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Indeed, the causes of all common facts are, we think, perfectly well known to us; and it is very probable, fifty or a hundred years hence, we shall as well know why the Metallic Tractors should in a few minutes remove violent pains, as we now know why cantharides and opium will produce opposite effects, namely, we shall know very little about either excepting facts."

Some stimulating embrocation, such as tincture of cantharides, may be rubbed along the whole course of the spine; and the medicine which has oftenest, but not always, succeeded, is castor-oil, syrup of buckthorn, and syrup of white poppies, given morning and night, and a tonic ball at noon. If the dog will not now feed, he should be forced with strong soup.

Six hours after the poisoning the child was still stupefied. The urine was free from albumin and sugar, and the next morning the little one had perfectly recovered. There is an instance mentioned of a robust youth of twenty who by a mistake took a half ounce of cantharides.

This is the ultimate aim of the insect, which becomes transfigured for this solemn function and then dies, having no more to do. A curious book might be written on the subject of love among the beasts. Long ago the subject tempted me. For a quarter of a century my notes have been slumbering, dustily, in a corner of my library. I extract from them the following details concerning the Cantharides.

He took, without considerable relief, gum kino, sanguis diaconis melted with alum, tincture of cantharides, isinglass, gum arabic, crabs eyes, spirit of hartshorn, and eat ten or fifteen oysters thrice a day. Dr. Home, having read my thesis, bled him, and found that neither the fresh blood nor the serum tasted sweet.

Bending over his reagents, he has sought to discover, according to the phrase of a philosopher, those secret retreats in which Nature is seated before her furnaces, in the depths of her laboratory; following up the metamorphoses of matter even to the wings of the Scarabaei, and observing how life, returning to her crucible the debris and ashes of the organism, combines the elements anew, and from the elements of the urine can derive, for example, by a simple displacement of molecules, "all this dazzling magic of colours of innumerable shades: the amethystine violet of Geotrupes, the emerald of the rose-beetle, the gilded green of the Cantharides, the metallic lustre of the gardener-beetles, and all the pomp of the Buprestes and the dung-beetles."

Drops to make old horses as lively as young. Take the tincture of assafoetida, 1 oz.; tincture of cantharides, 1 oz.; antimony, 2 oz.; fenugreek, 1 oz.; and fourth proof brandy, 1/2 gal.; mix all and let stand ten or twelve days; then give ten drops in a pail, or one gallon, of water.

Forman seven different sorts of poisons; viz. aquafortis, arsenic, mercury, powder of diamonds, lunar-caustic, great spiders, and cantharides. Overbury held out so long that Rochester became impatient, and in a letter to Lady Essex, expressed his wonder that things were not sooner despatched. Orders were immediately sent by Lady Essex to the keeper to finish with the victim at once.

Colocynth and aloes in this way move the belly, cantharides excites the urine, garlic applied to the soles of the feet assists expectoration, cordials strengthen, and an infinite number of examples of the same kind might be cited.

The "grit" was felt between the teeth, and the eyes were rendered almost useless. There was dust in eyes, mouth, ears, and hair. The shoes were full of sand, and the dust, penetrating the clothes, and getting in at the neck, wrists, and ankles, mixed with perspiration, produced an irritant almost as active as cantharides.