seed Corn lying in the fields may be kept from erosion by Animals if it be steeped in Oyl lees as also Whetstones Shoes Brazen-vessels from rust all Woodden-houshold-stuff Potters-vessels and the like The same Cato also saith That Myrtle branches may be preserued with their Berries on in Lees of Oyl Bind these or any of the like Nature into bundles put them into a vessel of Oyl-lees so that the Oyl cover them then cover the vessel Didymus saith That roses may be kept in Oyl-lees fresh and vigorous if they be covered over with this liquor If you would preserve Figtree-branches with their fruits in Oyl-lees bundle them up with their leaves and all and put them in a vessel of Oyl-lees as we said of Myrtle but if you would keep dry Figs from corruption lay them up in a Potters vessel wet with Lees of Oyl decocted Olives may be preserved in Oyl for when they have lost their colour they may be gathered with their stalks preserved in Oyl and a year after they will represent their green colour and if you besprinkle them with common salt they will pass for new ones CHAP. XIII How Apples may belong conserved in Sawdust with leafs and Chaff or straw THe Ancients have invented many Trees whose fruits may be long preserved in their own saw dust because of its dryness Now every fruit is best kept in its own leaves dust and the like as we have said of Olives which are best kept in Oyl Grapes in wine c. Orenges may be kept in Cedar-dust As Palladius asserts who avers that many have experienced it in the like manner Quinces may be long kept in dust because as Democritus avers the dryness of the dust preserves them from putrefaction they may be also kept long in Wooll fine Tow or the like in Chests The fruits of the Fir-tree may be long kept in dust Many diffuse the saw-dust of the Poplar or Fir-tree amongst their fruits for their preservation Apuleius saith You may lay them involved in fine Tow into a vimineous basket and they will keep Pomegranates may be kept from putrefaction in Oak-dust Columella would have the dust first steeped in vinegar and then they laid in it Mago would have us first strew a new potters vessel with the dust then lay in the apples then strew another layer of dust and another of apples till the vessel be full which we must
and the hole stopt with flax to fourty Sextarii you must pour on three gallons of water and if you will not have the wine so sweet pour on five gallons and it will do After ten dayes the liquor is taken and again the third time also the same measure of water wherein the figs were infused is poured on and in the like manner after four or five dayes it is drawn off Some to six Amphorae thereof adde ten Sextarii of salt that it may not early corrupt others put Fennel and Thyme in the bottom and the Caricae on the top and so in order till the vessel be full also men make Wine of Pears which from the Greek word for Pears is called Apyres and from the Latin Piery Palladius saith it was thus They are bruised and put in a very course bag of Canvas and pressed with weights or in a Press It lasts in the Winter but in Summer comes it sowrer Dioscorides will not have the Pears too ripe the same way is made Wine of Pomegranates Sotion makes wine of the grains of the Pomegranate taking away what is in the middle of the grains Palladius put the ripe grains well purged into a Date pail and press them out with a scrue press then boil them gently to half when it is cold put it into vessels that are pitched or plaistered with Gipsum Some do not boil the juice but to every Sextarius they mingle one pound of honey and put all in the said vessels and keep it There is made Wine of the Lote-tree fruit There is a kind of Lote without any inward kernel which is as hard as a bone in the other kind wine is pressed also out of it like Mead that will not last above ten dayes Nepos saith the same from Pliny Athenaus from Polybius Wine is made of the Lote steeped in water and bruised very pleasant to the taste as the best Mead is it is drunk pure without water also but it will not last above ten dayes wherefore they make but little for use to last onely so long Vineger is made also of it And yet not much or good enough yet there is made Wine of Myrtles berries and Cornels Out of Sotion who of the berries of Myrtles and Cornels when they are fresh pounded and pressed our made wine Now I shall shew how we may make Wine of Corn. Drink is made of Corn. Dioscorides teacheth to make Beer of Barley also a drink is made of Barley called Curmi they use that drink oft-times for wine the like drinks are wont to be made of Wheat In Hiberia toward the west and in Britany whence Pliny of Corn drink is made Beer in Egypt called Zythum in Spain Caelia and Ceria Beer in France and other Provinces In Aristotles book of drunkenness those that drink wine made of Barley till they be drunk fall upon their backs they call that wine 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but those that are drunk with any other kind of drinks fall any way on the right or left hand forward or backward but those that drink Pinum fall onely upon their backs Wine made of Barley they call Brytum Sophocles in Triptolemo and Aeschylus in Lycurgo But Hellanicus saith that Brytum is made in Farms out of roots Hecateus saith that the Egyptians grinde Barley to make drink and that the Macedonians drink Brytum made of Barley and Parabia made of Millet and Rice saith Athenaeus Also wine is made of Rice for saith Aelianus when an Elephant fights in war they give him not onely wine of grapes but of Rice also Now the same drink is made in the Northern Climates of Corn and they call it Biera but they put hops to it for it cannot be made without Barley and Wheat are infused in the decoction of it We see that of Barley and Wheat steeped in water a drink is made that tastes like wine and of them I have made the best aqua vitae But these drinks of old were Physical rather then to use as wine But I shall shew how some drinks that are so like wine in taste that you would think they were wine indeed And first Wine of Honey To nine vessels of water put eighteen pounds of Honey into brass Caldrons covered with Tin and let them boil a long time stirring all with wooden ladles and wiping away the froth that riseth with little brushes pour it out put it into a wine vessel then take two pounds of red wine Tartar and boil them in water till they be dissolved to which add an eighth part of a vessel of vineger that the loathsome and unpleasing taste of the sweetnesse of Honey may be lost let these be mingled then pour on two vessels of the best wine then let it settle after some days strain it through a hair-cloth strainer or one of cloth to cleanse it from the filth and excrements A liquor will run from this that will serve for sparing and to abate charge in a family and it is good to drink in health and sickness cover it close and drink it I shall shew you another way to make Wine of Raisins Pour into a brass Caldron seven vessels of water put in two pounds of Raisins let them boil till they be wasted in the water and the water be sweet as Mead if your kettle be too small do it at several times then take your kettle from the fire and when the liquor grows cold strain it gently forth put up the strained liquor in a wine vessel and pour into it a measure of the sharpest red wine vineger to abate the sweetnesse of the Raisins then add nine pound of Tartar finely powdered unto it and pouring on a fourth part of the best wine stop the vessel close when it is full after one week use it Another Wine of Quinces Put into brass Caldrons glazed with Tin a vessel of new wine and put thereto about fifty wild Quinces namely such as are full of streeks and wrinkled take out their kernels cut the Quinces in peices like as you do Rape Roots boil all at a gentle fire when they have boild a while take them off and let them cool pound the Quinces in a morter with a wooden pestle press them out with a press put the juice pressed forth of them the new wine and set it up in a glazed earthen vessel for a whole year When wine is scarce and you have occasion to use this put â—nto a vessel four parts of water two of new wine and one fourth part of the aforesaid mixture cover the vessel and let it boil and when it is clear use it Of all these an amphora of vineger a pound of honey as much Tartar in powder let them boil a while in a pot glazed with Nitre and mingle them and for every vessel of water pour on an Amphora of wine and cover all and after twenty dayes use it or take honey one pound as much red wine Tartar half
a pound of Raisins two Amphoras of Vineger let them boil in a pot adde wine also to them and it will be for drink I shall adde the Northern drink Wine called Metheglin The drink in Pannonia Poland and England is more pleasant and wholesome then many wines are it is made of twenty pound of good honey and of water one hundred and twenty pound skimming it till all comes to eighty pound which being cold and tunned up into a wine vessel put in leaven of bread six ounces or as much as will serve to make it work and purifie it self and withal put into a bag that hangs and may be put into the liquor and not touch the bottom of Cinnamon granes of Paradise Pepper Ginger Cloves two drams one hand full of Elder flowers let them stand in a wine Cellar all the Winter in Summer set them fourty dayes in the Sun till they taste like wine and the unpleasant taste of the honey be gone But it will be more pleasant if you add a third part of wine CHAP. XXII How vineger may be made divers wayes and of what AFter wine it follows to speak of vineger First how our forefathers made it then how of late years that it may be made extream sowre which is not only good for a family but is necessary for many Arts. Also there are some Countries where wine and so vineger is scarce Therefore in those places divers men have used their wits to make it wherefore to begin we say that Vineger may be made of the Fig-tree Out of Columella A green fig must be taken very betimes and also if it have rained and the figs fall to the earth beaten down with showres gather those figs and put them up in Hogs-heads or Amphora and let them ferment there then when it grows sharp and hath sent out some liquor what vineger there is strain it out diligently and pour it into a sweet pitched vessel This yields the best sharp vineger and it will never grow musty or hoary if it be not set in too moist a place Some to make more quantity mingle water with the figs and then they adde to them the ripest new figs and they â—et them consume in that liquor until it tast sharp enough like vineger then they strain all through rushy baskets or withie bags and they boil this vineger till they have taken off all the froth and filth from it Then they adde some terrefied salt and that hinders worms and other vermine to breed in it Cassianus makes it thus Put into a vessel old figs terresied Barley and the internal parts of Citrons Stir it often and diligently and when they are putrified and soaked strain them out and use them Apuleius They make vineger of figs wet upon the Trees and cast into water to putrifie Dioscorides The liquor of figs steeped grows sharp as vineger and is used for it There is made also Vineger of Dates To Date wine we speak of some adde water and receive it again and they do this three four five or six times and at last it grows sowre From the same Pliny teacheth to make Vineger of honey You must wash your honey vessels or hives in water with this decoction is made the most wholesome vineger Palladius teacheth the way to make Vineger of Pears wild Pears are such as are sharp and ripe are kept three dayes in a heap then they are put into a vessel and fountain or river water is put to them the vessel is left covered thirty dayes then as much vineger as is taken out for use so much water is put in to repair it Cassianus makes Vineger of Peaches Put soft delicate Peaches into a vessel and adde parched Barley to them let them putrifie for one day then strain them out and use it We may from Cassianus make Vineger without wine If you boil Gypsum and sea-sea-water and then mingle it with River water and use it being strained But if you will Turn wine into vineger and contrarily vineger into wine Cassianus hath it He puts Beet roots bruised into wine it will be vineger when three hours are over But if he would restore it again as it was he puts in Cabbage roots So also To make the same We may do it another way and quickly Cast into wine Salt Pepper and sowre leaven mingle them and they will soon make it vineger But to do it more quickly quench in it often a red hot brick or piece of steel also provide for that unripe Medlars Cornels Mulberries and Plums But Sotion shews to make Sharp vineger of new wine Dry the mother of wine of grapes at the Sun and put them into new wine adding a few sowre grapes thereto and it will make sharp vineger that will be for use after seven dayes or put in pellitory of Spain and it will be sharp Moreover if you boil a fourth or fifth part of vineger at the fire put that to the rest and set all eight days in the Sun you shall have most sharp and pleasant wine The roots of old grass and Raisins and the leaves of a wild Pear-tree bruised and the root of the bramble and whey of milk burnt Acorns Prunes rosted and the decoctions of Chiches and pot-sheards red hot all of these put severally into vineger will make it tart Apuleius teacheth To double the quantity of vineger Take a good measure of Vineger about a Metreta and to that adde one Metreta of Sea-water boiled to half mingle them and set them aside in a vessel Some steep Barley and strain it and of that juice they mingle one Metreta and they stir them together and they cast in torrefied salt when it is yet hot a good quantity then they cover the vessel and let it stand eight dayes But I use to make it thus Vineger of clusters of grapes pressed forth After the Vintage we cast in the clusters when the wine is pressed forth into a wooden vessel and we pour upon them a quantity of water and it will be vineger when a week is over Moreover we cut the tendrels from Vines and bruise them and put water to them and it will be vineger Also thus Ill wine is turned to vineger When the bunches of grapes are pressed forth lay them between two wooden bowls not very thick together let them grow hot for four days then pour on them so much naughty wine as may cover them let them alone 24 hours then strain them into another wooden bowl and after so many hours put them into another bowl and do so til it be turned into most sharp white vineger and if you would make more of the same clusters pour on upon them some sharp vineger and let them alone till they be extream sharp and sowre then take that out and pour on ill wine and do as you did Lastly press those clusters out in a press and you shall recover as great quantity as of the wine that was spent CHAP. XXIII
How the defects of wine may be managed and restored OUr forefathers found out many remedies to preserve wine and in our dayes we have taken no less pains For wine is easily corrupted and takes to it self many strange qualities Paxamus saith wine either grows sowre or dead about the Solstices and when the seven stars set or when the dog star causeth heat and when it is extream cold or hot or rainy or windy or when it thunders We shall shew remedies for all these First we shall lay down out of Africanus the signs to know wines that will last or will corrupt When you have put your wine into a vessel after some time change the vessel and look well on the Lees for thence shall you know what the wine is proving it by smelling to it whether it corrupt or weevils breed in it these are signs it putrifies Others take wine out of the middle of the vessel they heat it and when it is cold they taste of it and they judge of the wine by the favour some by the smell of the cover a strong taste is the best sign a watry the worst sharpness of duration weakness of corrupting The signs must be taken at the times to be feared we mentioned But to come to the remedies we shall shew how To mend weak wine The wine will be weak when it begins to breath forth that force of heat fot when the soul of it is breathed forth the wine grows immediately sowre vineger is the carcasse of wine Then we may presently prevent it by adding aqua vitae to it for by that it may put on a new soul the measure will be the fourth part of a pound for a vessel Another remedy will be That wine may not grow hot In the Summer Solstice wine grows hot by the hot weather and is spoiled then put quick-silver into a glass-viol well stopt and hang it in the middle of the vessel and the coldness of it will keep the wine from heating The quantity is two pound for great vessels for when the air is hot the external heat draws forth the inward heat and when that is gone it is spoiled We That wine may not exhale use this remedy The vessel being full we pour oyle upon it and cover it for oyle keeps the spirits from evaporating which I see is now used for all liquors that they may not be perverted Wines sometimes are troubled But To clear wines Fronto bids us do thus Cast three whites of egges into a large earthen dish and beat them that they may froth put some white salt to them that they may be exceeding white and pour them into a vessel full of wine for salt and the white of an egge will make all thick liquors clear but as many Dolia or such measures as there are in the vessel so many whites of egges must you have to be mingled again with so many ounces of salt but you must stir the mixture with a stick and in four dayes it will grow clear Also it is done That wines may not corrupt I said that salt keeps all things from corrupting wherefore for every Dolium powder one ounce of Allome and put it into the wine vessel with the wine for it will keep it from corrupting The same is done if you put in one ounce of common salt or half one half the other Also brimstone hinders putrefaction Wherefore if you shall adde to eight ounces of Allome or of Salt four ounces of brimstone you shall do well The Antients were wont to peserve wine by adding Salt or sea-water to it and it would continue along time Columella teacheth thus when the winds are quiet you must take water out of the deep sea when it is very calm and boyl it to thirds adding to it if you please some spices There are many ordinary things but we let them pass CHAP. XXIV How Oyl may be made of divers things IT is an excellent thing to shew the diversity of ways to make Oyl That if Olives should ever be scarce yet we might know how to draw Oyl from many kinds of fruits and seeds And some of these ways that came from the Antients yet onely the best and such as are our inventions Wherefore to begin We say that Oyl may be made of Ricinus call'd Cicinum Dioscorides makes it thus Let ripe Ricini as many as you please wither in the hot Sun and be laid upon hurdles let them be so long in the Sun till the outward shell break and fall off Take the flesh of them and bruise it in a morter diligently then put it into a Caldron glazed with Tin that is full of water put fire under and boil them and when they have yielded their inbred juyce take the vessel from the fire and with a shell skim off the Oyl on the top and keep it But in Egypt where the custom of it is more common for they cleanse the Ricini and put them into a Mill and being well grownd they press them in a press through a basket Pliny saith They must be boiled in water and the Oyl that swims on the top must be taken off But in Egypt where there is plenty of it without fire and water sprinkled with Salt it is ill for to eat but good for Candles But we collected them in September for then is the time to gather them with it parts from a prickly cover and a coat that holds the seed in it it is easily cleansed in a hot Caldron The weight of Oyl is half as much as the seed but it must be twice knocked and twice pressed Palladius shews how Oyl of Mastick is made gather many Grains of the Mastick-tree and let them lye in a heap for a day and a night Then put a basket full of those Berries into any vessel and pouring hot water thereto tread them and press them forth Then from that humour that runs forth of them the Oyl of Mastick that swims on the top is poured off But remember lest the cold might hold it there to pour hot water often on For thus we see it made with us and all the Country of Surrentum also so is made Oyl of Turpentine as Damageron teacheth The fruit of Turpentine is grownd in a Mill as the Olives are and is pressed out and so it sends forth Oyl The kernels serve to feed hogs and to burn Likewise Oyl of Bays Boil Bay-berries in water the shels yield a certain fat it is forced out by crushing them in the hands then gather the Oyl into horns Palladius almost as Dioscorides in January boil many Bay-berries that are ripe and full in hot water and when they have boy'ld long the watry oyl that swims on the top that comes from them you shall gently pour off into vessels driving it easily with feathers The Indians make as it is said Oyl of Sesamon It is made as we said before it sends forth excellent Oyl abundantly There is made Oyl of
made of most fine beards of corn and it will fill the whole vessel that the eye can behold nothing more pleasant The same is made of gold with aqua regia CHAP. VI. Of Silver I Shall teach how to give silver a tincture that it may shew like to pure gold and after that how it may be turned to true gold To give Silver a Gold-colour Burn burnt brass with stibium and melted with half silver it will have the perfect colour of gold and mingle it with gold it will be the better colour We boil brass thus I know not any one that hath taught it you shall do it after this manner melt brass in a crucible with as much stibium when they are both melted put in as muâ—h stibium as before and pour it out on a plain Marble-stone that it may cool there and be fit to beat into plates Then shall you make two bricks hollow that the plates may be fitly laid in there when you have fitted them let them be closed fast together and bound with iron bands and well luted when they are dried put them in a glass fornace and let them stand therein a week to burn exactly take them out and use them And To tincture Silver into gold you must do thus Make first such a tart lye put quick lime into a pot whose bottom is full of many small holes put a piece of wood or tilesheard upon it then by degrees pour in the powder and hot water and by the narrow holes at the bottom let it drain into a clean earthen vessel under it do this again to make it exceeding tart Powder stibium and put into this that it may evaporate into the thin air let it boil at an easie fire for when it boils the water will be of a purple colour then strain it into a clean vessel through a linnen cloth again pour on the lye on the powders that remain and let it boil so long at the fire till the water seems of a bloody colour no more Then boil the lye that is colour'd putting fire under till the water be all exhaled but the powder that remains being dry with the oyl of Tartar dried and dissolved must be cast again upon plates made of equal parts of gold and silver within an earthen crucible cover it so long with coles and renew your work till it be perfectly like to gold Also I can make the same Otherwise If I mingle the congealed quick-silver that I speak of with a cap with a third part of silver you shall find the silver to be of a golden colour you shall melt this with the same quantity of gold and put it into a pot pour on it very sharp vinegar and let it boil a quarter of a day and the colour will be augmented Put this to the utmost trial of gold that is with common salt and powder of bricks yet adding Vitriol and so shall you have refined gold We can also extract Gold out of Silver And not so little but it will pay your cost and afford you much gain The way is thiâ— Put the fine filings of Iron into a Crucible that will endure fire till it grow red hot and melt then take artificial Chrysocolla such as Goldsmiths use to soder with and red Arsenick and by degrees strew them in when you have done this cast in an equal part of Silver and let it be exquisitely purged by a strong vessel made of Ashes all the dregs of the Gold being now removed cast it into water of separation and the Gold will fall to the bottom of the vessel take it there is nothing of many things that I have found more true more gainful or more hard spare no labour and do it as you should lest you lose your labour or otherwise let the thin filings of Iron oak for a day in sea-water let it dry and let it be red hot in the fire so long in a â—rucible till it run then cast in an equal quantity of silver with half brass let it be projected into a hollow place then purge it exactly in an ash vessel for the Iron being excluded and its dregs put it into water of separation and gather what falls to the bottom and it will be excellent Gold May be it will be profitable to Fix Cinnaber He that desires it I think he must do thus break the Cinnaber into pieces as big as Wall-nuts and put them into a glass vessel that is of the same bigness and the pieces must be mingled with thrice the weight of silver and laid by courses and the vessel must be luted and suffer it to dry or set it in the Sun then cover it with ashes and let it boil so long on a gentle fire till it become of a lead colour and break not which will not be unless you tend it constantly till you come so far Then purge it with a double quantity of lead and when it is purged if it be put to all tryals it will stand the stronger and be more heavy and of more vertue the more easie fire you use the better will the business be effected but so shall we try to repair silver and revive it when it is spoil'd Let sublimate quick-silver boil in distil'd vinegar then mingle quick-silver and in a glass retort let the quick-silver evaporate in a hot fire and fall into the receiver keep it If you be skilful you shall find but little of the weight lost Others do it with the Regulus of Antimony But otherwise you shall do it sooner and more gainfully thus Put the broken pieces of Cinnaber as big as dice into a long linnen bag hanging equally from the pot sides then pour on the sharpest venegar with alom and tartar double as much quick lime four parts and as much of oaken ashes as it is usual to be made or you must make some Let it boil a whole day take it out and boil it in oyl be diligent about it and let it stay there twenty four hours take the pieces of Cinnaber out of the oyl and meer them with the white of an egge beaten and role it with a third part of the filings of silver put it into the bottom of a convenient vessel and lute it well with the best earth as I said set it to the fire three days and at last increase the fire that it may almost melt and run take it off and wash it from its faeces that are left at the last proof of silver and bring it to be true and natural Also it will be pleasant From fixt Cinnaber to draw out a silver beard If you put it into the same vessel and make a gentle fire under silver that is pure not mixed with lead will become hairy like a wood that there is nothing more pleasant to behold CHAP. VII Of Operations necessary for use I Thought fit to set down some Operations which are generally thought fit for our works and if you know them
not you will not easily obtain your deâ—â—re I have set them down here that you might not be put to seek them elswhere First To draw forth the life of Tinne The filings of Tinne must be put into a pot of earth with equal part of salt-peter you shall set on the top of this seven as many other earthen pots with holes bored in them and stop these holes well with clay set above this a glass vessel with the mouth downwards or with an open pipe with a vessel under it put fire to it and you shall hear it make a noise when it is hot the life flies away in the fâ—me and you shall find it in the hollow pots and in the bottom of the glased vessel compacted together If you bore an earthen vessel on the side you may do it something more easily by degrees and you shall stop it So also From Stibium we may extract it Stibium that Druggists call Antimony is grownd small in hand-mills then let a new crucible of earth be made red hot in a cole fire cast into it presently by degrees Stibium twice as muâ—h Tartar four parts of salt-peter finely powdred when the fume riseth cover it with a cover lest the fume rising evaporate then take it off and cast in more till all the powder be burnt then let it stand a little at the fire take it off and let it cool and skim off the dregs on the top and you shall find at the bottom what the Chymists call the Regulus it is like Lead and easily changed into it For saith Dioscorides should it burn a little more it turns to Lead Now I will shew how one may draw a more noble Metal To the out-side As foolish Chymists say for they think that by their impostures they do draw forth the parts lying in the middle and that the internal parts are the basest of all but they erre exceedingly For they eat onely the outward parts in the superficies that are the weakest and a little quick-silver is drawn forth which I approve not For they corrode all things that their Medicament enters the harder parts are left and are polished and whitened may be they are perswaded of this by the medals of the Antients that were within all brass but outwardly seemed like pure silver but those were sodered together and beaten with hammers and then stamp'd Yet it is very must to do it as they did and I think it cannot be done But the things that polish are these common Salt Alom Vitriol quick Brimstone Tartar and for Gold onely Verdigrease and Salt Ammoniack When you would go about it you must powder part of them and put them into a vessel with the metal The crucible must be luted with clay and covered there must be left but a very small hole for perspiration then set it in a gentle fire and let it burn and blow not lest the metal melt when the powders are burnt they will sink down which you shall know by the smoke then take off the cover and look into them But men make the Metal red hot and then when it is hot they drench it in or otherwise they put it in vinegar till it become well cleansed and when you have wrapt the work in linnenrags that was well luted cast it into an earthen vessel of vinegar and boil it long take it out and cast it into urine let it boil in salt and vinegar till no filth almost rise and the foul spots of the ingredients be gone and if you find it not exceeding white do the same again till you come to perfection Or else proceed otherwise by order Let your work boil in an earthen pot of water with salt alom and tartar when the whole superficies is grown white let it alone a while then let them boil three hours with equal parts of brimstone salt-peter and salt that it may hang in the middle of them and not touch the sides of the vessel take it out and rub it with sand till the fume of the sulphur be removed again let it boil again as at first and so it will wax white that it will endure the fire and not be rejected for counterfeit you shall find it profitable if you do it well and you will rejoyce if you do not abuse it to your own ruine CHAP. VIII How to make a Metal more weighty IT is a question amongst Chymists and such as are addicted to those studies how it might be that silver might equal gold in weight and every metal might exceed its own weight That may be also made gold without any detriment to the stamp or engraving and silver may increase and decreasâ— in its weight if so be it be made into some vessel I have undertaken here to teach how to do that easily that others do with great difficulty Take this rule to do it by that The weight of a Golden vessel may increase without hurting the mark if the magnitude do not equal the weight You shall rub gold with thin silver with your hands or fingers until it may dâ—ink it in and make up the weight you would have it sticking on the superficies Then prepare a strong lixivium of brimstone and quick lime and cast it with the gold into an earthen pot with a wide mouth put a small fire uâ—der and let them boil so long till you see that they have gain'd their colour then take it out and you shall have it Or else draw forth of the velks of eggs and the litharge of gold water with a strong fire and quench red hot gold in it and you have it Another that is excellent You shall bring silver to powder either with aqua fortis or calx the calx is afterwards washt with water to wash away the salt wet a golden vessel or plate with water or spittle that the quantity of the powder you need may stick on the outward superficies yet put it not on the edges for the fraud will be easily discovered by rubbing it on the touch stone Then powder finely salt one third part brick as much vitriol made red two parts take a brick and make a hole in it as big as the vessel is in the bottom whereof strew alâ—m de plume then again pour on the powder with your work till you have filled the hole then cover the hole with another brick and fasten it with an Iron pin and lute the joynts well with clay let this dry and let it stand in a reverberating fire about a quarter of a day and when it is cold open it and you shall find the gold all of a silver colour and more weighty without any hurt to the stamp Now to bring it to its former colour do thus Take Verdi rease four parts Salammoniack two parts salt-peter a half part as much brick alom a fourth part mingle these with the waters and wash the vessel with it then with iron tongs put it upon burning coles that it
