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Article MR. TASKER'S LETTERS ← Page 2 of 2
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Mr. Tasker's Letters
Centaury ( vulgo centory ) , and by the phrase , " Thessala Centaurea , " gives reason to think , that the name was derived from that famous antient practitioner of medicine , the Centaur Chiron ; but the usual practice of this tribe , in preventing the ilk consequences of venomous bites inflicted on strangers ' , was , we are told , to make" use of charms ( but God knows how ) ; and fearing these should not succeedthey made a circle found the -wound with their own salivaor
, , spittle , to confine the poison as in a magic circumference , and then they sucked it out with their lips ; and this last practice , I believe , contained the whole secret of the business . This seems to have been a rational practice , and likewise a safe one ; for , as Cato observes in the beginning of his march , when his soldiers came to a well , surrounded by , and full of serpents ,
Noxia serpentum est admissiv sanguine pestis ) Morsu virus habent , & fatum dente minantur , , Pocula morle carent . * * * , * * ' # * ?» My soldiers driiik , ancl dread nor death nor pain ; When urg'tl-to rage , their teeth the serpents fix , And venom with our vital juices mix ; The pest infus'd , thro' ev ' ry vein runs round ) Infects the mass , artel death is in the wound ; Harmless and safe , no poison here they shed . ¦ RoVrE .
« # * # ' ** *** # And this fact is further proved by the conduct of some German empiric that I have heard of , who'boasted that he had an infallible antidote for the bite of a viper ; and , in order to prove it , he Used to get a number of people around-him , and in their presence enrage a viper , and cause it to bite a bit of flesh , which he immediately swallowed ,
and then took the antidote , which he well knew there was no occasion for , nor virtue in . But the patients of the German doctor did not succeed so well ; for all those who were bitten by vipers , and relied ' on his nostrums , found no good effect , w hich led to the discovery after the following manner : one of the doctor ' s patients , rather of more discernment'than the restbeing- toldthat the nostrum he
de-, , livered vvtis aii infallible cure -for the bite he had received , humbly requested the doctor to make the experiment upon himself , by being bitten a Utile by a viper . The' tloctor shuddered at the thought ; made some plausible excuse ; viz . that his blood Was not at that time iii a proper state : for the experiment ; but that at some future period he would' have no objection to make the trial on
himself . I ' rt the mean time the doctor decamped , and was no more heard of in that part of the world . —This ignorant and daring empiric , howeVer , added to the improvement of real science , by provinothat the poison of the viper might be swallowed Without any detriment to tile constitution . ' Yours , & c . - VOL , IV , " ' G -
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
Mr. Tasker's Letters
Centaury ( vulgo centory ) , and by the phrase , " Thessala Centaurea , " gives reason to think , that the name was derived from that famous antient practitioner of medicine , the Centaur Chiron ; but the usual practice of this tribe , in preventing the ilk consequences of venomous bites inflicted on strangers ' , was , we are told , to make" use of charms ( but God knows how ) ; and fearing these should not succeedthey made a circle found the -wound with their own salivaor
, , spittle , to confine the poison as in a magic circumference , and then they sucked it out with their lips ; and this last practice , I believe , contained the whole secret of the business . This seems to have been a rational practice , and likewise a safe one ; for , as Cato observes in the beginning of his march , when his soldiers came to a well , surrounded by , and full of serpents ,
Noxia serpentum est admissiv sanguine pestis ) Morsu virus habent , & fatum dente minantur , , Pocula morle carent . * * * , * * ' # * ?» My soldiers driiik , ancl dread nor death nor pain ; When urg'tl-to rage , their teeth the serpents fix , And venom with our vital juices mix ; The pest infus'd , thro' ev ' ry vein runs round ) Infects the mass , artel death is in the wound ; Harmless and safe , no poison here they shed . ¦ RoVrE .
« # * # ' ** *** # And this fact is further proved by the conduct of some German empiric that I have heard of , who'boasted that he had an infallible antidote for the bite of a viper ; and , in order to prove it , he Used to get a number of people around-him , and in their presence enrage a viper , and cause it to bite a bit of flesh , which he immediately swallowed ,
and then took the antidote , which he well knew there was no occasion for , nor virtue in . But the patients of the German doctor did not succeed so well ; for all those who were bitten by vipers , and relied ' on his nostrums , found no good effect , w hich led to the discovery after the following manner : one of the doctor ' s patients , rather of more discernment'than the restbeing- toldthat the nostrum he
de-, , livered vvtis aii infallible cure -for the bite he had received , humbly requested the doctor to make the experiment upon himself , by being bitten a Utile by a viper . The' tloctor shuddered at the thought ; made some plausible excuse ; viz . that his blood Was not at that time iii a proper state : for the experiment ; but that at some future period he would' have no objection to make the trial on
himself . I ' rt the mean time the doctor decamped , and was no more heard of in that part of the world . —This ignorant and daring empiric , howeVer , added to the improvement of real science , by provinothat the poison of the viper might be swallowed Without any detriment to tile constitution . ' Yours , & c . - VOL , IV , " ' G -