2. _Gum._) Our author here manifestly distinguishes between _lachryma
and pituita_. The ancients imagined the _pituita_ to be concreted
tears, whereas it is the sebaceous matter secreted from the glands of
Meibomius. To translate it in one word I have therefore given it the
vulgar English name.
3. _Phlegm._) Vid. lib. ii. cap. 23.
4. _Diet ought to be somewhat fuller than formerly._) In Almeloveen
and Linden, _Post hæc cibo pleniore, quam ex operum consuetudine_. The
reading in the older editions was _ex eorum dierum consuetudine_, which
Morgagni prefers, Ep. vi. p. 153. and is the reading I have followed.
5. _Burnt antimony._) The antimony is rubbed over with suet, and hid
in the fire till the suet is burnt, and then being taken out, it is
extinguished in the milk of a woman, that has had a male child, or in
old wine. Dioscorid. lib. v. c. 873.
6. _Specillum asperatum._) Paulus Ægineta, treating of the same
disorder, mentions this instrument by the name of _blepharoxyston_,
that is, _an instrument for scraping the eye-lids_. It is delineated by
Heister, p. 2. tab. 16. fig. 5.
7. _Psoricum._) Dioscorides gives the same process for making of
psoricum: only he orders the vessel to be buried in dung for forty
days, about the heats of the dog star. Lib. v. cap. 890.
8. _Hot waters._) By our author’s using the plural number here, it
may be doubted, whether he does not intend mineral hot waters.
9. _Strigil._) This is used by other authors to signify a currycomb,
or that instrument, with which the sordes were scraped off the skin at
the baths; but in this place it can be taken for nothing else but a
tube or syringe.
10. The _specillum oricularium_, from its use here, as well as in
other places, must have been some kind of forceps.
11. _A board is laid down._) I could make no proper sense of this
sentence according to the present pointing, and therefore have altered
the punctuation in this manner; _tabula quoque collocatur, media
inhærens, capitibus utrinque pendentibus, &c._
12. The _teda_ is a tree very like the pine, abounding with resin.
Pliny says, that all the trees, that afford resin, by an excess of fat
are changed into the teda. Hence teda is often used for a torch in
Latin authors. Vid. Plin. Nat. Hist. lib. xvi. c. 10. & lib. xvii. c.
24.
13. _Sory_ was a mineral of much the same virtues as _misy_ and
_chalcitis_: it is strong scented, and creates a nausea. It is produced
in Egypt, Africa, Spain, and Cyprus. Dioscorid. lib. v. c. 893.
14. _Rhus_ is a shrub growing in rocky places, of about two cubits
in length; it has long leaves, and reddish, the fruit of it is like
a grape stone. The bark about is very useful: it has a styptick
quality, and is used for the same purposes as acacia. It was used by
the tanners. Dioscorid. lib. i. c. 138. It is supposed to be rhus
obsoniorum, or sumach of the moderns.
15. _In the inner part._) For _ulteriore_ in Almeloveen, I chuse to
read with Constantine _interiore_.
16. _In nine cyathi._) There is no liquid mentioned in Linden’s or
Almeloveen’s edition, but most of the others have _Ex novem cyathis
vini_.
17. _That the skin be kept from falling in contact, &c._) This
is agreeable to the reading of Linden and Almeloveen, _Illam esse
servandam ne considat, ulcerique agglutinetur_. But [JM] Morgagni would
here restore the reading of his editions and the MS. _Illam non esse
servandam ne considat_, &c. that is, ‘It must always be cut off in
such a case;’ which indeed is rendered probable by our author’s first
ordering circumcision, when there is a loss of substance in the penis;
and then his adding _Perpetuumque est_, as if that were a general rule
for the same operation in like circumstances.
[JM] Ep. 6. p. 145.
18. _Vulsella._) This instrument is delineated by Scultet. Arm.
Chirurg. tab. 4. fig. 1.
19. _Cicatrix is formed._ _Fit cicatrix._) I find no variety in any
of the copies, which I have seen. The sense however seems to require
_crusta_ instead of _cicatrix_; because the caustic medicines would
produce an eschar, whereas no cicatrix would be formed, till the eschar
cast off, and the ulcer was deterged and incarned.
20. _Consumed either by stronger medicines, &c._) This is agreeable
to the reading of the older editions--_Si hac ratione non tollitur:
vel medicamentis vehementioribus, vel ferro adurendum est._--Linden
and Almeloveen have it thus: _Si hac ratione non tollitur, vel aliis
medicamentis similibus, vel vehementioribus: ferro adurendum est_.
That is, ‘If it is not removed by this method, or like medicines, or
stronger, it must be burnt by the actual cautery.’ Which, Morgagni[JN]
justly observes, besides the incongruity of recommending similar
medicines after the first have failed, alters the sense much for the
worse.
[JN] Ep. vi. p. 146.
NOTES
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