find the brimstone almost white at the bottom of the vessel adde that to what you had before and set it again to boil with three parts as much distilled vinegar till the vinegar all evaporate and dry the brimstone take heed it burn not when it is dry put it again into distilled vinegar working the same way so often until putting a little of it upon a red hot plate of iron it will melt without flame or smoke Then cast it on a lump of gold and silver and the gold will sink to the bottom presently but the silver will remain on the top For if brimstone be boil'd in a Lixivium so strong that it will bear an egg until it will not smoke and will melt on a fire-cole if it be projected on a mass of gold and silver mingled when they are melted it will part the gold from the silver Also there is an ingenious and admirable way To part silver from brass with certain powders The best are those are made of powdred lead half so much quick brimstone and arsenick and common salt double as much salt-peter one half powder those fine each by themselves then mingle them Take the mixt metal with half so much more of the powder and in a vessel that will endure fire strew it in by turns and set the vessel fil'd at a strong fire till all melt take it out and cast it into another vessel that is broad atop narrow at bottom and hot as we said and smeered with ram or sowes grease clarified let it cool for you shall find the silver at the bottom and the brass on the top part one from the other with an iron rasp or file if you will you may purge your silver again in a copple But the silver must be made into thin plates that when it is strewed interchangeably with the powders they may come at it on all sides then cover the vessel with its cover and lute it well But the salt must be decrepitated that it leap not out and the brimstone prepared and fixed But we may thus Part gold from brass Make salt of these things that follow namely Vitriol Alom Salt-peter quick Brimstone of each a pound Salt-ammoniack half a pound Powder them all and boil them in a lye made of ashes one part as much quick lime four parts of beech-ashes melt them at the fire and decant them and boil them till the Lixivium be gone then dry it and keep it in a place not moist lest it melt and mingle with it one pound of powder of lead and strew on of this powder six ounces for every pound of brass made not in a melting vessel and let them be shaken and stirred vehemently with an iron thing to stir it with when the vessel is cold break it you shall find a lump of gold in the bottom Do the rest as I said CHAP. X. A compendious way to part gold or silver from other Metals with aqua fortis WE shall teach thus compendiously to part gold from silver and silver from other metals and it is no small gain to be got by it if a man well understood what I write for I have known some by this art that have got great wealth For example take a mixture of brass and silver dissolve it in common aqua fortis when it is consumed cast fountain-water into it to remove the sharpness of the water and that it can no more corrode the metal Put the water into a great mouthed earthen vessel and plunge plates of brass therein for the silver will stick to them like a cloud the brass is best in the water put the water into a glass retort with a large belly and make a soft fire under and the fountain-water will distil forth by degrees When you know that the whole quantity of fountain-water is distilled out or the belly of the retort looks of a yellow colour and the sent of the salts pierceth your nostrils take away the receiver and put another that is empty to it and lure it well that nothing break forth Augment the fire and you shall draw off your aqua fortis as strong as before and the brass will be at the bottom of the retort The aqua fortis will be as good as it was and you may use it oft-times THE SIXTH BOOK OF Natural Magick Of counterfeiting Precious Sones THE PROEME FRom the adulterating of Metals we shall pass to the counterfeiting of Jewels They are by the same reason both Arts are of kin and done by the fire And it is no fraud saith Pliny to get gain to live by and the desire of money hath so kindled the firebrand of luxury that the most cunning artists are sometimes cheated They are counterfeited by divers ways either by cutting Jewels in the middle and putting in the colours and joyning them together or else by giving a tincture to Crystal that is all one piece or counterfeiting Crystal by many ingredients or we shall attempt to make true Jewels to depart from their proper colour and all of them to be so handsomly coloured that they may shew like natural Jewels Lastly I shall shew how to make Smalt of divers colours CHAP. I. Of certain Salts used in the composition of Gems WE wil first set down certain operations which are very necessary in the making of Gems lest we be forced to repeat the same thing over again And first How to make Sal Soda The herb Kali or Saltwort is commonly called Soda grinde this Soda very small and sift it into powder put it into a brass Cauldron and boil it pouring in for every pound of Soda a firkin of water Let it boil for four hours till the water be consumed to a third part Then take it from the fire and let it stand twelve hours while the dregs settle to the bottom and the water becomes clear then drain out the water with a linnen cloth into another vessel and pour fresh water into the Cauldron Boil it again and when it is cold as before and all the dross setled filtrate the clear water out again Do as much the third time still having a care to try with your tongue whether it be still salt At last strain the water and set it in an earthen vessel over the fire keeping a constant fire under it until the moisture being almost consumed the water grow more thick and be condensed into salt which must presently be taken out with an iron ladle and of five pound of Soda you will have one pound of salt How to make Salt of Tartar Take the lees of old wine and dry it carefully it is commonly called Tartar put it into an Alimbeck made in such sort that the flame may be retorted from the top and so augment the heat There let it burn you will see it grow white then turn it with your iron tongs so that the upper part which is white may be at bottom and turn the back up to the
to which glass is very subject put into the crucible some white lead which presently groweth red then melts with the glass and becomes clear and perspicuous Make your tryal then with an iron hook for if it be clear of those bubbles it is perfected and so will be a perfect mass of Gems Now we will teach the several Colours Yellow Green or Blue wherein we will cast our Gems CHAP. IV. To make Colours WHile the Crystal is preparing in the fornace by the same fire the Colours may be also made And first How to make Crocus of Iron Take three or four pounds of the limature of Iron wash it well in a broad vessel for by putting it into water the weight of the iron will carry that to the bottom but the straws and chips and such kind of filth will swim on the top so you will have your filings clean and wash'd Then dry it well and put it into an earthen glazed pot with a large mouth and pour into it three or four gallons of the best and sharpest vinegar there let it macerate three or four weeks stirring it every day seven or eight times with an iron rod then giving it time to settle pour out the vinegar into another pot and put fresh vinegar into the iron and do this till the vinegar have consumed all the filings Then put all the vinegar into an earthen vessel and set it on the fire and let it boil quite away In the bottom there will remain a slimy durty mattter mixt with a kind of fatness of the iron which the fire by continuance will catch hold of let it burn and the remaining dust will be Crocus Others file your rusty nails and heating them red hot quench them in vinegar then strain them and dry the rust and set it again to the fire till it be red hot then quench it again with vinegar this they do three or four times at length they boil the vinegar away and take the remaining Crocus from the bottom Next remains to shew How to reduce Zaphara into Powder A litâ—le window is to be made out of the side of the fornace nigh to which must be built a little cell or oven so joyned to the mouth of the oven that the flame may be brought in through a little hole Let this cell have a little door without to admit the workmans hand upon occasion Let this cell be a foot in length and breadth Set the Saffron upon a Potters tile into the cell and shut the door let it be red hot and after six hours take it out and put it into water so will it cleave into pieces let it be dryed stamped and so finely seirced that it may scarce be felt But if it cannot be effected with a pestle and morter pour water upon the powder and stir it with your hands and let it settle for a while then strain it into another vessel and pour fresh water into the powder and reiterate this so often till that which setleth being beat and brayed do pass through with water then dry it and it will become very fine powder How to burn Copper Set the filings of Copper with an equal quantity of salt mixt in an earthen pot over the fire and turn it about three or four hours with an iron book that it may be burned on all sides There let it burn a whole natural day then take it out and divide it into two parts lay the one part aside and set the other with salt on the fire again for an artificial day do the same three or four times that it may be more perfectly calciâ—ed always having a care that it be as hot as may be but that it melt not Waen it is burnt it is black CHAP. V. How Gems are coloured ALl things being thus prepared there is nothing more I think remaineth to make an end of this work but to know how to colour them And we will begin with the way How to dye a Saphire Artificers begin with a Saphire for when it is coloured unless it be presently removed from the fire it loseth the tincture and the longer it remains in the fire the brighter it groweth Put a little Zaphara as they call it into a pot of glass two drachms to a pound of glass then stir it continually from top to bottom with an iron hook when it is very well mixed make tryal whether the colour please you or no by taking a little out of the pot If it be too faint adde some more Zaphara if too deep put in more glass and let it boil six hours Thus you may Colour Cyanus or sea-sea-water another kind of Saphire Beat your calcined brass into very fine powder that you may scarce feel it for otherwise it will mix with the Crystal and make it courser the quantity cannot be defined for there are lighter and deeper of that kind for the most part for one pound one drachm will be sufficient How to counterfeit the colour of the Amethist To a pound of Crystal put a dram of that they call Manganess and so the colour is made If the Gem be great make it the paler if small make it deeper for they use such for rings and other uses To counterfeit the Topaze To every pound of glass adde a quarter of an ounce of crocus of Iron and three ounces of red-lead to make it of a brighter red First put in the lead then the crocus The Chrysolite When you have made a Topaze and would have a Chrysolite adde a little more Copper that it may have a little verdure for the Chrysolite differeth from the Topaze in nothing but that it hath a greater lustre So we are wont To counterfeit an Emerald This shall be the last for we must let our work be as quick as possible because the copper being heavy when it is mixed with the Crystal doth presently sink down to the bottom of the pots and so the Gems well be of too pale a colour Therefore thus you must do when you give the tincture to a Cianus you may easily turn it into Smaragde by adding crocus of iron in half the quantity of the copper or brass viz. if at first you put in a fourth part of copper Now you must adde an eighth part of crocus and as much copper After the colours are cast in let it boil six hours that the material may grow clear again for the casting in the colours will make them contract a cloudiness Afterwards let the fire decrease by degrees until the fornace be cold then take out the pots and break them wherein you shall find your counterfeit precious Stones CHAP. VI. How Gems may otherwise be made THe manner which I have set down is peculiar and usual to our Artificers and by them is also accounted a secret But I will set down another way which I had determined always to keep secret to my self for by it are made with less charge less time and less
let it heat and melt then remove it with iron tongs into the hottest flames of the glass-makers fornace for three or four days Afterwards the pot being taken out and cold break it and in the top you will find glass of a saffron colour not clear but the longer it standeth in the fire the perfecter it will grow neither have I known better in this kind of those many that I have tryed It must be reduced into fine powder for the which not onely a morter and mills will be requite but also a Porphyrian stone If it be too florid you may make it of a more faint colour by adding glass to it Another way to make it This is onely for friends Take nine parts of burnt Tinne seven of Lead two of Cinnabaris of Spanish-soder and Tartar one part and a half of the Blood-stone one part of Painters red a fourth part And do with it as in the former CHAP. X. Of leaves of Metal to be put under Gems THere are certain leaves of Metal laid under Gems which being perspicuous are thereby made paler or deeper as you will for if you would have them of a fainter colour you must put under them leaves of a more clear brightness if of a deeper leaves of a darker hue Moreover Gems being transparent are seen quite through and discover the bottom of the ring which taketh much of their beauty off This is an invention of later times who by terminating the transparency of stones with leaves of a most bright and pleasant colour do fit and make up and mend the colour of the stones I have been very much delighted in this kind of work and therefore will deliver it particularly The leaves are to be made either of Copper alone or of Copper Gold and Silver mixt together I will speak of those which are made of Copper alone You must buy at the Brasiers-shops some thin plates of Copper of the thickness of strong paper that they may be the easier made thinner which you must cut into pieces of three fingers in length and two in breadth so that a sheet of two pound will be divided into a hundred and thirty parts these we must divide again into two parts that they may be hammered more easily Take fourty and heat them as Artificers do gold when they beat it out into thinne rays Let the anvile and hammer be smooth and polished lest the heavy stroaks should make dents in the Copper and break it Discontinue your work by turns so that you may hammer the Copper while it is hot and prepared by the fire and put it into the fire when it is cold for if you do otherwise it will break in pieces which you must presently remove from the rest for those that are broken will break others But that they may be the more easier prepared when they begin to be exâ—eruated I make use of this invention There must be prepared two plates of iron of a hand square and the thickness of paper Double one of them that it may receive the other within the folds of it so that they may receive the plates of Copper in the middle and enclose them on all sides that they can neither slip out nor any dust or ashes fall in so stick to them When you have thus enclosed the Copper plates put them into the fire and heat them then take them out with iron tongs and shaking off the ashes beat them with your hammer till they are cold and so they will become thin and fine rays But while you are beating one set others to heat and do this eight times over until you have hammer'd them very thin and made them fit for your purpose It will be worth your labor to look often upon them to see if any be broken in the working for they will break their fellows But because they are wont to grow black in the working and foul so that they oftentimes deceive the eye therefore it is fit that you have a pot of water ready with an equal quantity of Tartar and salt in it and let it boil over the fire Put into it your rays and stirre them about continually till they be boiled white Then take them out and wash them in a pot of clear water till they be very clean then dry them with a linnen cloth and then heat them and beat them on the anvile again as before until they spread into rays as thin as leaf-gold When this work is to be done the hammer and anvile must be as smooth and polished and bright as a looking-glass which you may effect in this manner First of all hold them to the grinde-stone wherewith they grinde knives until they be smoothed and planed then rub them with fine sand and Pumice-stone afterwards glaze them with a wheele and polish them with a plate of lead and powder of emerald if you use any other art you will but lose your labour Thus in two days your work will be finished that is by heating your plates eight or ten times and preparing them and by whiting them four times at least Finally examine them all whether they be whole and of a sufficient thinness so that if any remain too thick they may again be brought to the hammer and perfected But I must advertise you that the thinner they grow the less time they must lye in the fire because they will presently melt and so also in the water because the salt will eat into them At last cut them with sheares into square pieces that they may be more convenient for use CHAP. XI How leaves of Metals are to be polished THe plates being thus thinned and finished we will fall to polishing of them But first we must provide tools wherewith to perform it Take a plate of Copper of a foot in length and a hand in breadth most exquisitely burnished that it may be as smooth as a looking-glass bow it either with your hand or a hammer by little and little into the form of a semicylinder Then turn a piece of wood so that it may be equal and fit for it in every part and be received into the convexity of it where being fastned with four nails at the corners of the plate it may remain stedfast Fix this wood upon a little frame with two bars of a foot height fastned to the ends of it Now we will begin to burnish the plates which must be thus done provide chalk made into fine powder after this sort take some beaten clay wrap it in a clean and indifferently fine cloth and put it into a washing-bowl full of water stirre it about here and there in the water that the finest part may be washed through and the courser remain in the cloth then put the new chalk into the cloth again stirre it and strain it till it all pass through the cloth and then suffer the water to settle and seirce it through a strainer onely changing the water until no gross settlement
pure and good and become cool and allayed then pure and unmixed and pleasant visions appear Wherefore I thought it not irrational when a man is overwhelmed with drink that vapors should arise participating as well of the Nature of what he hath drank or eat as of the humours which abound in his body that in his sleep he should rejoyce or be much troubled that fires and darkness hail and putrefactions should proceed from Choler Melancholy coâ—d and puâ—rid humors So to dream of killing any one or being besmeared with Blood shews an abundance of Blood and Hippocrates and Galen say We may judge a man to be of a sanguine Complexion by it Hence those who eat windy meats by reason thereof have rough and monstrous dreams meats of thin and small vapours exhilarate the minde with pleasant phantasms So also the outward application of simples doth infect the species while they are a going to the Heart For the Arteries of the body saith Galen while they are dilated do attract into themselves any thing that is next them It will much help too to anoynt the Liver for the Blood passeth upward out of the Stomack by evaporation and runneth to the Liver from the Liver to the Heart Thus the circulating vapors are infected and represent species of the same colour That we may not please the Sleepers onely but also the Waking behold A way to cause merry dreams When you go to bed to eat Balm and you cannot desire more pleasant sights then will appear to you Fields Gardens Trees Flowers Meadows and all the Ground of a pleasant Green and covered with shady Bowers wheresoever you cast your eyes the whole World will appear pleasant and Green Bugloss will do the same and Bows of Poplar so also Oyl of Poplar But To make dark and troublesome dreams we eat Beans and therefore they are abhorred by the Pythagoreans because they cause such dream Phaseoli or French Beans cause the same Lentiles Onyons Garlick Leeks VVeedbine Dorycnium Picnocomum new red VVine these infuse dreames wherein the phantasms are broken crooked angry troubled the person dreaming will seem to be carried in the Air and to see the Rivers and Sea flow under him he shall dream of misfortunes falling death cruel tempests showers of Rain and cloudy dayes the Sun darkned and the Heavens frowning and nothing but fearful apparitions So by anointing the aforesaid places with Sooâ— or any adust matter and Oyl which I add onely to make the other enter the easier into the parts fires lightnings flashings and all things will appear in darkness These are sufficient for I have already shewed in my Book Phytognom how to procure true dreams CHAP. IV. Excellent Remedies for the Eyes HEretofore being much troubled with sore Eyes and become almost blinde when I was given over by Physitians of best account a certain Empyrick undertook me who putting this VVater into my Eye cured me the very same day I might almost say The same hour By Gifts Entreaties Cunning and Money I gained the Secret which I will not think much to set down that every one may use it at their pleasure It is good for Inflammations Blearness Mists Fistula's and such-like and cureth them certainly the second day if not the first If I should set down all those whom I have cured by it I should be too tedious Take two Bottles of Greek-VVine half a Pint of White-Rose-Water of Celendine two Ounces of Fennel Rue Eye-bright as much of Tutty half an Ounce of Cloves as much Sugar-Candy of Roses one Drachm Camphire half a Drachm and as much Aloes Tutty is prepared after this manner Let it be heat and extinguished six times in Rose-water mixed with Greek-Wine but let the water at last be left out powder what are to be powdered finely and mix them with the waters Aloes is incorporated with waters thus because it will not be powered let it be put into a Morâ—ar with a little of the forementioned waters and beat together until it turn to water and swim about in ropings and mix with the waters then put it to the rest Set them all in a Glass-Bottle close covered and waxed up that it do not exhale abroad in the Sun and Dew for forty dayes still shaking them four times in a day at last when it is well sunned set it up and reserve it for your use It must be applied thus In Inflammations Blood-shots and Fistula's let the Patient lie flat on his back and when a drop of this water is put upon his Eye let him open and shut his Eye-lids that the water may run through all the cavities of his Eve Do this twice or thrice in a day and he shall be cured But thus it must be used for A Pearl in the Eye If the Pearl be above or beneath the Cornea make a Powder of Sugar-Candy of Roses burnt Allome and the Bone of a Cuttle-Fish very finely beat and searched exactly and when the Patient goeth to Bed sprinkle a little of this Powder upon his eye and by and by drop some of this water into it and let him shut his Eyes and sleep for he will quickly be cured CHAP. V. To fasten the Teeth I Could finde not any thing in all this Physical Tract of greater value then this Remedy for the Teeth for the water gets in through the Gumms even to the very Nerves of the Teeth and strengthens and fasteneth them yea if they are eaten away it filleth them with Flesh and new cloaths them Moreover it maketh them clean and white and shining like Pearls I know a man who by this onely Receit gained great Riches Take therefore three handfuls of Sage Neâ—tles Rosemary Mallows and the rinde of the Roots of Wall-nut wash them well and beat them also as much of the Flowers of Sage Rosemary Olive and Plantaine Leaves two handfuls of Hypocistis Horehound and the tops of Bramble one pound of the Flower of Mirtle half a pound of the Seed two handfuls of Rose-Buds with their Stalks two drachms of Saunders Coriander prepared and Citron-Pill three drachms of Cinnamon in powder ten of Cypress Nuts five green Pine-Apples two drachms of Bole-Armenick and Mastick Powder them all and infuse them in sharp black Wine and let them macerate three dayes then slightly pressing the Wine out put them into an Alembick and still them with a gentle fire then boyl the distilled water with two ounces of Allome till it be dissolved in a Vâ—ssel close stopt When you would use it suck up some of the water and stir it up and down your mouth until it turn to Forth then spit it out and rub your Teeth with a Linen-cloth It will perform what I have promised for it fasteneth the Teeth and restoreth the Gums that are eroded Now we will deliver other Experiments To fasten the Teeth Macerate the Leaves of Mastick Rosemary Sage and Bramble in Greek-Wine then distil it with a gentle fire through a Retort take a mouthful
until this day and observed by our women to smoke their children and rowl them about in frankincense Keep him in an open air and hang Carbuncles Jacinthes or Saphires about his neck Dioscorides accounteth Christs Thorn wilde Hemp and Valerian hung up in the house an amulet against witchcraft Smell to Hyssope and the sweet Lilly wear a ring made of the hoof of a tame or wilde Ass also Saâ—vâ—ion the male and female are thought the like Aristotle commendeth Rue being smelt to All these do abate the power of witchcraft THE NINTH BOOK OF Natural Magick How to adorn Women and make them Beautiful THE PROEME SInce next to the Art of Physick follows the Art of Adorning our selves we shall set down the Art of Painting and how to beautifie Women from Head to Foot in many Experiments yet lest any man should think it superfluous to interpose those things that belong to the Ornaments of Women I would have them consider that I did not write these things for to give occasion to augment Luxury and for to make people voluptuous But when God the Author of all things would have the Natures of all things to continue he created Male and Female that by fruitful Procreation they might never want Children and to make Man in love with his Wife he made her soft delicate and fair to entice man to embrace her We therefore that Women might be pleasing to their Husbands and that their Husbands might not be offended at their deformities and turn into other womens-chambers have taught Women how by the Art of Decking themselves and Painting if they be ashamed of their foul and swart Complexions they may make themselves Fair and Beautiful Something 's that seemed best to me in the Writings of the antients I have tried and set down here but those that are the best which I and others have of late invented and were never before in Print I shall set down last And first I shall begin with the Hairs CHAP. I. How the Hair may be dyed Yellow or Gold-colour SInce it is the singular care of Women to adorn their Hair and next their Faces First I will shew you to adorn the Hair and next the Countenance For Women hold the Hair to be the greatest Ornament of the Body that if that be taken away all the Beauty is gone and they think it the more beautiful the more yellow shining and radiant it is We shall consider what things are fit for that purpose what are the most yellow things and will not hurt the Head as there are many that will but we shall chuse such things as will do it good But before you dye them Preparing of the Hair must be used to make them fit to receive a tincture Add to the Lees of White-wine as much Honey that they may be soft and like some thin matter smeer your Hair with this let it be wet all night then bruise the Roots of Celandine and of the greater Clivers Madder of each a like quality mingle them being bruised very well with Oyl wherein Cummin-Seed Shavings of Box and a little Saffron are mingled anoynt your Head and let it abide so twenty four hours then wash it with Lye made of Cabbage-Stalks Ashes and Barley-Straw but Rye-Straw is the best for this as Women have often proved will make the Hair a bright yellow But you shall make A Lye to dye the Hair thus Put Barley-Straw into an Earthen-pot with a great mouth Feny-Graec and wilde Cummin mingle between them Quick-lime and Tobacco made into Powder then put them upon the Straw beforementioned and pour on the Powders again I mean by course one under the other over till the whole Vessel be full and when they are thrust close pour on cold water and let them so stand a whole day then open a hole at the bottom and let the Lye run forth and with Sope use it for your Hair I shall teach you Another To five Glasses of Fountain-water add Alume-Foeces one Ounce Sope three Ounces Barley-Straw one Handful let them boyl in Earthen-pots till two thirds be boyled away then let it settle strain the Water with the Ashes adding to every Glass of Water pure Honey one Ounce Set it up for your use You shall prepare for your Hair An Oyntment thus Burn the Foeces of Wine heaped up in a Pit as the manner is so that the fire may go round the Pit when it is burnt pown it and seirce it mingle it well with Oyl let the Woman anoynt her Head with it when she goes to Bed and in the morning let her wash it off with a Lye wherein the most bitter Lupines were boyled Other Women endeavour To make their Hair yellow thus They put into a common Lye the Pills of Citrons Oranges Quinces Barley-Straw dried Lupines Foeny-Graec Broom-Flowers and Tartat coloured a good quantity and they let them there lie and steep to wash their Hair with Others mingle two parts Sope to one part Honey adding Ox-Gall one half part to which they mingle a twelfth part of Garden-Cummin and wilde Saffron and setting them in the Sun for six weeks they stir it daily with a wooden-staff and this they use Also of Vinegar and Gold Litharge there is made a decoction very good to dye the Hair yellow as Gold Some there are that draw out a strong VVater with fire out of Salt-Peter Vitriol Salt-Ammoniac and Cinaber wherewith the Hairs dyed will be presently yellow but this as wont to burn the Hair those that know how to mingle it will have good effects of it But these are but ordinary the most famous way is To make the Hairs yellow draw Oyl from Honey by the Art of Distillation as we shall shew First there will come forth a clear VVater then a Saffron-colour then a Gold-colour use this to anoynt the Hair with a Spunge but let it touch the Skin for it will dye it Saffron-colour and it is not easily washed off This is the principal above others because the Tincture will last many dayes and it will dye Gray-Hairs which few others will Or make a Lye of Oak-Ashes put in the quantity of a Bean of Rheubarb as much Tobacco a handful of Barley-Straw and Foeny-Graec Shells of Oranges the Raspings of Guaiacum a good deal of wilde Saffron and Liquorish put all these in an Earthen-pot and boyl them till the water sink three fingers the Hairs will be washt excellently with this Hold them in the Sun then cast Brimstone on the Coals and fume the Hairs and whilst it burns receive the smoke with a little Tunnel at the bottom and cover your Head all over with a cloth that the smoke flie not away CHAP. II. How to dye the Hair bed BEcause there are many men and women that are ruddy Complexions and have the Hair of their Heads and Bearbs Red which should they make yellow-coloured they would not agree with their Complexions To help those also I set down these Remedies The
