"Haud prorsus indignum qui in juniorum, et rure degentium medicorum gratiam typis mandetur ”—(1700). PREFACE. IN our eager boyish days, when a travelling exhibition of wild beasts came to visit the neighbourhood, with an imposing procession of elephants, camels, monkeys, lion-tamers, gilded cars, and other multiform fascinations, its lively brass band on the boards outside, and its voluble showman on the front steps, were, to our thinking, indispensable attractions before we sought zoological instruction within the big tent. But, of course, a doctor's medicinal menagerie is a much more serious affair; and far be it from us to announce the arrival thereof with beat of drum, or flourish of trumpet, in any such mountebank fashion! None the less we take leave to temper the grave occasion with some light prefatory patter before becoming didactic, and solemn, in the body of our book. "Dicit enim citius, meminitque libentius illud Quod quis deridet, quam quod probat, et veneratur." "Men see a joke when to a sermon blind : And laughter's lessons long possess the mind." "Risus enim Divum, atque hominum est æterna voluptas." "All the world allows that laughter is an eternal delight of both gods and men." "Tickle even the dull earth with a hoe," said Douglas Jerrold, "it will laugh with a harvest." In the first place we would note that many of the curative Animal Simples now advocated take the place of appetising foods more readily than the medicinal form of draught, powder, or pill. It was a famous old aphorism of Arnoldus (1275), that "the wise and pious doctor gives physic only on necessity, first trying medicinal dyet before he proceeds to medicinal cure." "Prudens, et pius medicus cibis prius medicinalibus quam medicinis puris morbum expellere satagat":"modestus et sapiens medicus nunquam properabit ad pharmacum nisi cogente necessitate." Likewise "of old," quoth Lemnius (1566), "in this our island there was no use of physick amongst us, and but little at this day; the country people use kitchin physick; and common experience tells us that they who make least use of Apothecaries' physick live freest from all manner of infirmities." "Some think physicians kill as many as they save," wrote quaint old Burton. "Who can tell, quot Themison ægros autumno occiderit uno," "how many unfortunate victims the complex pharmacy of Sir Benjamin Bolus sends to the shades in a single season? "A few simples, well prepared, and understood, are better than the heap of nonsense, confused compounds, which are in Apothecaries' shops ordinarily sold." "Vivere naturæ si convenienter amarent "In Arcady, where nature holds the sway, Doctors and druggists find no parts to play." Many of the Animal Simples to be herein discussed will be therefore regarded from a dietetic as well as from a medicinal point of view. The Schola Salernitana (1600) fully recognized in its day how important it is for the physician to regulate the diet of his patients, particularly with respect to meats, which are known to contain principles of food and physic combined. "Quale, quid, et quando, quantum, quoties, ubi dando, Ista notare cibo debet medicus dietando." "What, of what kind, and when, how much, how oft, and where, Food may be had, to teach sick folk should be the doctor's care." "Victuals and drink," says Poorgrass (Thomas Hardy), in a pleasant masticating manner, "is a cheerful thing, and gives nerves to the nerveless, if the form of words may be used. 'Tis the gospel of the body, without which we perish, so to speak it." Next we would seek to dispel beforehand such prejudices as might otherwise occupy the minds of our readers against certain edible clean-feeding insects, eminently delicate, and remedial, which, together with their grubs, and pupæ, have failed hitherto to gain favour as food, or medicine. Respecting these we take up our parable boldly, and Vincent Holt is our inspired prophet. Writing about them (in Why not eat Insects? 1885), he humorously puts it, "Whilst confident that the caterpillars, the grubs, the chafers, and the butterflies will never condescend to eat us, I am equally sure that on finding out how good they are (and what excellent virtues they possess), we shall right gladly determine to cook and eat them! Moreover, what a welcome change it will be to the labourer's wearisome meal of bread and bacon day after day for him to get a savoury mess of fried cockchafers, or of dainty grasshoppers done on toast! In these respects the birds are much more sensible than ourselves: they well know the value of the fat chafer as food. With what joy the jaunty rooks pounce upon its luscious grubs when they follow the plough with long strides over the upturned lea! What a feast the wise creatures obtain when aloft on the wing by devouring the fledged beetles. swarming in the tall tree tops!' "Men's stomachs," says Dolly Winthrop, the village nurse in Silas Marner, "are made so comical they wants a change; they do, I know; God help 'em!" Sextus Placitus (1535) has taught that Idpartus, an Egyptian king, sent to Cæsar Octavianus this message of health: "I ween that thou never camest to know Leechdoms such as those which we |