distilled water from the flowers will wonderfully make the Face whole Also with the decoction of Ivory one may make the Face like Ivory Melanthinm makes the Face beautiful Dioscorides But it shews its excellency when it is thus prepared Pown it and sift out the finest of it take the juice of Lemmons and let the Meal of Gith lie wet in it twenty four hours take it out and let it dry then break an Egg with the Shell and mingle it with it then dry it in the shade and sift it once more In the morning when the woman riseth out of her bed let her put this into a white Linen-clour that is not too fine and wet it with water or spittle and let her rub her Face with the clour that the moysture alone and not the Meal may come on the Face If you will have Your Face white it may be made as white as Milk many ways and chiefly with these that follow Let Litharge of Silver half an ounce boyl in a Glazed Earthen Pot with strong Vinegar until the thinner part be evaporated set it up for use Then in another Pot let half a pound of clear water boyl then mingle both these waters together and shake them and it will become like Milk and sink to the bottom when it is settled pour it off water being plentifully poured in and leaving it a while to settle pour it off again and pour on fresh shake it and leave it to settle a short time and so forbear That which is settled set in the Sun and when it is grown stiff as thick pap make small balls of it and lay them up You may use these with water to make the Face white Or else powder Lytharge of Silver eight ounces very fine pour on the Powder of the strongest Vinegar five pints distil them and keep them for your use Then take Allome de Plume Salt Gemma one drachm Frankincense one ounce and a half Camphire two drachms Oyl of Tartar six ounces Rose-water one pound powder what must be powdered and pour it in distil the water in Chymical Vessel and set it up When you would use them mingle a little of both waters in the palm of your hand and it will be like Milk rub your Face with it and it will be white Or else take off the Pills of about twenty Cirton Lemmons infuse the Pills in one pound of the best Wine and one pint and an half of Rose-water for six days then add one ounce of white Lilly and Mallow-Roots and let them stay as many days then add Rosin of Turpentine four ounces white Mercury sublimate two ounces Boxan half an ounce ten whites of Eggs made hard at the fire and mingle all these together let them stay one night The next day put a cap upon the Vessel and luting the joynts well that nothing may breath forth let the water drop into a Vessel to receive it set it aside for use I me this that is easie to make and doth the business completely Take the white of an Egg and stir it so long with an Iron that it froth well let it stand to turn to water then take half an ounce of the best Honey and beat with that water and â—ingle them until they unite add to them the quantity of two Corns of Wheat Mercury sublimate finely powdered when you go to bed take some of the water in the palm of your hand and wash your Face and so let it dry in that it may not slick to the Linen in the morning wash it off with Fountain-water and you shall have your Face cleer and white CHAP. X. How women shall make their Faces very clean to receive the Colour BEfore any thing be used to make the Face beautiful it must be made very clean and fit to receive it for oft-times women have excellent Waters and Remedies brought them but they have no operation wherefore the matter is that they must first prepare their Face This is the best Preparation of the Face Bind Barley-Meal-Bran in a Linen-cloth and let it down into a Pot full of water and let it boyl till a third part be remaining and press out the juice with this decoction wash your face and let it dry then bruise Myrrh and mingle it with the white of an Egg and burn it on hot Fire-sticks or red hot Tiles and receive the fume by a tunnel let the narrow part of it be toward the Face and the broad to the fire cover the head with a Napkin that the smoak flie not away and when you have received sufficient of the smoak rub your Face with a Linen-cloth then use your Remedy to anoynt your Face I shall shew you One that is stronger When the skin must be cleansed or made white you must cleanse some parts of your Face from skins that will not let your painting Oyntment stick Powder an ounce of Sublimate very finely put it into a Pot that is glazed and cast into it fix whites of Eggs so beaten that they are turned into water then boyl them on hot Embers till they grow thick put them into a Linnen-cloth that is loosly weaved and press the water out of them with your hands and wash your Face with it then mingle Honey whites of Eggs and the aforesaid water together equal parts put some in your palm and rub the place you would make white with the palms of your hands then boyl spelt and when it is boyl'd take the fume of it by a tunnel then rub your Face with a course Linnen-cloth Others wash their Face with water wherein fine flour is boyled CHAP. XI How the Face may be made very soft THe next Beauty of the Face and Hands is Tenderness which is procured by fat things and chiefly by Milk and principally of Asses for it takes off wrinkle and makes the skin white and soft And therefore it was not for nothing that Nero's wife had always five hundred Asses with her and in a Bath with a â—ear she soaked all her body with that Milk Wherefore if you would have Tour Face made soft and white Steep crums of Bread in Whey or in Milk then press it out and with that water wash your Face for it will wonderfully white your Face and make the skin fair Or take six Glasses of Milk steep crumbs of Bread in it five hours take ten Lemmons make clean the Pills and cut the Body of them into thin slices then shake ten whites of Eggs bruise an ounce of Camphire Allom Sauharinum two ounces mingle them all and distil them and set it in a glazed Vessel close covered in the Sun and then set it up for your use Here is one stronger For the same purpose Boyl two Calfs Feet in water first make them clean then boyl the water till half be consumed put it in Rice one pound and boyl it well let crums of Bread steep in Asses Milk or Goats Milk with ten whites of Eggs bruised with
their Shells distil all at a gentle fire add to the water a little Camphire and Borax put into a glazed vessel two yong naked Pigeons with their guts taken forth and put in as much Milk as will cover them and add one ounce of Borax Turpentine three ounces Caâ—phire one ounce five whites of Eggs put on the cover and distil them for it is fat things that make the Face soft I shall say more when I come to speak of making the hands white and soft the reason is the same for both CHAP. XII How to make the face clear and shining like silver THe face is not onely made clear but white as silver by those things that I said were white as silver yet not exactly as silver but they shine as clear as silver There is an herb commonly called Argentaria or Argentina or wilde Tansey whose leaves are green above but on the backside they shine of a silver colour the distilled water of it is drank by women against spots in their faces and to make them white as silver The snails that are found in moist places and leave behind them as they creep a silver cord Dioscorides saith will cure the spots in the face women much desire them for they put them in a still and draw out water from them that polisheth the skin exceedingly and makes it contract a silver gloss And the seashell-fish like an ear whose shell is of a silver colour within or pearl colour and many kinds of shells that being steeped in vinegar will grow pure casting off the outward crust as the Oystershel doth that brings forth pearl There are also shells we call the Mothers of pearl that inwardly are shining and of a silver colour like pearls all which women use for their art of beautifying themselves for they make the face smooth and to shine as white as silver But pearls do it best of all things when they are dissolved in sharp juyces and soaked in rotten dung till they send forth a clear oyl that is the best thing to beautifie the face as I shall shew elsewhere For the same use is a glass-stone used that shines like silver But no better water is prepared then from Talk or Quick-silver as I shall shew in that which follows CHAP. XIII How to dissolve Talk for to beautifie women THough I shall speak in a work on purpose more at large how Talk may be dissolved into water or oyl We shall here onely set down how it may be fitted for womens use Of all such ways as are used I shall set forth such as I have tried to be good Beat Talk in a mortar of metal then put it into a pot of the strongest clay and cover it and bind it in with strong iron wyer lute it well all cover and stop the joynts that nothing breathe out and set it in the Sun to dry Then put this stone in an oven that flames strongly or in some other place where the fire is most vehement When the fire of the oven is out take it forth and break the vessel and if it be well calcined it is enough Otherwise do the same again until the calx of it be as white as it ought to be When the calcined body of it is white as it must be grind it on a porphyry-stone and put it into a little bag or upon a marble in a very moist place or deep well or cistern and let it lie there long and with much moisture it will drop forth at last It will more easily and perfectly dissolve into water if it were burnt long enough and turned into a calx For the parts being turn'd to lime and made exceeding dry by force of fire they attract moisture It is also done Another way that is good Calcine the Talk and put it in an earthen pot and set it in the hottest part of a potters oven to stay there six days When the Talk is thus turn'd to a calx put it into a gourd-glass which you shall first make clean and make a hole at the bottom of it and setting a vessel under it you shall have the moisture of it drop forth and the calx will resolve into water put this into a glass vial and let the water evaporate in Balâ—eo take the sediment out for your use I use also Another way Put snails in an earthen vessel in the open air that they may be kept hungry three days and pine for want of meat and be purged then take a silver Loadstone or Talk most finely powdred mingle it with the white of an egge and make an ointment anoint the earthen vessel with it and put the snails into it for they will eat up all the Talk When they have eaten all and voided their excrements bruise the snails with their shells and putting them into a retott draw out their moisture with a gentle fire the humour that drops forth will exceedingly adorn the face CHAP. XIV The preparation of Sublimate I Said that there was nothing better than quick-silver for womens paints and to cleanse their faces and make them shine Wherefore I shall set down many ways to Prepare it that you may have the use of it to your desire Take one ounce and half of pure quick-silver not falsified with lead for if there be lead mingled with it all your labour is lost How it must be purged and known I taught elsewhere Mingle this with half a pound of Mercury sublimate and put it into a marble mortar and with a new wooden pestle stir it well turning it round about First it will be black in six hours it will grow white if you cease not to beat it Then adde one ounce and half of white salt always turning it about with the pâ—stle for the more you grind it the perfecter it will be When it is very well ground it must be washt Sprinkle boiling clear water into the mortar and stir it and then stay a while until the muddy part may sink down and the filth that was lighter and swims on the top laying the vessel on one side pour out the water gently and pour in fresh do this five or six times in the same manner until the pure and onely powder remain without dregs make little cakes of it and dry it in the sun Some whilst they bruise it sprinkle water on lest the powder by grinding should be made so small that it should fly away into the air The chief business is to purge it and grind it well that it be not troubled when it is strain'd forth that which is gone to the bottom and so part of it be lost some open a hole in the belly of a pot that when it is settled the hole being opened the water with the dregs may run forth Others to sublimate adde a third part of quick-silver and grind it in a wooden mortar and in the â—â—an while they chew four grains of mastick in their mouths and they spit the clammy spittle
out of their mouths into the mortar until it be white as I said then they boil it in one pound of the distilled water of Bryony-root till it be consumed then they put a linnen cloth to receive it at the mouth of the vessel and so they strain it forth and set it in the sun they make â—roches of it with gum Traganth others to sublimate add a sixth part of quick-silver bruising it round about then they adde camphir borax and ceruss half as much and mingle all together The principal matter is it is the best way to sprinkle it with water whilst you grind it lest by grinding it the powder become so light that it fly away also when the water is poured on all the filth will come on the top and more easily be poured off then when the sublimate is washed it is left to settle down then again pouring off the former water they pour on fresh and they wash it oft till they see it is enough and no black swims on the top But there is no better as we said than Water of quick-silver But some will not away with quick-silver by reason of the hurt it commonly doth to the teeth but they use other water Yet there is no better water then that which is extracted from quick-silver it is so clear and transparent and the face anointed with it shines like silver it draws the skin handsome and makes it soft by and by and I never saw a better the manner was shewed before CHAP. XV. How white-lead is prepared for the face BEcause sublimate is so dangerous there is a private way to do it with ceruss but not the usual way that women may have their desire without hurting their skin or their teeth I am now come to the business of ceruss Take of swines grease well washed and cleansed in common water at least ten times put it in to a lye of sweet water and after fifteen days into a pot or earthen vessel with a broad mouth pouring in the sharpest vinegar put in your swines grease that the vinegar may swim three fingers above it then fasten a plate of lead on the mouth of the pot well luting the joynts with linnen cloths that the vinegar may not evaporate Every fifteen days take off the cover and see how it is if the lead be dissolved and scrape the cover of all that hangs upon it and put in the cover anoint it all about and let it stand so long till all the rest be performed as I said before and the whole lead be turned to ceruss Ceruss must be washt thus Pour water into a vessel put the ceruss into it stir it up and down that what dregs there is may swim on the top the ceruss is heavy and will sink to the bottom Pour forth what swims above in the vessel and pour on fresh water and do this so often until the pure ceruss be found without dregs dry it and lay it up If you will do it Another way Take two handfuls of cleansed barley let it steep all night in fair water then dry it on a linnen cloth spread abroad in the sun When it is dried poun it in a marble mortar when it is bruised put it into a glazed vessel which is full of vinegar and cast upon this four whole eggs with their shells then stop the vessel with a plate of lead that is arched or not very even and let there be no place that gives vent Set it half in the sand and let it stand in the open sun after ten days take off the covering of the vessel that you stopt it with strike down the ceruss that is in it with a feather and scrape it off then take the eggs out and put in new and do as you did and after so many days scrape it off until the whole plate be consumed Let down the ceruss you have stricken off into a vessel full of water bound up in a linnen cloth that is clean and moderately fine and stir it in the water carrying it about here and there until the muddy part of it run forth and the sediment remain in the cloth let the water settle and strain it and pour it forth changing the water so long until no dregs remain Lastly strain forth the water and lay up the powder when it is dry This alone with fountain water will make the face white mingled with the white of an egge and will make it shine Some Another way wash ceruss and make it pure Mingle hards of hemp with whites of eggs well stirr'd role up the ceruss in the middle of it and wrapping a cloth about it boil it one hour in a new earthen pot putting water to it as it boils take off the skum then take it from the fire and if any Lead be sunk down cast it forth afterwards make Troches of it with Gum-Traganth that it may keep the better Some bid boyl in water of white Lillies Ceruss very finely powdered tied up in a skin and fastned in a Linen-cloth over it to the handle of the Vessel The manner of boyling is the same as I first shewed Then pour it forth into an earthen dish and strain it gently from all its moysture dry it fifteen days in the Sun and keep it CHAP. XVI The best Sopes for women I Shewed in particulars how you might procure whiteness lustre and softness to the Face now shall I speak of waters made of these that will at the same time make if it be first rub'd clean The Face white clear ruddy and soft These I speak of can do it being composed together and distilled Take Ceruss ready washed one ounce half as much Mercury sublimate Gum-Traganth as much Tartar one ounce powder all these and put them into a young Pigeon washed and unbowelled and sow them in put it into a new Earthen Pot full of water distilled by a Retort boyl it till the flesh part from the bones then distil it when you go to bed wash you Face and in the morning wash it with fountain-Fountain-water so you shall have it white clear soft and well-coloured Also you may do it Another way Bruise three pound of Bean-Cods the shells add two pounds of Honey and one of Rosin of Turpentine put them into a Vessel and close it that nothing vent forth and let it ferment eight days in dung then add four pound of Asses milk and in the Vessel draw forth Oyl at the fire use this water morning and evening If you will have Another way do it thus Distil all these severally Elder-flowers and Flowers of wilde Roses Broom Honey-snâ—kles Solomons-seal and Briony-Roots sowre Grapes and Sarcocolla mingle equal parts of each or distil them again and set them in the Sun This will be the best I shall shew Another for the same Pull of a Hens Feathers without water take out her Entrals cut her in pieces let infuse one night in white-Wine in the morning wash her in
softness remains which is onely given to fat Hands To make the Hands as white as Milk Take things that are Milk-White as Almonds Pine-Kernels Melon and Gourd-Seeds and the like Therefore bruise bitter Almonds Pine-Kernels and Crums of Bread then make Cakes of them with Barley-water wherein Gum Traganth hath been soaked You may use this for Sope when you wash your Hands for they scowre them and make them white I For the same use oft-times bitter Almonds half a pound put them in hot water to blanch them then beat them in a Marble-Morter Afterwards take the lesser Dragons two ounces Deers Suet and Honey of each as much mingle them all in an earthen Pot with a large mouth set them at the fire and let them be stirred gently with a wooden-stick that they mingle well put it up in Boxes for your use If you will have Your hands white wash fresh Butter nine times in sweet water and last of all in sweet-sented Rose-water to take off the ill smell and that it may look as white as Snow then mingle white wax with it and a good quantity of Oyl of sweet Almonds Then wash your gloves in Greek-Wine as the manner is and smeer on the foresaid mixture put on these when you go to bed that all night they may grow soft by the help of fat things Then take Peach-Kernels with the skins picked off Seeds of Gourds Melons white Poppy Barley-meal of each one ounce and half the juice of two Lemmons rosted in the Embers mingle these with as much Honey as will make them thick as an Oyntment and to make them smell well you may add a little Musk or Civet when you go to bed but in the morning wash them with Fountain-water and for Sope use the Lees of Oyl of Nuts well pressed forth or Lees of Oyl-Olive Others use this Liniment onely Press the Cream out of Lemmon-Seeds with two ounces of it mingle one ounce of Oyl of Tartar and as much Oyl of Almonds When at night you go to bed wash your Hands in Fountain-water dry them and anoynt them with this Liniment and put on your Gloves Take Another For one weeks-time infuse the Marrow of Ox-bones in cold water but change the water four or five times a day and for every pound of Marrow take six excellent Apples and cut them in the middle and cast forth the Seeds and Core then beat them small in a Marble-Morter and put them into a new Morter that they may smell the sweeter adding a few Cloves Cinnamon Spikenard let them boyl in rose-Rose-water When they are all very soft take them forth and strain them and again add a sharp Lixivium and let them boyl at a gentle fire until all the water be washed Then set them up in a Glass-Vessel for your use or make them into morsels That which follows is good For the same Make a hole in a Lemmon and put into it Sugar-Candy and Butter and cover it with the Cover wet Hards of Hemp and wrap it up in and boyl it in hot Embers and that it grow soft by rosting when you go to Bed anoynt your hands with it and put on your Gloves CHAP. XXVIII How to correct the ill sent of the Arm-pits THe stink of the Arm-holes makes some women very hateful especially those that are sat and fleshy To cure this we may use such kinde of Experiments The Ancients against the stink of the Arm-pits used liquid Allome with Myrrh to anoynt them or the Secrets and Arm-holes were strewed with the dry Leaves of Myttles in powder The Roots of Artichoaks smeered on doth not onely cure the ill sent of the Arm-pits but of the whole Body also But Zenocrates promiseth by Experiment That the faultiness of the Arm-pits will pass forth by urine if you take one ounce of the pith of the Root boyled in three Lemina's of Muskadel to thirds and after bathing fasting or after meat drink a cup thereof But I am content with this I dissolve Allome in waters and I wash the Feet and Arm-pits with it and let them dry so in some days we shall correct the strong smell of those parts But it will be done more effectually thus Pown Lytharge of Gold or Silver and boyl it in Vinegar and if you wash those parts well with it you shall keep them a long time sweet and it is a Remedy that there is none better CHAP. XXIX How the Matrix ovar-widened in Child-birth may be made narrower TRotula saith we may honestly speak of this because Conception is sometimes hindred by it if the Matrix be too open and therefore it is fit to lend help for such an impedient For some women have it stand wide-open by reason of their hard labour in Child-birth and if their Husbands be not content with it that the men may not abhor the women it is thus remedied Take Dragons-Blood Bole-Armeniac Pomegranate-shells white of an Egg Mastick Galls of each one ounce powder them and make them all up with hot water Put some of this Confection into the hole that goes into the Matrix Or Galls Sumach Plantain great Comfrey Allome Chamaelaea take equal parts of them all and boyl them in rain-Rain-water and foment the Privities Or beat sowre Galls very finely mingle a little of the Powder of Cloves with them Let them boyl in sharp red Wine wet a woollen cloth in it and apply to the part Or thus may you restrain that part of common whores with Galls Gums whites of Eggs Dragons Blood Acacia Plantain Hypocistis Balanstia Mastick Cypress-nuts Grape-skins Akorn-cups Or in that hollow part where the Glans breaks forth and gaping shews the Nucleus with Mastick and Terra Lemnia If all these be boyled in red Wine or Vinegar and the Matrix be often wet therewith it will come very close and be much straighter Or else powder all these and cast them in through a Reed or make a fume under them Great Comfrey will be excellent for this purpose for flesh boyl'd with it will grow together And the other also if it be boyl'd will very well glew together fresh Wounds The Decoction of Ladies Mantle or the juice or distilled water of it cast into the Matrix will so contract it that Whores can scarce be known from Maids or if they sit in the Decoction of it especially if we mingle other astringent things with it and wet the Secrets therewith The distilled water of Starwort being often injected into the Matrix will make one scarce know which is corrupted and which is not But if you will have A woman deflowred made a virgin again Make little Pills thus Of burnt Allome Mastick with a little Vitriol and Orpiment make them into very fine Powder that you can scarce feel them when you have made them Pills with Rain-water press them close with your fingers and let them dry being pressed thin and lay them on the Mouth of the Matrix where it was first broken open change it every
Sanders and Lignum Aloes an ounce of Spikenard let these all be grossly beaten and boyled in a vernished earthen Pipkin over a gentle fire for the space of an hour then let them cool Strain them through a Linen-cloth and set it up in a Glass close stopt But tye up the Cinnamon Cloves Lignum Aloes and Sanders in a thin Linen-cloth and so put them into the pot and boyl them as I said before and afterwards take out the bundle for after the boyling of the water the remaining dust may be formed into Pills and made into Cakes which may be used in perfuming as I shall teach hereafter This Water is made divers ways but I have set down the best yet in the boyling it will turn coloured and become red so that Hankerchiefs or white Linen if they be wetted in it are stained although they are made wonderfully sweet which maketh many forbear the use of it Wherefore if we would have Aqua Nansa clarified Take the former Water and put it into a Glass-Retort and set it in Balneo over a gentle fire the VVater will become clear and almost of the same sent onely a little weaker keep the Water and lay aside the rest of the Foeces for sweet Cakes CHAP. II. To make sweet Water by Infusion NOw I will teach how to make perfumed Liquors and what Liquors they are which will receive odors best for VVater is unapt to keep sent Oyl is better and VVine we may assign the reason out of Theophrastus for VVater is thin â—oid of taste or sent and so fine that it can gather no sent and those Liquors which are thick savory and have a strong sent VVine although it be not sweet of it self yet being placed nigh any odour it will draw it because it is full of heat which doth attract VVater being cold by Nature can neither attract nor receive nor keep any sent for it is so fine slender and thin that the odour flieth out again and vanisheth away as if there were no foundation whereon it could fix and settle as there is in VVine and Oyl who are more tenacious of sent because they are of a denser and callous Body Oyl is the best preserver and keeper of sent because it is not changeable wherefore Perfumers steep their perfumes in Oyl that it may suck out their sweetness We use Wine to extract the sent of Flowers and especially Aqua Vitae for Wine unless distilled infecteth the Water too much with his own senâ— Musk Water This VVater setteth off all others and maketh them richer wherefore it is first to be made Take the best Aqua Vitae and put into it some Grains of Musk Amber and Civet and set them in the hot Sun for some dayes but stop the Vessel very close and lute it for that will very much add to the frangrancy of it A drop of this put into any other water will presently make it smell most pleasantly of Musk. You may do the same with Rose-water and Fountain-water often distilled that it may obtain a thinness and heat which is very necessary for the extraction of Essences Water of Jasmine Musk-Roses Gilliflowers Violets and Lillies is extracted the same way for these Flowers send forth but a thin odour which dwelleth not in the substance of them but onely lieth scattered on the superficies so that if they remain too long on the fire or in their Menstruum their sweetness degenerateth from its former pleasantness and is washed off by the mixture of the stinking ill-savoured part of their substance VVherefore we must lay their Leaves onely in the best Aqua Vitae that is the Leaves of Lillies Jasmine Musk-Roses and the rest hanging them on a threed that when the VVater hath sucked out their odour we may pluck them out because their odour lieth onely on their superficies so that if they should remain long in the Aqua Vitae it would penetrate too deep into them and draw out a sent which would not onely destroy their former sweetness but taint them with an ill savour which accompanieth those inward parts After these Leaves are taken out supply them with fresh until you perceive their sent is also extracted But take out the Violets and the Gilliflowers sooner then the rest lest they colour the VVater This VVater being mixt with others taketh away the scurvy sent of the VVine A sweet compounded Water Take a great Glass-Receiver and fill the third part almost of it with Aqua Vitae put into it Lavender-Flowers Jasmine Roses Orange and Lemmon-Flowers Then add Roots of Iris Cypress Sanders Cinnamon Storax Labdanum Cloves Nutmegs Calamus Aromaticus with a little Musk Amber and Civet Fill the Glass and stop it well But after you have filled the Glass with the Flowers they will wither and sink down wherefore fill it up with more Set it in a very hot Sun or in Balneo until their sweetness be all extracted Then strain out the Water and one drop of it in Rose-water or of Myrtle-Flowers will perfume it all with a most fragrant smell CHAP. III. How to make sweet Oyls HOw to extract Oyl out of Spices and sweet things is declared before now I will shew how to draw sents out of other things with Oyl or as I said before to make Oyl the ground in which odours may be kept and preserved a long time which is done either by imbibing the Oyl with odors or the Almonds out of which we afterwards express the Oyl How to make Oyl of Ben which is the sweetest Oyl of all used by the Genois take an ounce of Ben a drachm of Amber as much Musk half a drachm of Civet put them in a Glass-bottle well stopt and set it in the Sun for twenty days then you may use it But be sure that it be close stopt for the Nature of odors being volatile and fugitive it quickly decayeth loseth his fragrancy and smelleth dully A way to make odoriferous Oyl of Flowers it is a common thing but very commodious for Perfumers and may be used for other things he that knoweth how to use it rightly and properly will finde it an Oyl very profitable to him Blanch your Almonds and bruise them and lay them between two rows of Flowers When the Flowers have lost their sent and fade remove them and add fresh ones Do this so long as the Flowers are in season when they are past squeeze out the Oyl with a press and it will be most odoriferous You may draw a sent with this way out of those Flowers from whom you cannot draw sweet Water Oyl of Jasmine Violets Musk-Roses Lillies Crows-foot Gilliflowers Roses and Orange-Flowers and of others being made this way smelleth most fragrantly Oyl of Amber Musk and Civet may be thus made also Cut the Almonds being blanched from the top to the bottom into seven or eight slices and enclose them in a Leaden Box with these perfumes for six days until they have imbibed the sent then press
either white or black or brown The white is made of Crude Parâ—er washed in Rose-water or other sweet Water and adding Musk Amber Civet and such-like it will smell at a good distance CHAP. VII How to make sweet Compounds THere may be made divers kindes of sweet Compounds of which are made Beads which some use to reckon their Prayers by and others to trim their clothes with also wash-Balls to cleanse and sweeten the hands And first How to make sweet Balls with small charge which yet shall seem to be very costly and sweet Take one ounce of Cyprian Powder and Benjamin of the best mixture which is brought out of Turky half an ounce of Cloves a sufficient quantity of Illyrian Iris. First melt some Gum Tragacantha in Rose-water then with the former powder make it into a Mass and rowl it up in little Balls bore them thorow and fix every one on a several tent upon the Table then take four Grains of Musk dissolve it in Rose-water and wash the outside of the Balls with it then let them dry afterwards wet them again for three or four times so will they cast forth a most pleasant sent round about which they will not quickly lose But if you would bestow more cost and have a greater sent I will shew How to make them another way Take one ounce of Storax of Amber half one a fourth part of Labdanum cleansed one drachm of Lignum aloes and Cinnamon an eighth part of Musk. Beat the Gum Storax and Amber in a Brass Morter with an Iron Pestle being both hot when these are well mixed cast in the other powders and mix them all together at last add the Musk and before they grow cold from what you please of them I will add also Another Compound very necessary in a time of Plague which will not onely refresh the Brains with its sweet odour but will preserve it against infection Take three ounces of Labdanum as much Storax one of Bejamin an ounce and a half of Cloves an ounce of Sanders three of Champhire one of Lignum Aloes Calamus Aromaticus and juice of Valerian a drachm of Amber mix all these in the juice of Balm Rose-water and Storax dissolved But to wash the Face and Hands I will set down a most Noble Composition Of washing Balls or Musk-Balls Take the fat of a Goat and purifie it in this manner Boyl a Lye with the Pills of Citron in a Brass Kettle let the fat remain in it for an hour then strain it thorow a Linen-cloth into cold water and it will be purified Make the Lye of two parts of the Ashes of the Ceruss-Tree one of Lime and half a Porringer of Alom mingle them and put them in a wooden Bowl with two holes in the bottom stopt with Straw then pour in water that it may cover them three fingers over and strain it out thorow the holes when the first is run out add another quantity of water and so the third time whilst the water doth receive any saltness Keep these several runnings asunder and add some of the second third unto the first while a new Egg will swim in it for if it sink and go to the bottom it will be too weak therefore add some of the first running If it swim on the top and lie upon the surface of the Water put in some of the second and third running until it descend so that scarce any part of it be seen above the Water Heat twenty pound of this Water in a Brass Kettle and put into it two of the fat then strain it out into broad Platters and expose it to the hot Sun mixing it often every day When it is grown hard make Pomanders of it and reserve them You may thus perfume them Put two pound of the Pomanders into a Bowl and with a VVooden Spoon mix it with Rose-water till it be very soft when it hath stood still a while and is grown hard add more water and set it in the Sun do this for ten days Then take half a drachm of Musk somewhat less Civet and as much of Cinnamon well beaten mix them and if you add a little Rose-powder it will smell much sweeter then judge of it by your nose If the sent be too weak add more of the Perfumes if too strong more of the Soap How to make Soap and multiply it Since we are fallen upon the discourse of Soap we will not pass it over this Take Soap Geta and reduce it into a small Powder set it on the fire in a Brass Kettle full of Lye of a moderate strength so that in three hundred pound of Lye you may put fourscore of Soap When the Water beginneth to boyl up in bubbles stir it with a wooden Ladle and if the Lye do fail in the boyling add new When the Water is evaporated take the Kettle from the fire and cast in six pound of ordinary Salt well beaten and with an Iron Ladle empty it out and let it cool all night In the mean time prepare a brine so sharp that it will bear an Egg. In the morning cut the Soap into slices and put it into a broad Vessel and pour the brine on it there let it stand one quarter of a day and it will become very hard If you put some Sal Alchali into the brine it will make it much harder CHAP. VIII How to make sweet Perfumes IT remaineth that we speak of Perfumes for they are very necessary for the senting of Skins Clothes and Powders and to enrich Noble mens Chambers with sweet odors in Winter they are made either of Waters or Powders How to make Perfumes of Waters Take four parts of Storax three of Benjamin of Labdanum Lignum Aloes and Cinnamon one an eighth part of Cloves a little Musk and Amber Beat them all grossly and put them in a Brass Pot with an ounce and a half of rose-Rose-water Set the Pot over the fire or hot Ashes that it may be hot but not boyl it will cast forth a pleasant odor when the Water is consumed put in more You may also add what you have reserved in the making Aqua Nanfa for it will send out a very sweet fume Another way Take three parts of Cloves two of Benjamin one of Lignum Aloes as much Cinnamon Orange-Pill and Sanders an eight part of Nutmeg Beat them and put them into a pot and pour into them some orange-flower-Orange-flower-water Lavender and myrtle-Myrtle-water and so heat it Another way Express and strain the juice of Lemmon into which put Storax Camphire Lignum Aloes and empty Musk-Cods macerate them all in Balneo for a week in a Glass-Bottle close stopt When you would perfume your Chamber cast a drop of this Liquor into a Brass Pot full of Rose-water and let it heat over warm Ashes it will smell most pleasantly Excellent Pomanders for perfuming Take out of the Decoction for Aqua Nanfa Lignum Aloes Sanders Cinnamon and Cloves and of the
with the best Gunpowder onely but the pipe with that mixture that burns more gently that when fire is put to it you may hold it so long in your hand until that slow composition may come to the centre and then throw it amongst the enemies for it will break in a thousand pieces and the iron wires and pieces of iron and parts of the Ball will fly far and strike so violently that they will go into planks or a wall a hand depth These are cast in by Souldiers when Cities are besiged for one may wound two hundred men and then it is worse to wound then to kill them as experience in wars shews But when you will fill the pipes hold one in your hand without a Ball full of the composition and try it how long it will burn that you may learn to know the time to cast them lest you kill your self and your friends I shall teach you how with the same Balls Troops of Horsemen may be put into confusion There are made some of these sorts of Balls that are greater about a foot in bigness bound with the same wire but fuller of iron piles namely with a thousand of them These are cast amongst Troops of Horsemen or into Cities besieged or into ships with slings or iron guns which they call Petrels and divers ways for if they be armed with iron pieces when they break they are cast forth so with the violence of the fire that they will strike through armed men and horses and so fright the horses with a huge noise that they cannot be ruled by bridle nor spurs but will break their ranks They have four holes made through them and they are filled with this said mixture that being fired they may be cast amongst Troops of Horsemen and they will cast their flames so far with a noise and cracking that the flames will seem like to thunder and lightning CHAP. VIII How in plain ground and under waters mines may be presently digged TO dig Mines to overthrow Cities and Forts there is required great cost time and pains and they can hardly be made but the enemy will discover it I shall shew how to make them in that champion ground where both armies are to meet with little labour and in short time To make Mines in plain grounds where the Armies are to meet If you would do this in sight of the enemy for they know not what you do I shall first teach how A little before night or in the twilight where the meeting shall be or passage or standing there may pits be made of three foot depth and the one pit may be distant from the other about ten foot There fit your Balls about a foot in bigness that you may fill the whole plain with them then dig trenches from one to the other that through them cotton matches may pass well through earthen pipes or hollow caâ—es but fire the Balls at three or four places then bury them and make the ground even leaving a space to give fire to them all at once Then at the time of war when the enemy stands upon the ground then remove at your pleasure or counterfeit that you fly from them and cast in fire at the open place and the whole ground will presently burn with fire and make a cruel and terrible slaughter amongst them for you shall see their limbs fly into the air and others fall dead pierced through burnt with the horrible flames thereof that scarce one man shall scape You shall make your Match thus In a new Test let the best Aqua vitae boyl with gunpowder till it grow thick and be like pap put your matches into it and role them in the mixture take the Test from the fire and strew on as much gunpowder as they will receive and set them to dry in the Sun put this into a hollow cane and fill it full of gunpowder or take one part refined salt-peter brimstone half as much and let it boyl in a new earthen pot with oyl of linseed put in your Match and wet them well all over with that liquor take them away and dry them in the Sun But if you will make Mines under the Water use this rare invention You shall make your Mines where the enemies Galleys or Ships come to ride you shall upon a plain place fit many beams or pieces of timber fastned cross-wise and thrust through or like nets according to the quantity in the divisions you shall make fit circles of wood and fasten them and fill them with gunpowder the beams must be made hollow and be filled with match and powder that you may set fire to the round circles with great diligence and cunning smeer over the circles and the beams with pitch and cover them well with it that the water may not enter and the powder take wet for so your labour will be lost and you must leave a place to put fire in then sink your engine with weights to the bottom of the water and cover it with stones mud and weeds a little before the enemy come Let a Scout keep watch that when their Ships or Galleys ride over the place that the snare is laid for fire being put to it the sea will part and be cast up into the air and drown'd the Ships or will tear them in a thousand pieces that there is nothing more wonderful to be seen or done I have tried this in waters and ponds and it performed more then I imagined it would CHAP. IX What things are good to extinguish the fire I Have spoken of kindling fires but now I shall shew how to quench them and by the way what things obnoxious to the fire will endure it and remain But first I will relate what our Ancestours have left concerning this business Vitruvious saith That the Larch-tree-wood will not burn or kindle by it self but like a stone in the furnace will make no coles but burn very slowly He saith the reason is That there is in it very little air or fire but much water and earth and that it is very solid and hath no pores that the fire can enter at He relates how this is known When Caesar commanded the Citizens about the Alps to bring him in provision those that were secure in a Castle of wood refused to obey his commands Caesar bade make bundles of wood and to light torches and lay these to the Castle when the matter took fire the flame flew exceeding high and he supposed the Castle would have fallen down but when all was burnt the Castle was not touched Whence Pliny writes The Larch-tree will neither burn to coles nor is otherwise consumed by fire then stones are But this is most false For seeing it is rosiny and oyly it presently takes fire and burns and being one fired is hard to put out Wherefore I admire that this error should spread so far and that the Town Larignum so called from the abundance of
Larch-wood compassed about with fire should suffer no hurt Moreover I read that liquid Alom as the Ancients report will stand out against fire For wood smeered with Alom and Verdignease whether they be posts or beams so they have a crust made about them will not burn with fire Aâ—â—â—â—laus the General for Mithridates made trial of it in a wooden Tower against 〈◊〉 which he attempted in vain to set on fire which I find observed by 〈◊〉 in his Annals But this liquid Alom is yet unknown to many learned men our Alum wants this property But many say that vinegar prevails against fire Plutarch saith That nothing will sooner quench fire them vinegar for of all things it most puts out the flame by its extreamity of cold Poliâ—â—â—â— reports 〈◊〉 when he was besieged by his enemies poured out of brazen vessels melted lead upon the engines that were set to scale the place and by this were the engines dissolved but the enemies poured vinegar upon it and by that they quenched the lead and all things else that fell from the walls and so they found vinegar to be the fittest to quench fire and an excellent experiment if things be wet with it Pliny prayseth the white of an egge to quench it saying that the white of an egge is so strong that if wood be wet with it it will not burn nor yet any garment Hieron to cover scaling engines used the raw hides of beasts new killed as having force to resist fire and the joynts of wood they fenced with chalk or with ashes tempered with blood or clay molded with hair or straw and with sea-weeds wet in vinegar for so they were safe from fire Carchedonius was the first that taught men to cover engins and rams with green hides I have heard by men of credit that when houses were on fire by a peculiar property the menstruons clothes of a woman that had her courses the first time cast over the planks would presently put out the fire Thick and muscilaginous juyces are good against fire as of Marsh-mallows Therefore Albertus writ not very absurdly that if a man anoint his hands with juyce of Marsh-mallows the white of an egge and vinegar with alom He may handle fire without hurt And it is a thing that hath much truth in it But I think that quick-silver killed in vinegar and the white of an egge and smeered on can preserve any thing from fire CHAP. X. Of divers compositions for fire I Shall speak of divers compositions for fire to be used for divers uses But men say M. Gracchus was Author of this invention To make a fiery composition that the Sun may kindle It consists of these things Oyl of Rosinous Turpentine of Quick-silver otherwise then I shewed in distilling of Juniper of Naphtha Linseed Colophonia Camphire let there be Pitch Salt-peter and Ducks-grease double to them all Aqua vitae refined from all flegm Pound them all and mingle them put them up in a glazed vessel and let them ferment two moneths in horse-dung always renewing the dung and mingling them together After the set time put it into a retort and distil it thicken the liquor either with Pigeons-dung finely sifted or with gunpowder that it may be like pap Wood that is smeered over with this mixture and set in the summer Sun will fire of it self Pigeons-dung easily takes fire by the Sun beams Galen reports That in Mysia a part of Asia a house was so set on fire Pigeons-dung was cast forth and touched a window that was neer as it came to touch the wood that was newly smeered with rosin when it was corrupted and grew hot and vapoured at Midsummer by heat of the Sun it fired the rosin and the window then other places smeered with Rosin took fire and by degrees part of the house began to take hold and when once the covering of the house began to flame it soon laid hold of the whole house because it hath a mighty force to inflame all Ducks-grease is very prevalent in fire-works and Physitians praise it extremely that it is most subtile penetrating and hot it makes other things penetrate and as it is most subtile and hot so it takes fire vehemently and burns I shall shew how to distil A most scalding Oyl When I would prepare the most excellent compositions of burning oyl I distilled common oyl in a retort but with great labour yet what was distilled was thin combustible and ready to fire that once kindled it was not to be put out and it would draw the flame at a great distance and hardly let it go But oyl of Linseed is stronger than it for if you distil it often it will have such a wonderful force to take fire that it can hardly be shut up in a vessel but it will draw the fire to it and the glass being opened it is so thin that it will fly into the Air and if the light of a candle or of fire touch it the Air takes fire and the oyl fired by it will cast the flame afar off so vehemently that it is almost impossible to quench it It must be distilled with great cunning lest the vessel over-heat it should take fire within Moreover Fire that is quenched with oyl is kindled with water It is thus made I said that Naphtha will burn in water and that Camphire is a kind of it Wherefore if you mingle brimstone with it or other things that will retain fire if you cast in oyl or mud it will quench it but it revives and flames more if you cast in water Livy relates That some old women in their plays lighting Torches made of these things passed over Tyber that it seemed a miracle to the beholders I said it was the property of Bitumen to take fire from water and to be quenched with oyl Dioscorides saith That the Thracian stone is bred in a certain River of Scythia the name of it is Pontus it hath the Force of Jet they say it is enflamed by water and quenched with oyl like as Bitumen Nicander speaks of this stone thus If that the Thracian stone be burnt in fire And wet with water the flame will aspire But oyl will quench it Thracian shepherds bring This stone from th' River Pontus Poets sing Torches that will not be put out by the winds They are made with brimstone for that is hardly put out if once kindled Wherefore Torches made with wax and brimstone may be carried safely through winds and tempests These are good for Armies to march by or for other necessary things Others use such They boil the wick of the Torches in Salt-peter and water when it is dried they wet them with brimstone and Aqua vitae of this mixture then they make their Candles with brimstone and then with half Camphire and Turpentine two parts Colophonia three of Wax of this they make four Candles and put them together in the middle that is empty they cast in quick-brimstone
and they will forcibly resist all things Or thus Boil wicks of Hemp or Cotton in water with Salt-peter take them out and dry them then melt in a brass pot equal parts of brimstone gunpowder and wax when they are melted put in your wicks to drink up part of the mixture take them out and to what is left in the kettle add Gunpowder Brimstone and Turpentine of each a like quantity of which mixture make your Torches and joyn them together Also there is made A cord that set on fire shall neither smoke nor smell When Souldiers or Hunters go secretly by day or night they use sometimes to make a Match that being lighted will neither smell near hand nor far off nor make any smoke for wild Beasts if the Match smell will sent it and run to the tops of the Mountains Take a new earthen pot and put into it a new cord so handsomely that the whole pot may be filled so laid in rounds that no more can go in cover it and lute it well three or four times that it may have no vent for the whole business depends on this Then make a fire round about it by degrees that first it may grow hot then very hot and lastly red hot and if sometimes the smoke come forth stop the chinks with clay still then heaped up under the coles let it grew cold of it self and opening the Pot you shall finde the Cord black like a cole Light this Cord and it will neither smoke nor smell CHAP. XI Fire-compositions for Festival days I Have shewed you Terrible and Monstrous fire-works it is fit to shew you some to use at Solemn Times not so much for use as to give you occasion to find out higher matters I shall shew then how to make one That when a man comes into his Chamber the whole Air way take fire Take a great quantity of the best refined Aqua vitae and put Camphire into it cut small for it will soon dissolve in it when it is dissolved shut the Windows and Chamber-doors that the vapour that exhales may not get forth when the vessel is full with water let it boil with coles put under without any flame that all the water may resolve into smoke and fill the Chamber and it will be so thin that you can scarce perceive it Let some man enter into the Chamber with a lighted Candle in his hand and the Air by the Candle light will take fire all about and the whole Chamber will be in a flame like an Oven and will much terrifie one that goes in If you dissolve in the water a little Musk or Amber-greese after the flame you shall smell a curious sent Also there is made Exceeding burning water Thus Take old strong black Wine put into it quick Lime Tartar Salt and quick-Brimstone draw out the water of them with a glass retort This will burn exceedingly and never cease till it be all consumed If you put it into a vessel with a very large mouth and put flame neer it it will presently take fire if when it is on fire you cast it against a wall or by night out at the window you shall see the Air full of sparks and kindled with fires It will burn held in your hands and yet will not scald you Distil it once again and it will burn the less But if you take equal parts of quick Lime and Salt and shall mingle them with common Oyl and make little Balls and cast them into the belly of the retort at the neck and then shall draw forth the Oyl by a vehement fire and mingling this Oyl again with Salt and quick Lime shall distill them again and shall do the same four times an Oyl will come forth that will burn wonderfully that some deservedly call it infernal Oyl A Solemn Pleasant fire is made for the Theater If Camphire be dissolved in Aqua vitae and with that Fillets Papers or Parchments be smeered and being dried again be lighted and shall fall from a loft as they fall lighted through the Air you shall see Serpents with great delight But if you dessire To cast flame a great way Do thus Beat Colophonia Frankincense or Amber finely and hold them in the palm of your hand and put a lighted Candle between your fingers and as you throw the Powder into the Air let it pass through the flame of the Candle for the flame will fly up high If you will have that Many Candles shall be lighted presently on Festival Days as I hear they are wont to do amongst the Turks You shall boil Brimstone and Orpiment with Oyl and in them let thred boil when it is dry bind it to the wicks of Candles and let them pass through for when one head is lighted the flame will run to them all and set them on fire Some call it Hermes his Oyntment Any man may Eating in the dark cast sparkles out of his mouth It is pleasant for the Spectators and it is thus Let a man eat Sugar-candy for as he breaks it with his teeth sparkles will seem to fly out of his mouth as if one should rub a fire-brand CHAP. XII Of some Experiments of Fires I Will set down some Experiments that are without the ranks of the rest I held it better to conceal them but they may give you occasion to think on greater matters by them If you will That Bullets from Brass Guns may enter deeper you may easily try this against a wall or plank set up Let the Ball rather go into the hollow of it streight then wide but wet it in Oyl before you put it in and so cast it in this Bullet shot off by force of fire will go in twice as far as otherwise The reason is easie for the Oyl takes away the occasion of the Airs breathing forth for all vents being stopt the flames striving within cast forth the Bullet with more violence as we shall shew more at large So also will the Bullets of Brass Guns penetrate with more force and if you lard the Bullets they will penetrate through Arms of proof I can also by a cunning Artifice Shoot a man through with a Bullet and no place shall be seen where it went in or came forth The minde of man is so cunning that it hath invented a way to shoot a man quite through with a Bullet and yet no mark of the Bullet shall appear though all the inward parts be bruised and beaten through Consider that what things are heavy are solid and so subtile that they will penetrate and leave no marks where they entred or came out and they will do the same though they be united as if they were disjoynted and every part will act by it self alone as it would do being united I have said thus to take away all occasions from ignorant and wicked people to do mischief I saw A Gun discharge often and yet no more powder was put in Famous Souldiers use
to lye a night and a day in strong Vinegar then wash him well and fill him with Spices and Herbs and rost him or boil him as you please either way you shall find him without bones Of old they brought to the Table The Trojan Hog The Antient Gluttons invented how a whole Ox or Camel should be set on the Table and divers other creatures Hence the people had a Tale concerning the Trojan Hog so called because he covered in his belly many kinds of living creatures as the Trojan Horse concealed many armed men Macrobius reports 3. Lib. Satur. That Cincius in his Oration where he perswades to put in practise Fannius his Law concerning Moderation of Expence did Object to the men of his age that they brought the Trojan Hog to their Tables Collers of Brawn and the Trojan Hog were forbidden by the Law of regulating expence The Hog was killed as Dalachampas translates it with a small wound under his shoulder When much blood was run forth all his entrails were taken out and cut off where they began and after that he was often and well washed with wine and hang'd up by the heels and again wash'd with wine he is rosted with Musk Pepper then the foresaid dainties namely Thrushes Udders Gâ—at-snappers and many Eggs poured unto them Oysters Scallops were thrust into his belly at his mouth he is washed with plenty of excellent liquor and half the Hog is filled with Polenta that is with Barley and Barley-Meal Wine and Oyl kneaded together and so is he put into the Oven with a brass pan set under and care must be had to rost him so leasurely that he neither burn nor continue raw for when the skin seems crup it is a sign all is rosted and the Polenta is taken away Then a silver platter is brought in onely gilded but not very thick big enough to contain the rosted Hog that must lye on his back in it and his belly sticking forth that is stuft with diversity of goods and so is he set on the Table Athenaeus Lib. 9. Dipnosophist But That an Egge may grow bigger than a mans head If you would have an Egge so big there is an Art how it may cover other Eggs in it and not be known from a natural Egge You shall part fifty or more yelks of Eggs and whites one from the other mingle the yelks gently and put them into a bladder and bind it as round as you can put it into a pot full of water and when you see it bubble or when they are grown hard take them out and add the whites to them so fitting the velks that they may stand in the middle and boil them again so shall you have an Egge made without a shell which you shall frame thus Powder the white Egge-shells clean washed that they may fly into fine dust steep this in strong or distilled Vinegar till they grow soft for if an Egge ly long in Vinegar the shell will dislove and grow tender that it may easily be thrust through the small mouth of a glass when it is thrust in with fair water it will come to its former hardness that you will wonder at it when the shells dissolved are like to an unguent with a Pencil make a shell about your Egge that is boiled and let it harden in clear water so shall you have a true natural Egge CHAP. X. How Meats may be prepared in places where there is nothing to rost them with SOmetimes it falls out that Men are in places where there want many things fit to provide supper but where convenience wants wit may do it if you want a frying pan you shall know How to fry fish on a paper Make a frying pan with plain paper put in oyl and fishes then set this on burning coles without flame and it will be done the sooner and better But if you will Rost a Chickin without a fire That Chickins may rost whilst we are in our Voyage Put a piece of steel into the fire put this into a Chicken that is pulled and his guts taken forth and cover him well with clothes that the heat breathe not out and if he do smell ill yet the meat is good If you want Servants to turn the spit and you would have A Bird to rost himself do thus For the Bird will turn himself Albertus writes That a Bird called a Ren that is the smallest of all Birds if you put him on a spit made of Hazel-wood and put fire under he will turn as if he turned himself Which comes from the property of the wood not from the Bird and that is false the Philosopher said for if you put fire under a Hazel-rod it will twist and seem to turn it self and what flesh you put on it if it be not too weighty will turn about with it So Eggs are rosted without fire Eggs laid in quick Lime and sprinkled with water are rosted for the Lime will grow as hot as fire The Babylonians have their invention when they are in the Wilderness and cannot have an opportunity to boil Eggs they put raw Eggs into a sling and turn them about till they be rosted But if you Want Salt for your meats the seed of Sumach strewed in with Benjamin will season any thing Pliny If you want Salt and would Keep flesh without Salt Cover what flesh you will with honey when they are fresh but hang up the vessel you put it into longer in winter a less time in summer If you would have That Salt-flesh should be made fresh First boil your Salted flesh in milk and then in water and it will be fresh Apicius You shall learn thus To wash spots from linnen clothes If you want Sope for red wine will so stain them that you can hardly wash them out without it But when it doth fall down and stain them cast Salt upon them and it will take out the spots If there want Groundlings how to make them Suidas saith That when Nicomedes King of Bithynia longed for some of these Fish and living far from the Sea could get none Apicius the glutton made the Pictures of these Fish and set them on the Table so like as if they had been the same They were prepared thus He cut the female Rape-root into long thin pieces like to these Fish which he boil'd in Oyl and strewed with Salt and Pepper and so he freed him from his longing As Aethenaeus saith in Cuphron Comic If there want fire I have shewed already how to make divers sorts of Artificial fires CHAP. XI Of divers Confections of Wines NOw I come to drink for I have spoken of meat sufficiently And I will teach you to make many sorts of wines and that they may be pleasant and odorifetous for I have said already what ways it may be made without pains If you will That you Wine shall smell of Musk Take a glass Vial and wash it and fill it with Aqua vita and
there is a just and due quantity required for their working then put in the other ingredients as sauce and seasoning to help the principal to work more easily and in due time So we mingle sweet things with unsavory and with bitter that it may smell and taste well for if we should mingle onely unsavoury and bitter receits they that we give it unto would loath it and their animal spirits would so abhor it that though they took it yet it could not work in them So we meddle soft and hard things together that they may go down more pleasantly Sometimes there is so little in a receit that the heat of the body wastes it before it can work here then is required a greater quantity for this doth not hinder the working but gives the natural heat somewhat to feed upon that in the mean space the receit may have fit time to work As for example If we would catch birds by bringing them to sleep here we must take the Nut Methella which is of that force as to cause sleep and heaviness of brain and let this be the ground of our mixtion then to make it more lively in working put thereto the juice of black Poppie and the dregs of wine If it be too hard and we would have it more liquid that so it may fill out the pulse or other baites which we lay for them put thereto the juice of Mandrakes and Hemlock and an Ox gall and that it may not be bitter or unsavoury put hony cheese or floure amongst it that so it may be fitter to be eaten and when once the birds have tasted of it they lie down to sleep on the ground and cannot flie but may be taken with hands The like must be observed in other things CHAP. XIX How to find out the just weight of a mixture WE must also have a special care to know the right ministring of a compound and how to find out the just proportion of weight therein for the goodness of the operation of things consists chiefly in the due proportion and measure of them And unless the mixtion be every way perfect it availeth little in working Wherefore the Antients were wont to observe not only in compounds but also in Simples due weight and measure and their experience hath left it unto us If then then bestowest thy pains in this faculty first thou must find out the weight of a simple Medicine how much of it would serve such a purpose as thou intendest and to that thou must proportionably frame thy compound observing a due proportion both in the whole and every part thereof Let thy chief Simple the ground of thy mixture be half the weight and the other ingredients altogether must be the other half but how much of each of these other ingredients that thou must gather by thy own conjecture So then thy whole compound must be but as much as if it were onely a simple receit for we do not compound things to make the receit greater either in quantity or in vertue but only because it should be more speedy in operation It must also be considered that the weights of mixtures and medicines must vary proportionably as the Countries and Climates vary for this alters their operation as we shewed before Thou must therefore work advisedly and as the operation of the Simples altereth so thou must alter their weight by putting to and taking from and wittily fitting all things that they may effect that which thou wouldest This is the reason why in our experiments which we have set down hereafter we have described the parts thereof by their several weights and lest the divers names of weights should hinder thy working we have used those weights and names which Cornèlius Celsus used before us for so it is fittest for all mens satisfaction CHAP. XX. How to prepare Simples HAving shewed the way how to compound and find out the just weight of our composition it now remains we teach how to prepare Simples which is a matter chiefly necessary for this work and greatest skill is seen in it For the operations of Simples do not so much corsist in themselves as in the preparing of them without which preparation they work little or nothing at all There be many wayes to prepare Simples to make them fitter for certain uses The most usual wayes are Steeping Boiling Burning Powning Resolving into ashes Distilling Drying and such like To macerate or steep any thing is to drench and to soak it in liquor that it may be throughly we both within and without so that the more subtil and intimate part of it may be drained and squeezed out and the grosser and earthly part be left behind to receive that humour in the very middle which we would have in it Boiling we then use when we cannot otherwise well get out the juice of any thing for by boiling we draw out of the centre into the circumference when we cannot do it by steeping though thereby the slighter vapours may be resolved So we use to burn to roste to pown things that we may take away all their moisture from them for by this means they may the more easily be resolved and the sooner converted into liquor and the better mingled with other things to be put to them So we roste or broil things when otherwise we cannot break them that they might become dust yet alwayes we must take heed that we do not so burn them as they may lose their strength nor so boil things but only as they may be fitter to receive that subtil humor and quality which we would convey into them Distillation of things is used as well to get out water that may be of greater strength therby to work more easily handsomly as also because the slighter and more subtile parts of Medicines are fittest for us the grosser parts must be cast away as being an hindrance to our purpose and the like we must conceive of other operations These things I thought fittest for this work He that would be instructed more at large herein let him look into the books of Physitians But let us now proceed to further matters THE SECOND BOOK OF Natural Magick Shewing how living Creatures of divers kinds may be mingled and coupled together that from them new and yet profitable kinds of living Creatures may be generated The PROEME HAving wandred beyond my bounds in the consideration of Causes and their Actions which I thought fit to make the Subject of my first book it will be time to speak of those Operations which we have often promised that we may not too long keep off from them those ingenious men that are very desirous to know them Since that we have said That Natural Magick is the top and the compleat faculty or Natural Science in handling it we will conclude within the compass of this Volume whatsoever is High Noble Choice and Notable that is discovered in the large field of Natural
a spung dipped in vinegar and aqua vitae then let it dry which done strew it with unquenched Lime Alome and Salt let it hang so two days in the smoak of Myrrhe Bay Rosemary and Cypress in a dry and open place Then make a mixture of unquenched Lime five pound of burnt Alome one pound good Salt two pound of Aloes and Myrrhe half a pound of Aloes-wood half a pound of the Oyl of Spicknard three onces of the powder of Rosemary-flowers five of burnt Green-brass and Calcanthum two of the best Theriack four of the dust of Cypress half a pound of dryed Saffron one once of the seeds of Coloquintida three and a half of Antimony beaten to powder one and an half of the ashes of Wine-lees five and a half of Musk half a dragm of Amber two Let all be diligently brayed and mixed together and strewed upon the Body which must be for three days together strongly rubbed in an open and dry place This also we admonish that in fat Bodies the fat of the Abdomen Buttocks Hips Muscles of the Leggs thighs and all other places must be first abstracted Things may be also preserved by Balsom But seeing we can compass no true Balsom or if there be any it is exceeding dear we are glad to make artificial Balsoms as we shall shew in due place CHAP. XVI How divers sorts of Bread may be made WE have spoken of preserving fruits and other things It remains to shew how we may use those we have kept Amongst the rest we shall teach you concerning those things that are most necessary for dayly use as for many kinds of Bread Wine Vinegar and Oyls that not onely the Housholder may provide for his family with small cost but when provision is dear he may provide for himself with small pains in Mountains and Desarts of all those things almost we have spoken of But we will begin with Bread and see what our fore-fathers used in case of necessity I shall let pass those common things as Spilt and Bean-corn Amel-corn Typh-wheat Panick Sesamum being all well known But first To make Bread of Wall-nuts Dioscorides saith there is a kind of Thistle commonly found in the waters that onely in Rivers brings forth a certain seed as big as a Ches-nut with three points membranous full of white pith that tastes like Ches-nuts they call them water ches-nuts vulgarly and the Inhabitants use them in meats as they do Ches-nuts Pilgrims make Chapelets of them The Thracians that dwell by the River Strimon fat their horses with this Thistle when it is green and of the same seed they make Bread to eat Moreover in places where they grow amongst us the Inhabitants when provision is dear make Bread of them as at Ferrara they do of Ches-â—uts and the Brutii rost them in the embers and eat them for juncates Almost in the same manner To make Bread of the Lote tree Theophrastus teacheth it The Lote-tree grows in plain ground where the Countries are overflowed with water The fruit is like a Bean naturally but less and more slender That which grows on the head comes forth promiscuously as Beans do many and very thick together When the Sun sets it closeth and opens when he riseth and springs up above the water The head is as great as a Poppy-head where it grows in Euphrates The Egyptians lay those heads on heaps to putrefie and when the shells are putrefied they wash them in a River and part the fruit from them and dry it and break it and make bread of it and eat it Pliny There is also bread made of the seed of it like to Millet seed in Egypt by the Shepherds and they knead it with water especially or with milk They say that nothing is more wholesom then that bread or lighter whil'st it is hot but cold it is harder to digest and becomes heavy It is certain that those who live upon that are never troubled with Dysenteries Tenasmus or any diseases of the belly And therefore it is one of their remedies For it was of old a custom To make bread of Dates which Pliny writes of Dates that are very dry of Thebes and Arabia that are slender and very lean with a continual vapour they are terrified and are covered rather with a Shel then a Skin In Ethiopia it is crumbled so great is the draught and like meal it is made into bread Bread of the Mulberry-figtree In Caria and Rhodes there is a great Fig of Egypt or increase of the Sycamore-tree and in the neighbouring places where there is little wheat the people for want of corn use it for bread and for all bread corn So great and continual plenty is there of that Apple and abundance of bread is made of it pleasing to the stomach but it affords but little nutriment and we might make the same if we would We find it in Writers of husbandry How we may make bread without leaven Out of Didymus some adde Nitre for Nitre makes bread more crumbly as it doth flesh also Some the day before they make their bread cast Grapes into the water and the next day when they will make their bread they take them away for they swim above the water and they press them out and use the moisture pressed forth for leaven and so they make their bread more pleasing If you would have leaven last you all the year when the new wine hath boiled in the vessels Skim off the froth that boils on the top and mingle with it Millet-meal and work it well together and make morsels of it which dry in the Sun and lay up in a moist place and you may take a sufficient quantity and use it for leaven CHAP. XVII Divers sorts of Bread made of Roots and fruits NOw we shall proceed to other kinds of bread found out in our days that are no small profit to us when corn is dear How to make bread of the Roots of Cuckow-pint the root of Wake-Robin when it is not too acrimonious is eaten and desired in meats Dioscorides saith The decoction was drank as not being over sharp Galen That it was eaten as Rape-roots and in some Countries it grows more corroding To prepare it rightly pour out the water of the first boyling and presently cast it into other hot water In Cyrene those Roots are otherwise then amongst us for there it is no Physical root and is not acrimonious at all so that it is more profitable then a Rape-root Also our forefathers when Corn was dear used this Root in meats with great profit Caesar de bello civili Also there is a kind of Root found by them that were with Valerius which is called Chara which mingled with milk releived a Souldier that was hungry and it was made up like to bread There was great plenty of this Root and of it bread was made when those of Pompey his side objected to our Souldiers that they wanted food they would commonly
throw these at them that they might deceive their expectation And a little after the Army used this and were very healthful And in Dioscorides in the false names of simples Cuckow-pint was of old called Chara with us it is so acrimonious that we scarce can endure to touch it with our tongues But I shall open the reason how excellent bread may be made of it and if I may say so better then Wheat-bread The great Roots are made clean and they are cut into small thin plates for the thinner they are cut the sooner will they become pleasant and they must boil in vessels of hot water until you perceive the water grow sharp and the Roots somewhat sweet pour out the former water and pour in fresh then boil them again till the water become sweet and the root when it is cheweded hath no acrimony left Then take them out of the water and put them upon linnen cloths extended and hanging up until they be dry then grind them in hand-mils and the meal will be exceeding white which by it self a with a third part of wheat-meal added to it will make most pure bread and well rasted There are other ways to make it sooner when you have obtained this art you will be exceeding glad I am very certain of it For with great pleasure Bread of Asphodils is eaten This is so fruitful of round-heads with us that no Plant hath more for oftimes 80 heads will be heaped together Moreover Mountains and Sea-shores are full of them that it may be truly thought to be made for mans meat Pliny The Daffodil is eaten with the seed and head terrified But this rosted in the embers as Hesiod affirms is eaten with oyle also braied with figs it is eaten with great pleasure These Round-heads are like to Navews of moderate bigness So saith Galen also But with us they are so unpleasant and acrimonious in tast that a man cannot eat them and Sowes digging them up with their snowts will hardly feed on them no not when we want corn can we eat this in our greatest hunger it was the poor fair of frugal antiquity But by boiling the sharpness of it becomes more mild and the heat of it more tolerable as we said of Cuckow-pint It will be sufficient to satisfie a mans hunger as of old it was used As Pliny saith We have made most wholesom bread of these mingled with meal especially for men wasted and in consumptions also Bread is made of Rape-roots Turneps and Skirworts For of those boil'd and cooked first cleansed from all excrements a most commendable bread may be made as I have tried But meal must be mingled with them to a third part or else half as much of one and the other as we shall shew a little after And not to be tedious the same way-bread to eat may be made of all Navews Roots or Bulbous-heads Also there is made Excellent bread of Gourds For Gourds may be had very cheap and they make savoury bread with meal and so the bread is greater for this is the greatest of all fruits for with a very little meal in time of Famine we may feed many men and not onely use it for need but for dainties also for seasoned with Sugar and prepared for mens pallats and to quench feaverish heats they are carried about every where to be sold. The way to make them up is this Take great round Gourds and fully ripe and cut into many pieces the dry skin and the pith must be taken from them with a knife put them into a kettle of boiling water and boil them for by long boiling the grassy greenness and the rank smell and loathsom taste are taken away and they will smell better and taste and nourish better and will last as long as bread Being now brought to the form of an ointment press it through a linnen strainer with your hands that if any parts of it be not well boiled or any woddy pieces be there they may be kept back by the narrowness of the strainer To this Mass adde a third part of meal and make them into bread together which will be pleasant to eat daily I will not have you to eat your fill of it but if you eat it moderately it will profit much When it is new it is excellent but stale it is not so sightly nor dainty I have shew'd you the way how you must use such things of superfluous moisture now do you learn wisely to do it CHAP. XVIII Divers ways to make bread of all sorts of Corn and Pulse ANtiently they made Bread of divers kinds of Corn and Pulse it would be needless to repeat them for you may find them in the Books of the Antients and there can be no error in making them In Campania very sweet bread is made of Millet Also the people of Sarmatia are chiefly fed with this bread and with the raw meal tempered with Mares-milk or blood drawn out of the veins of their legs The Ethiopians know no other Corn then Millet and Barley Some parts of France use Panick but chiefly Aquitane But Italy about Po adde Beans to it without which they make nothing The people of Pontus prefer no meat before Panick Panick meal now adays is neglected by us and out of use for it is dry and of small nourishment of Millet bread and cakes are made but they are heavy and hard of digestion and clammy to eat Unless they be eaten presently when they are newly baked or not else they become heavy and compact together Of the Indian Mais heavy bread is made and not pleasant at all very dry and earthly next to Millet like to this is bread called Exsergo that is also void of nutrimental juice There was also of old bread called Ornidos made of a certain seed of Ethiopia so like Sesamum that it is hard to know them asunder Also Bread is made of Lupins The best kind was known also to the Antients For Didymus teacheth how Lupins will grow sweet being three days infused in River or Sea-water and when they grow mild they must be dried and laid aside and then the meal of them mingled with Barley-meal or Wheat-meal is fit to make bread But we make it thus First the Lupins are ground in mills and are made into flower fifty pound of these are put into a wooden vessel and fair water is cast upon them that it may swim four fingers breadth above them and it must be often stirred with a woodden stick then let it settle till the water grow clear and the meal sink down then strain the water well that no meal be lost and pour on water the second time and stir it as before do so the third time till the meal and water be come sweet which will be done in one day if the water be often changed As that is done put the meal into a linnen cloth laid abroad that the meal may be seperated with a wooden slice
meal Do this thrice or four times and so you may increase it continually and this must be done in a stove that the dewy spirit may be fostered I thought good to tell you also before that you must not prick the lump lest the generative blast should breath forth and flie into the air for so you will lose your labour and there must not want presently a dewy vapour which being carried into the air and made to drop may moisten the lump so you will rejoice at the wonderful increase but you must be cunning in the manual application Pray do not destroy by your negligence what was invented by the careful ingenuity of those that tried it CHAP. XX. How we may long endure hunger and thirst THe Antients had some compositions to drive away hunger and thirst and they were very necessary both in times of Famine and in wars Pliny saith some things being but tasted will abate hunger and thirst and preserve our forces as Butter Licoris Hippace and elsewhere Scythia first produced that root which is called Scythia and about Baeotia it grows very sweet And another that is excellent against Convulsions also it is a high commendation of it that such as have it in their mouths fell nor hunger nor thirst Hippace amongst them doth the same which effects the same in horses also And they report that with these two herbs the Scythians will fast twelve dayes and live without drink also all which he translated out of Theophrastus first book The Scythian Hippace is sweet also and some call it Dulcis it grows by Maeotis Amongst other properties it quencheth thirst also if it be held in the mouth For which cause both with both with that and with the other called equestris men say the Scythians will endure hunger and thirst twelve dayes Hence it appears that Pliny translated all this out of Theophrastus But I think he erred for Hippace signifies Cheese made of Mares milk and is no herb Theodorus translated it Equestrem as it were a root like Licoris fit to drive away hunger and thirst For Hippocrates saith the Scythian shepherds eat Hippace but that is Mares Cheese and elsewhere The Scythians pour Mares milk into hollow vessels of wood and shake it and that froths with churming and the fat of it they call butter which swims on the top that which is heavy sinks to the bottom they separate this and dry it when it is dry they call it Hippace the reason is because Mares milk nourisheth exceedingly and is as good as Cows milk Dioscorides The west Indians use another composition also To endure hunger and thirst Of the herb called Tobacco namely of the juice thereof and the ashes of Cockle shells they make little balls and dry them in the shade and as they travel for three or four dayes they will hold one of them between their under lip and their teeth and this they suck continually and swallow down what they suck and so all the day they feel neither hunger thirst nor weariness but we will teach another composition which Heron mentions and it was called The Epimenidian composition to endure hunger and thirst For it was a medicament that nourished much and abated thirst and this was the food the besiegers of Cities and the besieged also lived on It was called the Epimenidian composition from the Sea-onion called Epimendium that is one of the ingredients of that composition it was made thus The squil was boiled and washt with water and dryed and then cut into very small pieces then mingle sesamum a fift part poppy a fifteenth part make all these up with honey as the best to make up the mass to mitigate it divide the whole as into great Olives and take one of these about two of the clock another about ten and they felt no hurt by hunger that used it There is another composition of the same that hath of Athenian sesamum half a Sextarius of honey a half part of oyle a Cotyle and a Chaenice of sweet Almonds mundified the sesamum and Almonds must be dried and ground and winowed then the squil must have the outsides taken off and the roots and leaves must be cut into small pieces and put into a morter and bruised till they be well mollified then you must make up the squils with the like quantity of honey and of oyle and put all into a pot and set them in cold and stir them well with a wooden ladle till they be well mingled when the lump is firm it is good to cut it into little morsels and he that eats one in the morning another at night hath meat enough This medicament is good for an Army for it is sweet and so fills a man and quencheth thirst we had this in an old Scholiast a Manuscript upon the book of Heron in the Vatican Library I saw the same composition in Philo in his fifth book of wars where he describes such like other things CHAP. XXI Of what fruits wines may be made NOw we shall speak of fruits of which wines may be made And first our Ancestors did do thus but they had two wayes for some were for Physicks which are found plentifully in Physick books others again were for ordinary use and they were divers and almost infinite according as the differences of places and Nations are for what is granted to one is denyed to another First Wine of Dates Pliny saith that in the East they make wine of Dates and he reckons up fifty kinds of Dates and as many different wines from them Cariotae are the chief full of juice of which are made the principal wines in the East they are naught for the head and thence they have their name The best are found in Judaea chiefly about Jericho yet those of Archelaiis are well esteemed and of Phaselis and of Libias valleyes of the same Country The chiefest property they have is this they are full of a white fat juice and very sweet tasting like wine with honey The wine will make one drunk and the fruit also eaten largely Dioscorides teacheth thus Put ripe Dates called Chydeae into a pitcher with a hole at bottom and stopt with a pitched reed shut the hole with linnen and to fourty Sextarii pour on three gallons of water If you would not have it so sweet five gallons will be sufficient to pour on after ten dayes take away the reed with the linnen take the thick sweet wine and set it up Also wine is made Of Figs. Sotion relates it thus Some make wine of green figs filling half the vessel with them and the other half to the brim they fill with fair water and they try still by tasting for when it tasts like wine they strain it and use it It is made faith Dioscorides of ripe figs and it is called Catorchites or Sycites Chelidonian or Phaenician figs called Caricae are steeped in a pot with a hole in the bottom with a pitched reed
the Plane-Tree Pliny For want sometimes they are forced to make Oyl for candles of the Plane-tree berries soaked in water and salt but it is very little as I proved Pliny saith the Indians make Oyl of Ches-nuts which I think very difficult for but a little will come from them as you shall find if you try He said also That Gallia Cisalpina made Oyl of Acorns of the Oak to serve for lights but we can make very little Also the Ancients used to make Oyl of Wallnuts that they pressed from the Wallnuts unsavoury and of a heavy taste for if there be any rottenness in the kernel the whole manner is spoil'd Now Gallia Cisalpina makes it for to eat and for lights also For lights by parting the naughty Nuts from the sound but the best serves for to eat at second courses These therefore are to eat and those for lights they burn cleer and there is nothing that yields more Oyl For it turns almost all to Oyl for one pound of cleansed Nuts will yield almost ten ounces of Oyl Now follows Oyl of sweet Almonds Oyl of sweet Almonds is best for food and of bitter for Physick and of old it was made with great diligence Dioscorides shews the way how half a bushel of bitter Nuts cleansed and dried are pounded in a morter with a wooden pestle into lumpâ— then a sextarius of seething water is poured on and when for half an hour the moisture is drunk in they are beaten more violently then before then is it pressed between boards and what sticks to the fingers is collected with shells The Nuts being pressed again a Hemina of water is sprinkled on them and when they have drank that up they do as before every bushel yields an Hemina With us it is commonly drawn out the same way These are the Oyls of the Antients Now we shall proceed with our Oyls Next follows Oyl of small Nuts They yield abundance of sweet sented excellent Oyl which all may use also for meats one pound of the cleansed Nuts will yield eight ounces of Oyl which former times were ignorant of Oyl of Pistaches serve for Meat and Physicks Out of Pine kirnels Oyl is made They are cull'd and the naughty ones serve for lights but the Oyl that comes from the best is for to eat and for Physick very much is extracted I saw it at Ravenna But Oyl of Beech The best of all is pressed out in abundance for meats and for lights It burns very cleer and tastes as sweet Almonds and the whole Nut almost goes into Oyl as the Wallnut doth The elder the Mast is the more Oyl it yields and the Lees of the Oyl is excellent to far Oxen and Hogs They are soon gathered cleansed bruised and pressed We pressed also Oyl from the bastard Sycomore as they call it for it is abundant in seed and in winter the boughs of it are seen loaded with seed onely In February we collected it and crumbled it the shell is broken into six or seven parts the kernels are like a Pear they are bruised and heated in a pan then put into a press and they yield their Oyl They make clear light in lamps and the seed yields a fourth part of Oyl There is drawn Oyl out of the Sanguine-Tree for lights About the middle of September the ripe berries are taken forth of the clusters let them dry a few days bruise them and let them boyl in water in a brass kettle for one hour then put them into the press you shall have green coloured Oyl about a seventh part of the seed The Mountainous people use it There is pressed Oyl out of the Grapes or Raisins The Greeks call'd these Gigarta Cisalpina Gallia makes oyl of them bruised heat and pressed in a press but it is very little fit for lights because it burns exceeding cleer There is much in Egypt Oyl of Radish-seed made they use it to season their meats and boil it with them But Cisalpina Gallia presseth Oyl out of Radish-seed and Rape-seed Rapes are pulled up onely in Novembâ—r but they are covered with sand together with their leaves They are planten in March that they may seed in May. For unless they be pulled up they freeze with winter cold But there is another kind of Rape that is sowed in July it is weeded it comes forth in the spring in May it yields seed out of a quarter of a bushel of it eighteen pounds of Oyl are drawn it is good for lights and for common people to eat If you sow a whole Acre with this seed you shall have five load of seed and of every load you may make two hundred pounds of Oyl it is onely plow'd and weeded Also Oyl is made of the seed of Cameline It is made for lights but those of Lombardy make great plenty of a golden-coloured Oyl of a seed like to this called Dradella It hath plaited leaves as wild Rochet which they sowe amongst Pulse The same may be said of the seeds of Nettles Mustard Flax Rice CHAP. XXV How a Housholder may provide himself with many sorts of Thread NOw shall I speak of many sorts of Yarn because this may much help the Household for the Houswife hath always need thereof Our Ancestors used Hemp and Flax for thus they made Yarn of Flax yet there needs no example the Thread is so common I will speak of those that follow and of other inventions Pliny Flax is known to be ripe two ways when the seed smells or looks yellow then it is pulled up and bound in handfuls and dried in the Sun letting it hang with the roots upwards for one day Then five of these bundles standing with their tops one against another that the seed may fall in the middle Then after Wheat-harvest the branches are laid in the water that is warm with the Sun they are kept down by some weight and soaked there and again as before turn'd up-side down they are dried in the Sun Then being dried they are bruised on with a flax-hammer that which was next the rind is call'd hard or the worst flax and it is fit for to make weiks for Candles yet that is kemmed with hackes till all the membrans be pilled clean The art of kembing and making of it is out of fifty pound of Flax-bundles to make fifteen pound of Flax. Then again it is polished in Thread it is often beat upon a hard stone with water and when it is woven it is bruised again with Beetles and the more you beat it the better it is Also there is made Thread of Hemp Hemp is excellent for ropes Hemp is plucked up after the Vintage but it is cleansed and pill'd with great labour There are three sorts of it that next the rind is the worst and that next the pith the middlemost is the best which is called Mesa Another To make Thread of Broom It is broken and pull'd from the Ides of May until the Ides in June
of brass you may make Iron to become white If you put amongst it some silver though it be not much it will soon resemble the colour of silver for Iron doth easily suffer it self to be medled with gold or silver and they may be so thoroughly incorporated into each other that by all the rules of separation that can be used you cannot without great labour and very much ado separate the one of them from the other CHAP. V. Of Quick-silver and of the effects and operations thereof IN the next place it is meet that we speak something concerning Quick-silver and the manifold operations thereof wherein we will first set down certain vulgar and common congelations that it makes with other things because many men do desire to know them and secondly we will shew how it may be dissolved into water that they which are desirous of such experiments may be satisfied herein First therefore we will shew How Quick-silver may be congealed and curdled as it were with Iron Put the quick-silver into a casting vessel and put together with it that water which the Blacksmith hath used to quench his hot Iron in and put in also among them Ammoniack Salt and Vitriol and Verdegrease twice so much of every one of these as there was quick-silver let all these boil together in an exceeding great fire and still turn them up and down with an Iron slice or ladle and if at any time the water boil away you must be sure that you have in a readiness some of the same water through hot to cast into it that it may supply the waste which the fire hath made and yet not hinder the boiling thus will they be congealed all together within the space of six hours After this you must take the congealed stuff when it is cold and binde it up hard with your hands in leather thongs or linnen cloth or osiers that all the juice and moisture that is in it may be squeesed out of it then let that which is squeesed and drained out settle it self and be congealed once again till the whole confection be made then put it into an earthen vessel well washed and amongst it some spring-water and take off as neer as you can all the filth and scum that is upon it and is gone to waste and in that vessel you must temper and diligently mix together your congealed matter with spring-water till the whole matter be pure and clear then lay it abroad in the open air three days and three nights and the subject which you have wrought upon will wax thick and hard like a shell or a tile-sheard There is also another congelation to be made with quick-silver Congeailng of Quick-silver with balls of Brass thus make two Brass half circles that that may fasten one within the other that nothing may exhale put into them quick-silver with an equal part of white Arsenick and Tartar well powdred and searced lute the joynts well without that nothing may breathe forth so let them dry and cover them with coles all over for six hours then make all red hot then take it out and open it and you shall see it all coagulated and to stick in the hollow of the Brass ball strike it with a hammer and it will fall off melt it and project it and it will give an excellent colour like to Silver and it is hard to discern it from Silver If you will you may mingle it with three parts of melted Brass and without Silver it will be exceeding white soft and malleable It is also made another way Make a great Cup of Silver red Arsenick and Latin with a cover that sits close that nothing may exhale fill this with quick-silver and lute the joynts with the white of an Egg or some Pine-tree-rosin as it is commonly done hang this into a pot full of Linseed Oyl and let it boil twelve hours take it out and strain it through a skin or straw and if any part be not coagulated do the work again and make it coagulate If the vessel do coagulate it slowly so much as you find it hath lost of its weight of the silver Arsenick and Alchymy make that good again for we cannot know by the weight use it it is wonderful that the quick-silver will draw to it self out of the vessel and quick-silver will enter in Now I shall shew what may be sometimes useful To draw water out of Quick-silver Make a vessel of potters earth that will endure the fire of which crucibles are made six foot long and of a foot Diameter glassed within with glass about a foot broad at the bottom a finger thick narrower at the top bigger at bottom About the neck let there be a hole as big as ones finger and a little pipe coming forth by which you may fitly put in the quick-silver on the top of the mouth let there be a glass cap fitted with the pipe and let it be smeered with clammy clay and bind it above that it breathe not forth For this work make a furnace let it be so large at the top that it may be fit to receive the bottom of the vessel a foot broad and deep You must make the grate the fire is made upon with that art that when need is you may draw it back on one side and the fire may fall beneath Set therefore the empty vessel into the furnace and by degrees kindle the fire Lastly make the bottom red hot when you see it to be so which you may know by the top you must look through the glass cap presently by the hole prepared pour in ten or fifteen pounds of quick-silver and presently with clay cast upon it stop that hole and take away the grate that the fire may fall to the lower parts and forthwith quench it with water Then you shall see that the water of quick-silver will run forth at the nose of the cap into the receiver under it about an ounce in quantity take the vessel from the fire and pour forth the quick-silver and do as before and always one ounce of water will distil forth keep this for Chymical operation I found this the best for to smug up women with This artifice was found to purifie quick-silver I shall not pass over another art no less wonderful than profitable for use To make quick-silver grow to be a Tree Dissolve silver in aqua fortis what is dissolved evaporate into thin air at the fire that there may remain at the bottom a thick unctious substance Then distil fountain-water twice or thrice and pour it on that thick matter shaking it well then let it stand a little and pour into another glass vessel the most pure water in which the silver is adde to the water a pound of quick-silver in a most transparent crystalline glass that will attract to it that silver and in the space of a day will there spring up a most beautiful tree from the bottom and hairy as
may be red hot take it off and plunge it in urine and it will regain the colour If it shine too much and you would have it of a lower colour the remedy is to wet it in urine and let it stand on a plate red hot to cool But thus you shall make vitriol very red put it into a vessel covered with coles and boil it till it change to a most bright red take it out and lay it aside and do not use it for an ill purpose We may with the fragments of brass Do this business otherwise That shall supply the place of silver and it shall become too weighty Or otherwise melt two parts of brass with silver then make it into small thin plates in the mean while make a powder of the dregs of aqua fortis namely of salt-peter and vitriol and in a strong melting vessel put the plate and the powder to augment gold fill the vessel in a preposterous order Then lure the mouth of it and set it in a gentle fire half a day take it off always renewing the same till it come to the desired weight We have taught how to increase the weight and not hurt the fashion or stamp Now I shall shew how without loss in weight nor yet the stamp being hurâ— Gold and Silver may be diminished Some use to do it with aqua fortis but it makes the work rough with knots and holes you shall do it therefore thus Strew powder of brimstone upon the work and put a candle to it round about or burn it under your work by degrees it will consume by burning strike it with a hammer on the contrary side and the superficies will fall off as much in quantity as you please as you use the brimstone Now shall I shew how To separate gold from silver Cups that are gilded For it is oft-times a custome for Goldsmiths to melt the vessels and cast them away and to make new ones again not knowing how without great trouble to part the gold from the silver and therefore melt both together To part them do thus Take salt Ammoniack brimstone half a part powder them â—ne and anoint the gilded part of the vessel with oyl then strew on the powder and take the vessel in a pair of tongs and put it into the fire when it is very hot strike it with an iron and the powder shaken will fall into the water in a platter under it and the vessel will remain unaltered Also it is done Another way with quick-silver Put quick-silver into an earthen vessel with a very wide mouth and let it heat so long at the fire that you can endure the heat of it with your finger put into it put the gilt plate of silver into it and when the quick-silver sticks to the gold take it out and put it into a Charger into which the gold when it is cold will fall with the quick-silver Going over this work again until no more gold appears in the vessel Then put the gold with the quick-silver that was shaken into the Charger into a linnen clout and press it out with your hands and let the quick-silver fall into some other receiver the gold will stay behind in the rag take it and put it into a cole made with a hole in it blow till it melt make it into a lump and boil it in an earthen vessel with a little Stibium and pour it forth into another vessel that the gold may fall to the bottom and the Stibium stay atop But if you will Part Gold from a vessel of Brass wet the vessel in cold water and set it in the fire when it is red hot quench it in cold water then scrape off the gold with latin wire bound together CHAP. IX To part Metals without aqua fortis BEcause waters are drawn from salts with difficulty with loss of time and great charges I shall shew you how to part gold from silver and brass and silver from brass without aqua fortis but by some easie operations with little cost or loss of time And first I shall shew how To part Gold from Silver Cast a lump of gold mixt with silver into an earthen vessel that will hold fire with the same weight of Antimony thus when the vessel is red hot and the lump is melted and turned about with the force of the fire cast a little Stibium in and in a little time it will melt also and when you see it cast in the rest of the Stibium and cover the vessel with a cover let the mixture boil as long as one may repeat the Lords-prayer take away the vessel with a pair of tongs and cast it into another iron Pyramidal vessel red hot called a Crucible that hath in the bottom of it rams fat shaking it gently that the heavier part of gold separated from the silver may fall to the bottom when the vessel is cold it is shaken off and the part next the bottom will be gold the upper part silver and if it be not well parted refuse not to go over the same work again but take a less quantity of Stibium Let therefore the gold be purged again and let the Stibium be boiled and there will be always at the bottom a little piece of gold And as the dregs remain after the same manner purge them again in the copple and you shall have your silver without any loss of the weight because they are both perfect bodies but the silver onely will lose a little But would you have your silver to lose less do thus adde to two pound and half of Stibium wine-lees two pounds and boil them together in an earthen vessel and the mass will remain in the bottom which must be also boil'd in a copple then adding pieces of lead to it purge it in a copple wherein the other things being consumed by the fire the silver onely will remain but if you do not boil your Stibium in wine-lees as I said part of the silver will be lost and the copple will draw the silver to it The same may be done Another way Take three ounces of brimstone powder them and mingle them with one ounce of common oyl and set them to the fire in a glazed dish of earth let the fire be first gentle then augment it till it run and seem to run over take it from the fire and let it cool then cast it into sharp vinegar so the oyl will swim above the vinegar the brimstone will fall down to the bottom cast away the vinegar and let the brimstone boil in strong vinegar and you shall see the vinegar coloured you shall strain the vinegar through a wisp into a glased vessel to which adde more brimstone boil it again and again strain out the lye into the vessel doing this so oft till the Lixivium comes forth muddy or of a black colour Let the Lixivium settle one night again strain it through a wisp and you shall
flame when it hath ceas'd smoaking take it out and break part of it to see whether it be white quite through for that is an argument of the sufficient burning because it oftentimes happens that the outside onely is burned and the rest of it remaineth crude Therefore when it hath gained the colour of chalk it must be taken out and when it is cold grinde it and lay it in water in some wide-mouth'd vessel a quarter of a day When the water is grown clear filtrate it and strain it into another vessel and then pour water again unto the settlement observing the same things we spoke before until the water have taken out all the salt which will come to pass in the third or forth time Pour your waters which you saved into a vessel of glass and all things being ready put live coles under it and attend the work until the water be consumed by the force of the fire which being done the salt will stick to the bottom it being thus made preserve it in a dry place lest it turn to oyl CHAP. II. How Flint or Crystal is to be prepared and how Pastils are boiled THe matter of which Gems are made is either Crystal or Flint from whence we strike fire or round pebbles found by river sides those are the best which are taken up by the river Thames white clear and of the bigness of an egge for of those are made best counterfeit Gemms though all will serve in some sort Some think that Crystal is the best for this purpose because of the brightness and transparency of it but they are deceived The way of making Gems is this Take riverpebbles and put them into a fornace in that place where the retorted flame is most intense when they are red hot take them out and fling them into water then dry them and powder them in a mortar or a hand-mill until they are very fine put them into a wide-mouthed vessel full of rain water and shake it well in your hands for so the finest part will rise to the top and the grossest will settle to the bottom to that which swims at top pour fresh water and stir the dust again and do this oftentimes until the gross part be quite separated and sunk down Then take out the water and let it settle and in the bottom there will lie a certain slimy matter gather together and reserve the refined powder But whil'st the stone is ground both the morter and the mill will lose somewhat of themselves which being mixt with the powder will foul the Gem wherefore it will be worth the labâ—r to wash that away to which end let water be often poured into the lavel and stirred about the dust of the morter will rise to the top by reason of its levity and the powder of the pebbles will retire to the bottom by reason of its weight skim the lavel and separate them with a spoon till all that sandy and black dust be taken off then strain out the water and reserve the powder dry These being done we must teach How Pastils are boiled Artificers call those pellets which are made of the salts and the forenamed powder and water Pastils Take five parts of salt of Tartar as many of salt of Soda double the quantity of these of the forespoken powder of pebbles and mix them very well in a stone morter sprinkle them with water wet them so that they may grow into a past and make Pastils of them in bigness of your fist set them in the sun and dry them well Then put them into a fornace of reverbaration the space of six hours encreasing the fire by degrees that at last they may become red hot but not melt wherefore use no bellows when they are baked enough let them cool and they will become so hard that they will endure almost the hammer CHAP. III. Of the Fornace and the Parts thereof NOw the Fornace is to be built which is like to that of glass-makers but less according to the proportion of the work Let your fornace be eight foot high and consist of two vaults the roof of the lower must be a handful and a half thick the vault it self must have a little door by which you may cast in wood to feed the fire there Let it also have on the top and in the middle of its roof a hole about a foot in breadth by which the flame may penetrate into the second vault and reach to the upper roof whence the flame being reverberated doth cause a vehement heat In this upper vault there must be cut out in the wall small holes of a handful in breadth which must open and shut to set the pots and pans in on the floor and to take them out again Artificers call these pots Crucibles they are made of clay which is brought from Valencia and doth very strongly endure fire They must be a finger thick and a foot and a half deep their bottom somewhat thicker lest they should break with the force of the fire All things being thus provided cast in your wood and fire and let the fornace heat by degrees so that it may be perfectly hot in a quarter of a day Your workmen must be diligent to perform their duty then let the Pastils being broken into pieces about the bigness of a wall-nut be put into crucibles and set in the holes of the fornace built for that purpose with a pair of iron tongs to every pot When they melt they will rise up in bubbles and growing greater and greater must be pricked with sharp wires that the vapor passing out the bubbles may sink down again and not run over the mouth of the crucibles Then let other pieces be put in and do as before until the pots be filled to the top and continue the fire for a whole day until the matter be concocted Then put an iron hook into the pots and try whether the matter have obtained a perfect transparency which if it have take it out of the pots with iron instruments for that purpose and cast it into clear water to wash off the filth and stains and to purge out the salt for when the Gems are made on a suddain the salt breaks forth as it were spued out and overcast them like a cloud Yet there must be a great deal of diligence used whilâ—st you draw out this vitrified matter lest it touch the sides of the fornace for it will cleave thereto like birdâ—ime hardly to be pulled off without part of the wall as also lest it fall into the vessels for it is very difficult to separate it and it prejudices the clearness of the glasâ— When it is cold put it again into the crucibles and let it glow for two days until it be concocted into perfect glass When this vitrified matter hath stood so for two days some to make it more fine and bright lest it should be specked with certain little bubbles
the west-Indies is excellent against them for when I anointed their mouth and jaws with it they died in half an hour Balsame of the east is a present remedy against poyson by oyntments or the biting of a serpent saith Aetius In Arabia where it groweth there is no fear of poyson neither doth any one dye of their bitings for the fury of this deadly poyson is allayed by the feeding of the serpents upon this pretious Balsame But I have found nothing more excellent than the earth which is brought from the Isle of Malta for the least dust of it put into their mouths kills them presently I have tried the same vertue in Lithoxylon which Physitians use for the worms in children There is a stone called Chelonites the French name it Crapodina which they report to be found in the head of a great old Toad and if it can be gotten from him while he is alive it is soveraign against poyson they say it is taken from living Toads in a red cloth in which colour they are much delighted for whilst they sport and open themselves upon the scarlet the stone droppeth out of their head and falleth through a hole made in the middle into a box set under for the purpose else they will suck it up again But I never met with a faithful person who said that he found it nor could I ever find one though I have cut up many Nevertheless I will affirm this for truth that those stones which are pretended to be taken out of Toads are minerals for I remember at Rome I saw a broken piece of stone which was compacted of many of those stones some bigger some less which stuck on the back of it like limps on a rock But the vertue is certain if any swallow it down with poyson it will preserve him from the malignity of it for it runneth about with the poyson and assawageth the power of it that it becometh vain and of no force A most perfect oyl against poyson often tryed in repressing the violence of it Take three pound of old oyl put into it two handfulls of the flower of St Johns wort and let them macerate in it for two months in the sun Then strain out the flowers and put into the oyl two ounces of the flowers of the same herb and set it to boil in Balneo Mariae a quarter of a day Stop the bottle close that it may have no vent and set it a sunning for fifteen days In the moneth of July take three ounces of the seed stamp it gently and steep it in two glasses of the best white-wine with gentian tormentil white dittany zedoary and carline gathered in August red sanders long aristolochie of each two drams Let all these mecerate in the wine for three days then take them out and put them in the oyl and boil them gently in Balneo for six hours then strain them in a press Adde to the expression an ounce of saffron myrrhe aloes spikenard and rubarb all bruised and let them boil in it for a day in B. M. at last treacle and mithridate of each two ounces and let them also boil in it six hours as before then set it forty days in the sun It must be used thus In the plague-time or upon suspition of poyson anoint the stomach and wrists and the place about the heart and drink three drops of it in wine It will work wonders CHAP. X. Antidotes and preservatives against the Plague I Have spoken of poysons now I will of the plague being of the same nature and cured almost by the same Medicines I will set down onely them which in our time have been experimented by the Neapolitanes Sicilians and Venetians whilst the plague was spread amongst them to resist the contagion of that epidemical plague and preserve their bodies from infection A confection of Gillyflowers against the plague of wonderful operation Gather some clove-gilliflowers in the moneth of May of a red and lively colour because they are of the greater vertue pull them out of their husks and clip off the green â—nd then beat them in a marble mortar with a wooden pestle until they become so fine as they may hardly be felt In the mean while take three pound of sugar for one of the flowers melt it in a brass skillet and boil it with a little orange-flower water that may quickly be consumed When it is boiled sufficiently put in some whites of egges beaten enough to froth and clarifie it still stirring it and skimming off the froth with a spoon until all the dregs be taken out Then put in the due weight of flowers and stir it with a wooden slice till iâ— turn red when it is almost boiled adde thereunto two drachms of cloves beaten with a little musk the mixture of which will both add excite a sweet sent and plâ—asantness in the flowers Then put it into earthen pots and set it up if you add a little juyce of lemon it will make it of a more lively blood-colour We may also make Lozenges and round Cakes of it by pouring it on a cold marble If any would do iâ— after the best manner they must extract the colour of the flowers and boil their sugar in that infusion for so it will smell sweeter Some never bruise the flowers but cut them very small with sizers and candy them with sugar but they are not very pleasant to eat This confection is most grateful to the taste and by reason of the sent of the cloves very pleasant The vertues of it are these as I have found by experience it iâ— good for all diseases of the heart as fainting and trembling thereof for the megrum and poyson and the bitings of venimous creatures and especially against the infection of the plague There may be made a vinegar or infusion of it which being rub'd about the nostrils is good against contagious air and night-dews and all effects of melancholy Against the Plague Gather Ivy-berries in May and wilde Poppies before the sun rise lest they open In April gather goats rue dry them in the shade and make them into powder One drachm of it being drank in wine is excellent against infectious diseases The Bezoar stone brought from the west-Indies being hung about the neck nigh to the heart or four grains of it in powder being taken in wine is good against the plague and the infection of all pestilential feavors as I can testifie And taketh away soundings and exhilarateth the heart The water or oyl extracted from the seeds of Citron is a very strong Antidote against the plague Apparitius Hispanus his oyl is also approved against the same CHAP. XI Remedies for wounds and blows THere are some remedies for wounds and blows which shall not be omitted for I have found some of them to be of wonderful vertue The oyl of Hispanus for wounds and other things Take two pound of new wax four ounces of wax as many of linseed
it and press her between your hands that no Wine remain and then adding two Cups of white-Wine distil her in a Chymical Vessel then distil the Flowers of Bindeweed Citrons Oranges together and keep this water by it self Then open Lemmons and press out the juice And also take water of Bean-flowers then distil six cups of Asseâ— milk and as many of Cows-milk You shall do the same with water of Gourds and of Milk well boyled and of water of Bean-flowers and of Rosin of Turpentine Then provide a glazed Vessel put into it Camphire two drachms four ounces of Ceruss finely powdered mingle them with the aforesaid waters and set it in a soft Vessel in the open Air fifteen days and nights When you would use it wet a Linen-rag in it and wash your Face CHAP. XVII How to make the Face Rose-coloured I Have made the Face white now I will make it red that the wise may be made wholly Beautiful for her husband And first To make a pale Face purple-coloured And to adorn one that wants colour use this Remedy Take Vinegar twice distilled and cast into it the raspings of red Sanders as much as you please boyl it at a gentle fire adding a little Allom and you shall have a red colour most perfect to dye the Face If you would have it sweet-smelling add a little Musk Civet Cloves or any Spices Now Another Take Flowers of Clove-Gilliflowers bruise the ends of the sprigs and draw forth the juice if they be so ripe that they are black add juice of Lemmons that they may shine with a more clear red With this paint your Face and you shall have a pleasant red colour without any stinking smell or wet the sprigs of Clove-gilliflowers in juice of Lemmons and set them in the Sun Take away the old and put in fresh until it be as red as you would have it let the juice dry and the color will be most glorious But I draw a quintessence from Clovegill flowers Roses Flower-gentle with Spirit of Wine then I add Allom and the juice of a Citron and I made an excellent colour to beautifie the Face Take Another If you add to the best Wine one tenth part of Honey and one ounce of Frankinsenceâ— and then distil it and steep in it the raspings of red Saunders until it is coloured to your minde and then wash your Face with it it will make your Face white and well-coloured Also A Fucus that cannot be detected And it is so cunningly made that it will delude all men for a cleer water makes the Cheeks purple-coloured and it will last long and the cleerer the part will be the more your wash it with it and rub it with a cloth of Woolen You shall draw out a water from the Seeds of Cardamom which the Apothecaries call Grains of Paradise Cubebs Indian Cloves raspings of Brasil and Spirit of Wine distilled when they have been infused some time draw forth the water with a gentle fire or corrupt Dung and wet your Face often with this There are also Experiments To colour the Body If you boyl Nettles in water and wash your Body with it it will make it red-colored if you continue it long If you distil Straw-berries and wash your self with the water you shall make your Face red as a Rose But the Ancients dyed their bodies of divers colours partly for ornament partly for terrour as Caesar writes of the Britans going to war for they painted themselves with wood Theophrastus calls it Isatis and we call it Guado The Grecian-women painted themselves with wood as Zenophon writes And in our days the West-Indians crush out in Harvest-time a blood-red juice from the Roots of wilde Bugloss which the women know well enough whereby they cover their pale colour with a pleasant red and so change their over-white colour with this Experiment CHAP. XVIII To wash away the over-much redness of the Face I Have shewed you how to colour the Face now I shall shew how to uncolour it when the Face is too red and women that are very red desire this The way is To wash away the too-much redness of the Face Take four ounces of Peach-Kernels and Gourd-Seed two ounces pown them and crush them out strongly that you may draw forth an oyly Liquor with this morning and evening anoynt the red Carbuncles of your face and by degrees they will vanish and be gone Another Take Purple-Violets Egg-shells Saunders Camphire mingled with water set the water in the open Air and wash the redness therewith Also I know that the distilled water of white Lillies will take away the redness CHAP. XIX How to make a Sun-burnt Face white WHen women travel in the open Air and take journeys in Summer the Sun in one day will burn them so black that it is hard to take it off I found out this Experiment Beat about ten whites of Eggs till they come to water put them in a glazed Vessel adding one ounce of Sugar-Candy to them and when you go to bed anoynt your Face and in the morning wash it off with Foutain-water Pliny also saith thus Another If the Face be smeered with the white of an Egg it will not be Sun-burnt With us women that have to do in the Sun to defend their Faces from the heat of it that they may not be black they defend it with the white of an Egg beaten with a little Starch and mingled and when the Voyage is done they wash off this covering with Barley-water Some do it Another way rubbing their foul Skin with Melon-Rindes and so they easily rub off Sun-burnings and all other spots outwardly on the Skin The Seed also bruised and rubbed on will do it better Also a Liquor found in little bladders of the Elm-Tree when the Buds first come forth makes the Face clear and shining and takes away Sun-burnings CHAP. XX. How Spots may be taken from the Face OFt-times fair women are disgraced by spots in their Faces but the Remedy for it is this to use Abstergents and Detergents in whiting of their Faces Therefore To take off spots from the Face anoynt the Face with Oyl of Tartar and let it dry on and wash it not at all do this for ten days then wash it with a Lixivium and you shall see the spots no more If the part be not yet clean enough do it once more If this please you not take Another Put Quick-Lime into hot water mingle them and stir them for ten days After two days pour forth the clear water into a Brazen Vessel then take Salt-Ammoniac between your Finger-tops and rub it so long at the bottom of the Vessel until you see the water become of a blew-colour and the more you rub it the better colour it will have and it will turn into a Skie-colour or Purple-colour very pleasant to behold Wet Linen-cloths in this water and lay them on the spots till they be dry and wet them again till
the spots be gone See Another Take two ounces of Turpentine-Rosin Ceruss as much mingle them with the white of an Egg and stirring them well besmeer Linen-cloths with them And when you go to bed let them stick to the spots in the morning wash the place and do the same again till all the spots be gone If you please here is Another The distilled water of Pimpernel mingled with Camphire and laid to the Face will make women that desire to be beautiful have a cleer Skin very sightly to behold and will take off the spots Distil the Mulberry-Leaves let the water stand ten dayes in the Sun add to this Mercury sublimate Verdigrease artificial Chrysocolla called Borax and a good quantity of the Powder of Sea-Cockle-shells finely beaten Set it so many dayes in the Sun and then use it If you will rub off the wan colour of your cheeks do thus especially for women when they are in their courses Anoynt the place with Ceruss and Bean-flower mingled with Vinegar or yelks of Eggs mingled with Honey The same may be done with Bean-meal and Feny-Greek smeered on with Honey But we wipe away Black and blew marks thus If you wash the black and blew places with the juice of the Leaves and Roots of Thapsia made into Cakes in the Sun but one night they will be taken away Nero Caesar made his Face white from the strokes he had received in his Night-walks with Wax and Frankincense and the next day his Face was clear against all reports Or Oyl pressed from the Seeds of Flowers when it is thick will do it rarely Or the Root mingled with equal quantities of Frankincense and Wax but let it â—ay on but two hours at most then foment the place with Sea-water hot Also Wal-nuts bruised or smeered on will take away black and blew spots Vinegar or Honey anoynted will take away the same So doth Garlick rubbed on and brings black and blew to the right colour Or the Ashes of it burnt smeered on with Honey The juice of Mustard-Seed anoynted on but one night is good for the same or it is anoynted on with Honey or Suet or a Cerate If a Briony-root be made hollow and Oyl put into it and it be boyled in hot Embers if that be anoynted on it will blot out black and blew spots Marks that are noted upon Children by Women great with-child when they long exceedingly are taken away thus Let her first eat of that Flesh or Fruit her belly full then let her binde on that Flesh alive or the green Fruit to the part till it die or corrupt and they will be gone Or else let her wash the place with Aqua Fortis or Regia and the Skin grows very black so it will take the marks away Do it again For spots and beauty I will not omit Aelian's Experiment of a Lion which is a kinde of Locust For in some Membranes where the Testes are bound together under which there are some soft Carbuncles and tender that are called the Lions fat This will help people to make ill Faces look comely mingled with Oyl of Roses and made into an Oyntment it will make the Face look fair and shining CHAP. XXI How we may take off red Pimples BEcause red Pimples use to deform the Face and specially the whitest therefore to take them off use these Remedies I often to take off Pimples used Oyl of Paper namely extracting it from burnt Paper I shall shew the way elsewhere because I will not disturb the Order where I shall speak of the Extraction of Oyls and Waters Wherefore anoynting that on the red spots will soon blot them out For the same Rear Eggs are good twenty of them boyled hard cut in the middle and the yelks taken forth fill up the hollow places in the whites with Oyl of sweet Almonds and Turpentine-Rosin extract the Liquor in a Glass Vessel use it Another Beat two Eggs well together add as much juice of Lemmons and as much Mercury sublimate set it in the Sun and use it Another to polish the Face Take Sow-bread-Roots three parts cleansed Barley six parts Tartar calcined one part Roots of wilde Cucumers powdered two parts Wheat-Bran two handfuls let them all boyl in Water till a third part be consumed then wash your Face with it CHAP. XXII How Tetters may be taken from the Face or any other part of the Body RIng-worms will so deform the Face that nothing can do it more sometimes they run upon other parts of the Body as the Arm-pits and Thighs there drops forth of them a stinking water that will foul the cloths I found these Remedies Against Tetters Distil water from the Roots of Sowredock and add to every pound of these of Pompions and Salt-Peter half an ounce Tartar of white-Wine two ounces let them soak for some days then distil them and wash your Face in the morning therewith and at night smeer it with Oyl of Tartar and of Almonds mingled Oyl of Eggs is good also to anoynt them with Yet sometimes these Tetters are so fierce that no Remedies can cure them I shall set down Another that I have used with admirable success when they were inveterate In a Glass of sharp red-Wine boyl a drachm of Mercury sublimate then wash the place with it morning and evening let it dry of it self Do this three or four times and the Tetters will away and never come again Another Take Salt-Peter three ounces Oyl of bitter Almonds two pound of Squils half a pound one Lemmon without the Pills mingle them and let them ferment three days then with Chymical Instruments extract the Oyl and anoynt your Tetters therewith and they will be gone though they seem to turn to a Leprosie CHAP. XXIII How Warts may be taken away WArts use to possess the Fore-head Nose Hands and other open places so doth hard Flesh and other foulness of the skin women cannot endure them I found out Remedies against these deformities of the skin Against Warts The Ancients used the greater Spurge whose juice anoynted on with Salt takes them away and therefore they called it Warts-Herb There is also a kinde of Succory called Verrucaria from the effect for if one eat it but once in Sallets all the Warts will be gone from any part of the Body or if you swallow one drachm of the Seeds Another This one and so no more There is a kinde of Beetle that is Oyly in Summer you shall finde it in Dust and Sand in the way if you rub that on the Warts they will be presently gone and not be seen You may finde these and keep them for your use CHAP. XXIV To take away wrinkles from the Body MAny parts of the Body use to be wrinckled as the Hands Face Belly after Child-bearing and the like To contract the Skin therefore do thus For a wrinckled Forehead the Dregs of Linseed-Oyl is good or Lees of Oyl of Olives putting unto it a little Gum-Arabick
the Wine for the life and tenuous part is taken out Then distil the same again an the third time alwayes drawing off but a third part Then prepare a Vessel with a longer and straighter neck of three cubits and distil it again in this at last put it into the mouth of the Vessel cover it with Parchment and set on the Cap of the Stillatory and kindle the fire the thin spirits of the Wine will pass through all and fall down into the Receiver and the phlegm which cannot get passage will settle to the bottom The note of perfect deputation from phlegm will be if a rag being dipt in it and set on fire do burn quite away or if some of it being dropt on a plain boaâ—â— be kindled into flame doth leave no moysture or mark of it But all the work dependeth on this that the mouth of the Vessel be exactly stopped and closed so that the least Spirit may not finde vent and flie into Air. The fittest thing to stop them with is an Ox's Bladder or some other Beasts for being cut into broad fiâ—â—ets and while they be wet rolled and tied about where the mouths of the Vessels meet it will alone keep in the expiring vapors You may observe this in the Distillation of it The Coals being hot the Vessel boyleth and a most burning Spirit of the Wine ascendeth through the neck of the Vessel it is hot below and cold on the top till it getteth up into the Cap then encountring with cold it turneth into water and runneth down by the nose into the Receiver and what was a long time ascending then in a small interval of time flows down again to the under-placed Glass Then the Cap being cold sendeth down that quality through the neck into the very belly of the Stillatory until the Spirit being separated from the phlegm worketh the same effâ—ct again I use to suffer the Wine to ascend so long as the Spirit runneth invisible into the Receiver for when the phlegm ascendeth there will appear bubbles in the Cap and streams which will run into the water through the nose Then I take away that dead carcase of the Wine and pour in fresh VVine and extract the Spirit out of the same way To do the same a more compendious way Those who desire to do this in a shorter time must make a Brass Vessel of the bigness of an ordinary Barrel in the form of a Gourd but the nose of the Cap must be made of Glass or Brass of fifteen or twenty foot winding about with circling Revolutions or mutual crossings or as it were with the circling of Snakes which they must set in wooden Vessels full of cold water that passing through it may be received into the Receiver For when it hath distilled the third part of the VVine in three hours they must cast out the residue and put that which is distilled into the Stillatory again and the second time diâ—â—ill out a third part so also the third time in the same day At length they put it into a Stillatory with a longer neck and separate the phlegm from it Some make the Cap with three or four heads setting one upon another all being pervious but the uppermost and every one having his nose and his particular Receiver They fit them to the Vessel with a long neck set them on binde them and lute them that they have no vent the water which distilleth out of the uppermost head is cleerest and most perfect that out of the lowest more imperfect and must be reserved asunder for they will be of different estimation the highest will be cleere from all phlegm the lower full of it the middle in a mean between both How to make Aqua Vitae of new Wine It may be done without the charge of Coals and VVood for it may worthily be called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 neither doth it require the attendance of a learned Artist but of an ignorant Clown or a woman for this Spirit is drawn out meerly by the vehement working of Nature to free her self without any other help whatever When the VVine is run out of the press into the Ho shead and other Vessels and beginneth to purge place an earthen neck or one of wood being two cubits in length upon the bung-hole of the Vessel set the Cap upon the neck and lute the joynts very close that there may be no vent set the Receiver under the nose to take the Water which floweth down Thus thine exhaltations being elevated by the working Spirits of the Wine are converted into Water meerly for the work of Nature without the help of fire which therefore hath his particular vertues which we will pass over now and mention them in another place CHAP IV. How to distil with the heat of the Sun WE may distil not onely with fire but with the Sun and Dung But the last tainteth the distilled Waters with a scurvy sent The Sun extracteth the best Water and very useful for many Medicines The heat of the fire changeth the Nature of things and causeth hot and fiery qualities in them Wherefore in all Medicines for the eyes we must use Waters extracted from the Sun for others do fret and corrode the eye these are more gentle and soft The Sun extracteth more Water then the fire because the vapours do presently condense and drop down which they do not over the fire because they are driven up with a force and stick to the sides of the Stillatory and fall down again into the bottom There are other advantages which shall be explicated in their proper places Besides it is good Husbandry for the work is done without wood or coals or labour It is but filling the Vessels with the Ingredients and setting them in the Sun and all the pains is past Therefore to explain the manner in a few words Prepare a Form of three foot in height two in breadth and of a length proportionable to the number of the Vessels you intend to set to Work if many make it longer if a few let it be shorter Board up that side of the Form next the Sun lest the heat do warm the Receivers and make the Water ascend again In the middle of the upper plank of the Form make several holes for the necks of the Glasses to pass down through When the Sun hath passed Gemini for this must be performed in the heat of Summer only set your form abroad in the Sun Gather your Herbs before Sun-rise pick them and cleanse them from dust and durt of mens feet from the urine and ordure of Worms and other Creatures and such kind of fiâ—th and pollutions Then lest they should foul and soil the Water shake them and wipe them with clothes and lastly wash your hands and then them and dry them in the shade when they are dried put them into the Glasses take some wire-Cittern strings and winde them into round clues so that being let go they may
pour as much Fountain-water on as will cover them a handful or five large fingers over then set on the head and stop the joynts very close Put the other end of the Pipe into the other Pot and joynt them exactly then set on the other head and fasten the lower end of its crooked Pipe into that straight one which passing through the Barrel runneth into the Receiver If the joynts be anywhere faulty stop them with Flax and paste them with Wheat-flour and the white of an Egg then rowl them about and tie them close with Fillets cut out of a Bladder for when the vapors are forced by the heat of the fire they are so attenuated that they will break forth through the least rime or chink in spite of all your endeavors Fill the Barrel with cold water and when it beginneth to grow hot draw it out through a Cock at bottom and supply fresh water that the Pipe may always be kept cool At length make the Pot boyl at first with a gentle fire then encrease it by degrees until the vehemency of the heat doth make the vapors hiss as it were ready to break the Pipes as they run thorow them so they will be elevated thorow the retorted Pipes and leave the phlegmatick water in the lower Vessel till passing through the cold Pipe they be condensed into Liquor and fall down into the Receiver If the water do consume away in the boyling pour in more being first warmed thorow a little Pipe which the Pot must have on one side with a Spigget to it for this purpose but be sure to stop the Spigger in very close that there may be no vent Afterwards separate the Oyl from the Water sublime and purifie it in another Vessel Of all the Instruments that ever I saw not any one extracteth a greater quantity of Oyl and with less labour and industry then this Thus you may without any fear of burning draw Oyl out of Flowers Leaves Spices Gums and VVood with the vehementest fires as also out of Juniper and Laurel-Berries CHAP. IX The Description of a Descendatory whereby Oyl is extracted by Descent I Cannot refrain from discovering here an Instrument found out by my own private experience which I hope will be of no small profit to the Ingenious by which they may draw Oyl out of any the least things without any fear of burning For there are many tenuous oyly Flowers as of Rosemary and Juniper and other things as Musk Amber Civet Gum and such-like out of which may be drawn Oyls very sweet and medicinable but they are of so thin a substance that there is a great hazard of burning them when they are forced by the heat of the fire without which neither fat things will be elevated nor Oyl extracted Therefore to remedy these inconveniences I have invented an Instrument by which Oyl shall descend without any labour or danger of burning Let a Vessel be made of Brass in the form of an Egg two foot high and of the same breadth let it be divided towards the top of which the upper part must serve for a cover and be so fitted to be received into the lower part that the joynts may closely fall in one another and be exactly stopt In the lower part towards the middle about half a foot from the mouth let there be a Copper-plate fitted as it were the midriff so that it may easily be put and taken out in which must be made three hollow places to receive the bottom of three retorted Vessels the rest of the plate must be pervious that the boyling VVater and hot Spirits may have passage to rise upwards Out of the sides of the Vessel there must be three holes through the which the necks of the Retorts may pass being glued and fastned to their Pipes with Flax and tied with Fillets of Bladders so that not the least Air much less any VVater may flie out VVhen you prepare to work fill the Glass-Retorts with the things you intend to still thrust the necks thorow the holes outward and lay their bodies in the prepared hollowness of the cross-plate somewhat elevated If there remain any void space between the necks and the sides of the holes they pass through stop it with Flax and tie it about with Fillets of Bladder and fill the Vessel with with water within three fingers up to the cross-plate The Vessel being covered and the joynts well stopt and glued and bound about so that the force of the vapours arising may not burst it open and scald the Faces of the by-standers kindle the fire by degrees until it become very vehement then wil the vapors make a great nose almost sufficient to terrifie one and first VVater then VVater and Oyl will distil out I cannot contain my self from relating also another Instrument invented for the same purpose Make an oval Brass-Vessel as I advised before with a hole bored thorow the bottom to which fasten a pipe that may arise up to the mouth of the Vessel let the mouth of it be wide like a trumpet or tunnel so that the long neck of a Gourd-Glass may pass through the Pipe of it and the wide mouth of the Vessel under may by degrees receive the swelling parts of the neck Adapt a cover to this Vessel that it may be close stopt and luted as we said before You must make a Furnace on purpose for this use for the fire must not be made in the bottom but about the Vessel The use is this Fill the Glass with Flowers or other things put in some wire Lute-strings after them that they may not fall out again when the Glass is inversed Thrust the neck thorow the Brass-Pipe set the Vessel on the Furnace and fill it with Water round about the arising Pipe put on the Cover and plaister it about set the Receiver under the Furnace that it may catch the dropping Water and Oyl then kindle the fire about the sides of the Pot the violence of which will elevate vapors of burning water which beating against the concave part of the Cover will be reverberate upon the bottom of the Gourd-Glass whose fervent heat will turn the Water and Oyl into vapor and drive it down into the Receiver I will set down some examples of those things which I made trial of my self As How to extract Oyl out of Rosemary Flowers Fill the Retorts with the Leaves and Flowers of Rosmary and set them in the Brass-Furnace the fire being kindled will force out first a Water and afterward a yellow Oyl of a very strong and fervent odor a few drops of which I have made use of in great sicknesses and driving away cruel pains You may extract it easier if you macerate the Flowers or Leaves in their own or Fountain-water for a week In the same manner Oyl of Citron-Pill is extracted When Citrons are come to perfect ripeness shave off the peal with a gross Steal-File put the Filings into a Pot
the whole work depended on it let it circulate in Balneo a whole month take off the yellow Oyl or Quintessence of all with a Silver-Spoon and add to it a drachm of Musk and Amber and set it by for your use in a Glass-bottle close stopt Distil the remainder and it will afford a yellow cleer water but you cannot extract the Oyl without a stink of burning I have very exactly extracted Oyl of Gums Roots and Seeds of the forementioned and mixing them together have effected strange things with them Most of their operations are against Poysons and Pestilential Contagions especially those that are apt to seize on the Spirits for a drop of it being anoynted on the Lips or Nostrils reviveth the Soul and keepeth it in perfect Senses at least six hours CHAP. XVIII Of a Clyssus and how it is made THat there may nothing be omitted I will now shew what a Clyssus is and how it may be made A Clyssus is the Extraction of the Spirits of every part of a Plant united in one common entity There are in a Plant the Root Leaf Flower Fruit and Seed and in every one of these parts there is a peculiar Nature The Operation is thus Dig the Roots when they are full of juice the Leaves when they are fresh and green the Flowers when they are blown the Fruit and Seeds in their due time Extract the Spirits or Essences out of all these by Distillation Maceration or Calcination or any other of the former wayes But when they are all extracted severally one in the form of Oyl another of Salt or Liquor then mix them all together so that the may be conjoyned and united in one body which is called a Clyssus Some mix them in Distillation in Vessels made for the purpose in this manner They put the Water Salt and Oyl in three several Curbicles of equal height and bigness and tying their three necks together and put them into one common Head which may be fit to receive them all close them lute them and kindle the fire under The heat will elevate the thinnest substance in all of them which will meet and mix in the Head and run down by the Nose or Spout into the Receiver so set them by for use This Congregation of Essences doth penetrate and search all the remote passages of the Body and is very useful in Physick CHAP. XIX How to get Oyl out of Salts I Have declared many ways of extracting Oyl now I will shew how to draw it out of Salts that they may be more penetrative and work more powerfully which can be done no other way They seem to have some kinde of fat in them yet will not burn so that it cannot be called a perfect Oyl How to extract Oyl of Tartar Burn the Tartar and reduce it into a Salt as I shewed before then lay it on a Marble in a moyst place and in a few days it will turn to Oyl and run down into a dish which you must set underneath to receive it Thus you may easily make it into Salt Beat the Tartar into Powder and mix an equal quantity of Salt-Peter with it when they are mixt in Iron Mortar set them in the fire until they be quite burned grind the remaining Foeces and dissolve them in a Lye strain it and let the Lye evaporate away and the Salt will settle to the bottom then boyl some Eggs hard take ouâ— the yelks and fill up their place with Salt and in a little time it will dissolve into Oyl Oyl of Sal Sodae Dissolve the Salt in Water and strain it through a cloth then dry it lay it on a Marble and set it in a moyst place and it will run down in an Oyl So The famous Oyl of Talk is extracted onely by the vehement heat of fire yet I knew not at first what it was useful for But I perceive it is much accounted of by women in their Fâ—cus Beat it into fine Powder in an Iron-Morter and put it into a very strong thick Pot fasten the cover on with wire plaiâ—â—er it with Potters Clay and set it in the Sun for three days then thrust it into a Potters Furnace where the flames are most violent After three or four days take it out break open the Pot and if you finde it not sufficiently calcined make it up and set it in again When it is burned perfectly white lay it on a Marble and place it in a moyst room or in a hole dug in the earth and there let it stand for a good while until it dissolve into Oyl then reserve it in a Glass-bottle So also is made Red Oyl of Sulphur Grinde live Sulphur into a small Powder and mix it with an equal quantity of the former Oyl of Tartar boyl it three hours in a Glass-bottle and when it is dissolved strain it through a Linnen-cloth into another Glass and set it over a Gentle fire till it thicken like clotted blood and so dry Then powder it and lay it on a Marble in a moist Cellar there it will dissolve and run down into the under-placed dish Set this Liquor being first strained thorow a cloth in a Glass-bottle over warm Ashes until the moysture be consumed and there will remain a red Oyl of Sulphur Oyl of Myrrh Boyl some Eggs hard cut them in the middle take out the yelks and fill their places with Myrrh powdered and seirced lay them in an earthen Pan upon long cross-sticks that the Eggs may not imbibe the Oyl again and shut them in a moist Cellar so the Oyl will drop down into the Pan. CHAP. XX. Of Aqua Fortis NOw I will recite those Distillations which draw out neither Water nor Oyl but a middle between both for the terrene parts are forced up turned into Water by the vehemency of the fire from whence they do acquire so great a heat that corrode and burn most violently They are extracted onely in igne reverberationis and with great care and labour How to draw Aqua Fortis or Oyl out of Salt It is a piece of Art discovered to very few Take Pit-Salt put into a Glass-Retort treble luted over and dried set it in igne reverberationis where the flames do struggle most violently the first time you will get but little moysture Break the Retort and remove the Foeces into another and pour the extracted Water into them and distill them again the second time thou wilt get more Do the same a third time and so to the tenth until the Salt be all turned into Liquor which is a most precious Jewel and worth thy labor Some quench hot Bricks in the liquified Salt and then distil them with a most intense fire as in Oyl of Bricks A Water for the Separation of Silver Take Salt-Peter and Alom in equal quantity beat them in a Morter and put them into a Glass-Retort luted over three double when it is well dried set it in the circulating-fire that is which
them and they will yield a most sweet Oyl and yet perhaps not make the Musk much worse CHAP. IV. How to extract Water and Oyl out of sweet Gums by Infusion VVE may extract sweet VVaters by another Art that we spoke of before out of Gums by Infusion and Expression as for example A sweet Water of Storax Benjamin and Labdanum which affordeth a most sweet savour and is thus extracted Infuse Storax or Benjamin being bruised in as much Rose-water as will cover them two fingers over set them in Balneo or a warm place for a week then distil them in Balneo and you will have a very pleasant Water from them which you must expose to the hot Sun that if there should remain any stink of the smoak in it it may be taken away We may also put Gums into Glass-Vessels and make a slow fire under it there will sweet out a very little water but of sweet savour and the Gum will settle to the bottom which will be useful for other things To extract Oyl of Benjamin Storax and other things We may do this by beating and mixing these Gums with Oyl of Almonds or of Ben and macerating them in Balneo for a month then draw out the Oyl either by a Retort or by Expression which is better it will yield a most fragrant odour that you can hardly perceive whether it were drawn out of the Gums themselves by a Retort Ben called in Latine Glans Unguentaria is used in precious Oyntments in stead of Oyl Pliny calleth it Morobolane So also Martial What not in Virgil nor in Homer's found Is of sweet Oyl and Acorn the compound It is without any sent and therefore fitter to receive them and when it doth receive them to reserve them for it never groweth rank CHAP. V. How to perfume Skins NOw we will discourse of the perfuming of Skins which is performed several ways either by sweet Waters or rubbing them with Oyls or laying them in Flowers so that they may attract their odor And first How to wash Skins that they may lose the sent of the Beasts and of Flesh. The manner is this First wash them in Greek-Wine and let them lie wet for some hours then dry them and if the sent continueth in them still wash them again that being taken away wash them in sweet Waters Take four parts of Rose-water three of Myrtle or Orange-Flowers two of sweet Trifoli one of Lavender half one mix them and put them into a wide mouthed earthen Vessel and steep the Skins in them for a day Then take them out and hang them up in the shade to dry but when they are almost dry stretch and smooth them with your hands that they may not be wrinkled Do this thrice over till they savour of the sweet Waters and lose their own stink Next How to perfume Skins with Flowers They must first be rub'd over with Oyl for as I have told you that is the foundation of all sents both to attract them and retain them in a greasie body It may be done with common Oyl but better with Oyl of Ben because it is without any sent of his own best of all with the Oyl of Eggs which I have taught before how to make The manner is thus Anoynt your Gloves or Skins with a Spunge on the inward side and especially in the Seams when that is done you may thus make them attract the sent of any Flowers Violets and Gilliflowers blow first in the Spring gather them in the morning and lay them on both sides of your Skins for a day When they grow dry sooner or later fling them away and lay on new stirring or moving them thrice or four times in a day lest they make the Skins damp and grow musty When these Flowers are past lay on Orange-flowers and Roses in the same manner and last of all Jasmine which will continue until Winter I mean Garden-Jasmine for it flourisheth two or three months Thus your Skins or Gloves will become very sweet in a yeers space The odour will quickly fade and die but if you do the same the second time it will continue much longer and preserve their pleasantness It very much preserveth their fragrancy to keep them in a close place in either a Wooden or Leaden Box but if you lay them among Linen it will suck out their odour and dull their sent How to perfume Skins If you add Musk Amber and Civet to the aforesaid Skins they will smell much more sweet and gratefully Or take four parts of Western Balsam one of Musk as much Amber and rub it on your Gloves with a Spunge and they will smell very sweet I will add one more excellent Composition Take eight parts of Iris one of Sander two of Benjamin four of Rose-Powder one and a half of Lignum Aloes half a one of Cinnamon or rather less soften them all with Rose-water and Gum-Tragacanth and grinde them on a Porphyretick Marble then anoynt your Gloves with it in a Spunge and take three Grains of Musk two of Amber one of Civet mingle them and rub them also on How to take the sent out of Gloves If you repent your self of perfuming them or would make sport with any one boyl a little rose-Rose-water or â—qua Vitae and while they be hot put the Gloves in and let them remain there awhile This will take away their sent and if you steep other Gloves in it and dry them they will imbibe it CHAP. VI. How to make sweet Powders NOw we come to making sweet Powders which are either Simple or Compound they are used in stuffing sweet Bags in perfuming Skins and Compositions Learn therefore How to make Cyprian Powder Take Moss of the Oak which smelleth like Musk gather it clean in December January or February wash it five or six times in sweet Water that it may be very clean then lay it in the Sun and dry it Afterwards Steep it in Rose-water for two dayes and dry it in the Sun again This you must iterate oftentimes for the more you wash it the sweeter it will smell When it is dried grinde it into Powder in a Brass-Morter and seirce it then put it into the ceive and cover it make a fire and set some sweet waters to boyl over it or cast on some perfumed Cakes and let the fume arise up into the ceive The more often you do this the stronger and more lasting sent will be imbibed by the Powder When you perceive it to have attained a sufficient odour take one pound of the Powder a little Musk and Civet powdered and a sufficient quantity of Sanders and Roses beat them in a Brass-Morter first putting in the Musk and then by degrees casting in the Powder so mingle them well At last put the Powders into a Glass close stopt that the sent may not transpire and grow dull There are several Compositions of this Powder which would be too tedioâ— to recount It may be made
remaining Powders make a mass which you may form into cakes which being burnt on hot Ashes smell very sweetly I take out the Cinnamon and the Woods because in burning they cast forth a stink of smoak Another way Take one pound and a half of the Coals of Willow ground into dust and seirced four ounces of Labdanum three drachms of Storax two of Benjamin one of Lignum Aloes mix the Storax Benjamin and Labdanum in a Brass Morter with an Iron Pestle heated and put to them the Coal and Lignum Aloes powdered Add to these half an ounce of liquid Storax then dissolve Gum Tragacantha in Rose-water and drop it by degrees into the Morter When the powders are mixed into the form of an Unguent you may make it up into the shape of Birds or any other things and dry them in the shade You may wash them over with a little Musk and Amber upon a Pencil and when you burn them you will receive a most sweet fume from them Another Perfume Anoynt the Pill of Citron or Lemmon with a little Civet stick it with Cloves and Races of Cinnamon boyl it in rose-Rose-water and it will fill your chamber with an odorifeous fume CHAP. IX How to adulterate Musk. THese Perfumes are often counterfeited by Impostors wherefore I will declare how you may discern and beware of these Cheats for you must not trust whole Musk-Cods of it there being cunning Impostors who fill them with other things and onely mix Musk enough to give its sent to them Black Musk inclining to a dark red is counterfeited with Goats blood a little rosted or toasted bread so that three or four parts of them beaten with one of Musk will hardly be discovered The Imposture may be discerned onely thus The Bread is easie to be crumb'd and the Goats blood looketh clear and bright within when it is broken It is counterfeited by others in this manner Beat Nutmegs Mace Cinnamon Cloves Spikenard of each one handful and seirce them carefully then mix them with the warm blood of Pigeons and dry them in the Sun Afterward beat them again and wet them with Musk-water and Rose-water dry them beat them and moysten them very many times at length add a fourth part of pure Musk and mix them well and wet them again with Rose-water and Musk-water divide the Mass into several parts and rowl them in the hair of a Goat which groweth under his Tail Others do it Another way and mingle Storax Labdanum and Powder of Lignum Aloes add to the Composition Musk and Civet and mingle all together with Rose-water The Imposture is discovered by the easie dissolving of it in water and it differeth in colour and sent Others augment Musk by adding Roots of Angelica which doth in some sort imitate the sent of Musk. So also they endeavour To adulterate Civet with the Gall of an Ox and Storax liquified and washed or Cretan Honey But if your Musk or Amber have lost their sent thus you must do To make Musk recover its sent hang it in a Jakes and among stinks for by striving against those ill savours it exciteth its own vertue reviveth and recovereth its lost sent THE TWELFTH BOOK OF Natural Magick Of Artificial Fires THE PROEME BEfore I leave off to write of Fire I shall treat of that dangerous Fire that works wonderful things which the vulgar call Artificial Fire which the Commanders of Armies and Generals use lamentably in divers Artifices and monstrous Designs to break open Walls and Cities and totally to subvert them and in Sea-fights to the infinite ruine of mâ—rtal men and whereby they oft-times frustrate the malicious enterprizes of their Enemies The matter is very useful and wonderful and there is nothing in the world that more frights and terrifies the mindes of men God is coming to judge the world by Fire I shall describe the mighty hot Fires of our Ancestors which they used to besiege places with and I shall add those that are of later Invention that far exceed them and lastly I shall speak of those of our days You have here the Compositions of terrible Gun-powder that makes a noise and then of that which makes no noise of Pipes that vomit forth deadly Fires and of Fires that cannot be quenched and that will rage under Water at the very bottom of it Whereby the Seas rend asunder as if they were undermined by the great violence of the flames striving against them and are lifted up into the Air that Ships are drawn by the monstrous Gulphs Of Fireâ—Balls that flie with glittering Fire and terrifie Troops of Horse-men and overthrow them So that we are come almost to eternal Fires CHAP. I. How divers ways to procure Fire may be prepared VItruvius saith That it fell out by accident that sundry Trees frequently moved with Windes and Tempests the Bows of them rubbing one against another and the parts smiting each other and so being ratified caused heat and took fire and flamed exceedingly Wilde people that saw this ran away When the Fire was out and they durst come neerer and found it to be a great commodity for the Body of man they preserved the Fire and so they perceived that it afforded causes of civility of conversing and talking together Pliny saith It was found out by Souldiers and Shepherds In the Camp those that keep watch found this out for necessity and so did Shepherds because there is not always a Flint ready Theophrastus teacheth what kindes of Wood are good for this purpose and though the Anger and the handle are sometimes both made of one sort of Wood yet it is so that one part acts and the other suffers so that he thinks the one part should be of hard Wood and the other of soft Example Wood that by rubbing together will take Fire They are such as are very hot as the Bay-Tree the Buck-thorn the Holm the Piel-Tree But Mâ—estor adds the Mulberry-Tree and men conjecture so because they will presently blunt the Ax. Oâ— all these they make the Auger that by rubbing they may resist the more and do the business more firmly but the handle to receive them is to be made of soft Wood as the Ivy the wilde Vine and the like being dried and all moisture taken from them The Olive is not fit because it is full of fat matter and too much moysture But those are worst of all to make Fires that grow in shady places Pliny from him One Wood is rub'd against another and by rubbing takes Fire some dry fuel as Mushroomes or Leaves easily receiving the Fire from them But there is nothing better then the Ivy that may be rubbed with the Bay-Tree or this with that Also the wilde Vine is good which is another kinde of wilde Vine and runs upon Trees as the Ivy doth But I do it more conveniently thus Rub one Bay-Tree against another and rub lustily for it will presently smoak adding a little Brimstone put your fuel
much because these Cattle feed on binding meats as on the Oak Mastick Olive-boughs and Turpentine-tree But in such places where Cattle eat Scammony black Hellebore Perwincle or Mercury all their milk subverts the belly and stomack such as is reported to be in the mountains of Justinâ—â— for Goats that eat black Hellebore that is given them when the yong leaves come first out their milk drank will make one vomit and causeth loathing and nauseating of the stomack Dioscorides Also there is found Honey that is venemous That which is made in Sardinia for there the Bees feed on Wormwood At Heraclia in Pontus some times of the year by a property of the flowers there Honey is made that they which eat it grow mad and sweat exceedingly Dioscorides There are Eggs laid that stink When there are no fruits nor herbs to be seen then Hens feed on dung and so do other Birds that lay Eggs. But then those raste best that feed on fat things and eat Wheat Millet and Panick but such as eat Wormwood their Eggs are bitter CHAP. VIII How Animals may be boiled rosted and baked all at once I Have thus far spoken to please the palate Now I shall represent some merry conceits to delight the guests Namely How a Hog may be rosted and boiled all at once Athenaeus in his ninth Book of Dipnosophistae Dalachampius translates it more elegantly saying There was a Hog brought to us that was half of it well rosted and half of it was soft boil'd in water and the Cook had used great industry to provide it that it should not be seen in what part he was stuck for he was killed with a small wound under his shoulder and the blood was so let out all his intestines were well washed with wine and hanging him by the heels he again poured wine on him and rosted him with much Pepper He filled half the Hog with much Barley-flouer kneaded together with Wine and Barley and he put him into an Oven setting a brass platter under him and he took care to rost him so leasurely that he should neither burn nor be taken up raw for when his skin seemed somewhat dry he conjectured the rest was rosted He took away the Barley-meal and set him on the Table So A Capon may be boil'd and rosted Put a Capon well pulled and his guts taken out into a silver dish and fill the one half of him with broth and put him into an Oven for the upper part will be rosted by the heat of the Oven and the under part will be boiled Nor will it be less pleasant to behold A Lamprey fried boilâ—d and rosted all at once Before you boil your Lamprey take out his bones to make it more graceful for his flesh is full of bones which you shall do with two little sticks held in both hands and fastning the Lamprey in the middle you shall cut his back-bone in the middle then his head and end of his tail about which the bones are heaped by reason of the bones pulled out being cut off and his entrails taken forth put him on a spit and wrap about three or four times with fillets all the parts that are to be rosted and fried strewing upon the one Pepper and the fillets must be made wet in Parsley Saffron Mint Fennel and sweet wine or with water and salt or broth for the rosted parts for the fried parts with Oyl and so let him be turned always moystning the fillets with strewing on the decoction of Origanum When part of it is rosted take it from the fire and it will be gallant meat set it before your guests CHAP. IX Of divers ways to dress Pullets I Shall here set down divers ways to dress Chickens that will be very pleasant for the guests So that A boiled Peacock may seem to be alive Kill a Peacock either by thrusting a quill into his brain from above or else cut his throat as you do for yong kids that the blood may come forth then cut his skin gently from his throat unto his tail and being cut pull it off with his feathers from his whole body to his head cut off that with the skin and legs and keep it Rost the Peacock on a spit his body being strffed with spices and sweet herbs sticking first on his brest cloves and wrapping his neck in a white linnen cloth wet it always with water that it may never dry when the Peacock is rosted and taken from the spit put him into his own skin again and that he may seem to stand upon his feet you shall thrust small iron wires made on purpose through his legs and set fast on a board that they may rot be discerned and through his body to his head and tail Some put Camphire in his mouth and when he is set on the table they cast in fire Platira shews that the same may be done with Pheasants Geese Capons and other Birds and we observe these things amongst our Guests But it will be a more rare sight to see A Goose rosted alive A little before our times a Goose was wont to be brought to the Table of the King of Arragon that was rosted alive as I have heard by old men of credit And when I went to try it my company were so hasty that we eat him up before he was quite rosted He was alive and the upper part of him on the outside was excellent well rosted The rule to do it is thus Take a Duck or a Goose or some such luâ—â—y creature but the Goose is best for this purpose pull all the feathers from his body leaving his head and his neck Then make a fire round about him not too narrow left the smoke choke him or the fire should rost him too soon not too wide lest he escape unrosted Within-side set everywhere little pots full of water and put Salt and Meum to them Let the goose be smeered all over with Suet and well larded that he may be the better meat and rost the better put fire about but make no too much hast when he begins to rost he will walk about and cannot get forth for the fire stops him when he is weary he quencheth his thirst by drinking the water by cooling his heart and the rest of his internal parts The force of the Medicament loosneth and cleanseth his belly so that he grows empty and when he is very hot it rosts his inward parts Continually moysten his head and heart with a spunge But when you see him run mad up and down and to stumble his heart then wants moysture wherefore take him away and set him on the Table to your Guests who will cry as you pull off his parts and you shall almost eat him up before he is dead If you would set on the Table A yong Pigeon with his bones pulled out you shall take out his bones thus Put a yong Pigeon his entrails taken forth and well wash'd for
Oyl and the thick Oyl sticks to her and so she is catched without snares or nets How Quails are taken with a Locking-Glass Clearchus saith that Quails spend their seed not only when they see the Females but when they hear their cry also The cause is the impression in their mindes which you shall know when they couple if you set a Looking Glass against them and before that a Gin for running foolishly to their picture in the Glass they see they are catcht Athenaeus and Eustathius CHAP. VII How Animals are congregated by sweet smells THere are many odours or other hidden qualities that gather Animals together from the particular Nature of things or of living Creatures I shall speak of the smelling odours and other aliments that they much desire As The Unicorn is allured by sent Tretres writes that the Unicorn so hunts after young Virgins that he will grow tame with them and sometimes he will fall asleep by them and be taken and bound The Hunters clothe some young lusty Fellow in Maids clothes and strewing sweet odours on him they set him right against the place where the Unicorn is that the winde may carry away the smell to the wilde Beast the Hunters lie hid in the mean time The Beast enticed with the sweet smell comes to the young man he wraps the Beast's Head in long and large sleeves the Hunters come running and cut off his Horn. To make Wheezles come together The Gall of a Stellio beaten with water will make Wheezles come together saith Pliny Also the wise Plinianists write that with the Gall of a Chamaelion cast into water Wheezles will be called together To make Mice come together If you pour thick lees of Oyl into a Dish and set it right in the house they will stick to it Palladius But Anatolins saith if you pour Oyl-Lees into a Brazen Bason and set it in the middle of the house all the Mice at night will meet together To make Fleas come together The fat of a Hedge-hog boyl'd in water and taken off as it swims on the top if you anoynt a staff with it and set it in the house or under your bed all the Fleas will come to it Rhasis To bring Frogs together The Gall of a Goat set into the earth in some Vessel is said to bring all the Frogs together if they can finde any delight therein CHAP. VIII How Creatures made drunk may be catch'd with the hand I Have said what draws them now I shall say what will make them drunk There are many simples that will do it that you may take them with your hands whilst they sleep and because there are divers Animals that are made drunk with divers things I shall speak of them in order And first How Dogs are made drunk Athenaeus saith that Dogs and Crows are made drunk with an Herb called Aenutra but Theophrastus from whom he had it saith that the Root Aenothera given with Wine will make them more tame and gentle Whence Aenutra comes by corruption of the word Theophrastus his Aenothera is Rhododaphni as I said So Asses are made drunk And when they sleep they are not onely taken but if you pull off their skins they will scarce feel you nor awake which comes by Hemlock for when they have eaten that they fall so fast asleep that they seem stupid and sensless So Horses are made stupid by Henbane seed if you give it them with Barley and they will be so fast asleep that they will be half dead half a day A certain Cheat who wanted money on his way cast this seed to some of his company and when they lay almost dead asleep and they were all much troubled for them for a reward he promised to help them which received he put Vinegar to their Nostrils and so revived them Whereupon they went on their journey So Libards are made drunk Opian teacheth the way and how they are taken when they are drunk In Africa so soon as they come to a Fountain where the Libards use to drink every morning there the Hunters in the night bring many vessels of Wine and not far from thence they sit covered in blankets The Libards very thirsty come to the Fountain and so soon as they have drunk Wine that they delight in first they leap then they fall fast asleep on the ground and so they are easily taken If you desire to know how Apes are taken being drunk Athenaeus writes that Apes will drink Wine also and being drunk are catch'd And Pliny saith that four-footed Beasts with Toes will not encrease if they use to drink Wine So Sows run mad eating Henbane-seed Aelian saith that Boars eating this Herb fall sick of a lingring disease and are troubled it is of the Nature of Wine that disquiets the minde and head So Elephants are made drunk Athenaeus reports out of Aristotle's Book de Ebrietate that Elephants will be drunk with Wine Aelian writes that they give the Elephant that must go to war Wine of the Grapes and made Wine of Rice to make them bold Now I will shew bow Birds laid asleep may be catch'd with your hands If then you would know how Birds may be catch'd with hands Pliny writes A certain Garlick grows in the Fields they call it Alum which being boyled and cast to them is a remedy against the villany of Birds that eat up the Corn that it cannot grow again the Birds that eat it are presently stupid and are catch'd with ones hand if they have staid a little as if they were asleep But if you will Hunt Partridge that are drunk Boetius teacheth you thus You shall easily hunt such Partridge if you cast unto them meal wet in wine for every Bird is soon taken with it If you make it with water and wine mingled and put that which is stronger into the vessels so soon as they have but sipt a little they grow drowsie and stupid He sheweth How to take Ducks with your hand If any one observe the place where Ducks use to drink and putting away the water place black wine in the place when they have drunk they fall down and may be easily taken Also wine-lees is best Ducks and other Birds being drunk are soon taken With some meats as are the Bur Dock seed strewed here and there in places where Birds frequent they are so light-headed when they have eaten them that you may take them with your hands Another bait Tormentil boy'ld in good wine and boyl Wheat or Barley in the same cast to Birds is good to catch them for they will eat pieces of Tormentil with the seeds and be drunk that they cannot flie and so are they catc'd with your hands This is best when the weather is cold and the Snow deep Or else strew Barley-corns in places where many Birds come then make a composition like a pultis of Barley-meal Ox-gall and Henbane-seed set this on a plank for them when they have tasted it
brass Cauldron that will hold much water fill it with salt water after that the Urinals and putting on their caps when fire is put under both the Urinals will drop and the cap that contains others by its pipe will drop out water also for the vapors rising from the Cauldron of hot water will make the Urinals drop and the cap will drop withal But if at Sea the commodity of such a vessel cannot be had We may Distil salt water otherwise though but little Dioscorides shews the old way of distillation we may that way distil sea water in ships which Pliny shews also Fleeces of wool extended about the ship are made wet by the vapors rising from the Sea and sweet water is pressed out of them But let us see whiter Salt water may be made fresh another way Aristotle saith it and Solomon before him That all Rivers came from the Sea and return to the Sea for by the secret passages under ground the waters that are sent forth leave their earthly and dry parts mixed with the earth and they come forth pure and sweet He saith The cause why the salt water comes not forth is because it is ponderous and settles and therefore onely hot-waters of salt-waters can run forth for they have a lightness that oversways the weight of the salt for what is hot is lightest Adde that waters running through the earth are much strained and therefore the heavior and thicker they are the more do they continually sink down and are left behind and the lighter they are the more pure do they come forth and are severed For as Salt is heavy so sweet water is light and so it comes that they are sweet waters that run forth This is the very cause why salt-water when it moves and is changed is made the sweeter for motion makes it lighter and purer Let us see now if we can imitate Nature Fill then great vessels with earth and set them so one above another that one may drean into another and thus salt-water dreaning through many vessels may leave the salt behinde I tried it through ten vessels and it remain'd still salt My friend said that he made it sweet through twenty vessels Yet thus I thought to warn you of that all earth is not fit for this use Solinus saith That sea-water strain'd through clay will grow sweet and it is proved that the salt is taken away if you strain it often through thin sand of a River Earth that lies in covered places and under roots is naught for that is commonly salt as also where Cattle are sâ—alled which Columella saith is naught for Trees for that it makes salt-water what is strain'd from it Black earth is naught for it makes the waters sharp but clay grounds make sweet waters Paxamus Anaxagoras said That the saltness of the sea came from the Rivers running through salt places and communicating that quality to the sea Some approve River-gravel for this use and their reason is because always sweet waters are found by the shores and they say this happens because they are strain'd through the sand and so grow fresh coming from the salt-sea for the sweet water that is found neer the sea is not of the sea but such water as comes from the tops of hills through the secret channels of the earth thither For waters that drean forth sweet are sweet though they lye even with the sea and in plain places as Apuila where the waters drean not from the hills they are salt So on the shores of Africa But Aristotle brings an experiment from a vessel of wax for if one make a Ball of wax that is hollow and shall dip it into the sea it being of a sufficient thickness to contain he shall finde it full of fresh water because the corpulent saltness cannot get in through the pores of the wax And Pliny by letting down little nets into the sea and hollow balls of wax or empty vessels stopt saith they will draw in fresh water for sea-water strain'd through clay will grow fresh But I have found this to be false For I have made pots of clay as fine and well as I could and let them down into salt-water and after some days I found salt-water in them Also if it were true it is of no use when as to sweeten one pound of water a thousand Balls of wax a day were not sufficient But for this many vessels might be invented of porous wood and stones A vessel of Ivy that parts as I said wine from water will not part salt from water if it drean through it But stones are brought from Portingal made into vessels into which sea water put will drean forth sweet if not the first yet the second time they use it to break the stone also for that many pumex and porous stones may be tried Leo Baptista Albertus saith That an earthen pot well stopt and put into the sea will fill with potable water But I have tried all earthen vessels and I always found salt-water Aristotle in his Problems saith It may be done Another way If salt-water cannot be drank cold yet hot and cool again it is better to drink It is because a thing useth to change from contrary to contrary and salt-water is contrary to fresh and when it is boil'd the salt part is boil'd off and when it is cold stays at the bottom This I tried and found it false and more salt for by heat the thin vapors of the water that are sweet exhale and the salt stay behinde and in lesser water the same quantity of salt makes it salter as I said in my distillations I wonder such a wise man would relate such falsities Florentinus borrowing it from him saith If water be not good nor poâ—able but ill let it be boiled till a tenth part of it be consumed then purge it and it will be good For sea-sea-water so boil'd will grow sweet Let me see whether it can be made so Another way and that in great quantity There is a thing that being cast into large vessels filled with sea-sea-water by fastning the salt will make it fall to the bottom or by curdling it and so it frees the water from it Wherefore we must think on things that have a stiptick quality the Antients tried this the Moderns have effected it Pliny Nitrous of bitter waters if you put Barley-flower dried to them they are tempered that you may drink of them in two hours therefore is Barley-flower put into wine sacks and elswhere Those that go to the Red-sea through the Desarts make nitrous and salt and bitter waters fit to drink in two hours by putting in of Barley-meal and they eat Barley-meal The like force hath the Chalk of the Rhodes and our Clay Also Cooks with Catlings and Meal of Wheat will take salt out of very salt meaâ— I tried this oft but found it false yet some of the saltness was taken away Pliny If you must drink ill
him but if he let his ears down he is easily slain Aristotle and Pliny from him When they raise their ears they hear quickly when they let them fall they are afraid and not to go over all Creatures that have large right up open ears I say those that have such ears they raise them and direct them forward when they would hear afar off and they are of most perfect hearing I shall shew now by the contrary that such Creatures which have short small ears and not so visible are of dull hearing Great part of Fishes want ears and such as have onely holes and no ears must needs hear more deafly for the outward ears are made by Nature that the sounds might be conveyed to the ears by them Adrianus Consul of Rome is a most clear witness of this who having this sense hurt made hollow catches to hear better by and these he fastned to his ears looking forward And Aristotle saith That Horses Asses Dogs and other Creatures that have great ears do always stir them about and turn them to hear noise Nature teaching them the use of those parts and we finde that they hear less that have their ears cut off wherefore it is fit that the Form of the Instrument for hearing be large hollow and open and with screws inwardly For the first if the sound should come in directly it would hurt the sence for the second the voice coming in by windings is beaten by the turnings in the ears and is thereby multiplied as we see in an Eccho The sea-Periwinkle is an argument to prove it which being held to the eare makes a light noise Now it remains to speak of what matter it must be made I think of porous Wood for the holes and pores are passable every way and being filled with air they sound with every small stroke and amongst the porous Wood is the Ivy and especially the tree called Smilax or Woodbind for a Dish made with Ivy will let out the water as I said Wherefore Pliny speaking of the Woodbind saith It is proper to this matter that being set to the ears it will make a small noise And in another place I said that the Woodbind-Ivy would sound if set to the ear Therefore fit your Instrument to put into your ear as Spectacles are fitted to the eyes CHAP. VI. How by some Impostures we may augment weight I Have set down some Impostures here that such as handle with wicked men may take heed that they be not deceived As To augment the weight of Oyl water is mingled with the Oyl that the fraud may not be known let it be done with troubled waters as with the decoction of Wood Rapes Asphodills that it may the harder be discerned from it Or else they put the choisest Gumtragant into water for two days then they bray it in a Mortar always putting water to it to melt the Gum adde these to the Oyl dropping forth and they will be turn'd to Oyl By the like fraud almost Silk is made to weigh more They put it upon the vapour that riseth from boiling water and this makes it swell with moisture and grow heavier Others bray one ounce of Gum Arabick and being well passed through a sieve they mingle it with the decoction of Honey they dissolve this mixture into water and wet the Silk with it and then let it dry Others keep it in the green leaves of Walnut-tree If you will Increase the quantity of Honey Adde to it the Meal of Chestnuts of Millet and that augments it and it cannot be known So you may Increase the weight of Wax Adde to the Wax Bean-meal excellent well beaten and this will burn in Candles without any excrement for it increaseth the weight and bigness and the fraâ—d is scarce discerned So you may Augment Sope. If you mingle the Ashes of Oxens shank-bones well burnt it Potters ovens or white Brimstone For you shall augment the weight and quantity without and distinction of it If you would Counterfeit Pepper You may gather green Juniper-berries and let them dry till they shrivel then mix them with grains of Pepper Others gather great black Vetches and first they boil them with wilde Pepper for swelling in the water when they come to be dried they become wrinkled I did sophisticate them so that I deceived in sport the best Apothecaries and afterwards I did in mirth discover the fraud Take the Berries of the ripe red Sanguinaria these when they are dried will be so shriveled and like to Pepper that any man almost may be deceived by it unless he tasts of it So we may Increase the weight of Wheat By setting a vessel of Wood within it full of water or vinegar For as Pliny saith It will drink it in CHAP. VII Of the Harp and many wonderful properties thereof THe Harp hath some properties in it and things worthy to be observed which I shall propound here First I shall mention some wonderful effects that the Antients speak of then how they may be done or how the Antients did then Since Musick is now more Adorned and Noble than it was amongst the Antients for then it was more rude and imperfect and yet in our days it doth not perform those operations It is certain that Musical Tunes can do much with men and there is no heart so hard and cruel but convenient and sweet harmony will make it yield and on the otherside harsh Musick will vex and harden a mans minde Musaeus discovers that Verse and Songs are a most delightful thing to Mortal man and the Platonists say That all things living are charmed by Musick and there are many effects observed of it Drums sound in the wars to provoke those that are slow to fight and we read that the Antients did such like things One Timotheus a Musician as oft he he pleased would play a Phrygian Tune and so enrage the mind of Alexander that he râ—n presently to the wars and when he would do otherwise he changed his tune and took off all his courage making him lasie and would then draw him being grown effeminate to Banquets and Feasts And Plutarch saith That when he heard Antigenida playing Melodies with a Pipe that they called Harmatii he was so inflamed that he rose in his Arms and laid hold of him that sat next to him Cicero reports That Pythagoras made a yong man more calm by a slower tune who was a Tancomonite and was whitled with wine and mad for a whore and spurred forward by a Phrygian tune for being a corrival he sought to set the house on fire where the whore was And the same Author saith If yong men are provoked by the sound of Flutes to commit any wickedness if the Piper play but a slower tune they are called off again for by the gravity of the Musick their petulant fury is alayed Empedocles when one set upon his Host that provoked him with reproaches and ill language turned the burden of his