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As far back as the time of Pliny, we have directions for the gathering of this magic plant. The person plucking it was to go barefoot, with feet washed, clad in white, after having offered a sacrifice of bread and wine. Another plant which had to be gathered with special formalities was the magic mandragora.
Flax seems to have been widely grown, and rushlights were then a luxury. The subject of trees and plants does not so readily lend itself to fables as some other parts of natural history, but we refer the reader to the accounts of aloes, pepper, and mandragora as a specimen of the tales told, as our author says, "to make things dear, and of great price."
There is a complaint which neither poppy, nor mandragora, nor all the drowsy syrups of the East could allay, in the men in his time, as we are informed by a popular poet of the days of Elizabeth; and which, when exhibited in women, no medical discoveries or practice subsequent neither homoeopathy, nor hydropathy, nor mesmerism, nor Dr. Simpson, nor Dr.
Her harmless and pure youth was made to appear a childhood of sorcery and idolatrous superstition; she was accused in her earliest years of having trafficked with evil spirits: it was alleged that she had consorted with witches; that she had frequented places where spirits and fairies best loved to congregate; that she had taken part in sacrilegious dancing; that she had suspended wreaths on the trees in honour of these rural spirits; that she had carried hidden about her person a plant called Mandragora, hoping by it to obtain good luck; that she had left her parents against their will to go to Neufchâteau, and lived in that place among a debauched set of people: that in consequence of all these wicked acts, a youth who intended marrying her had not done so.
There is a time, I think, according to one of our poets, when lust and envy sleep. This, I suppose, is when they are well gorged with the food they most delight in; but, while either of these are hungry, Nor poppy, nor mandragora, Nor all the drousy syrups of the East, Will ever medicine them to slumber. The colonel was at present unhappily tormented by both these fiends.
'No, I have not heard of anything serious, he said, with as long a face as one naturally round could be turned into at short notice. 'I only hear vague reports of such things. 'You may think it will be all right, said Barnet drily. 'But I have a different opinion . . . No, Downe, we must look the thing in the face. Not poppy nor mandragora however, how are your wife and children?
The conference ended with Iago's begging Othello to account his wife innocent, until he had more decisive proof; and Othello promised to be patient: but from that moment the deceived Othello never tasted content of mind. Poppy, nor the juice of mandragora, nor all the sleeping potions in the world, could ever again restore to him that sweet rest, which he had enjoyed but yesterday.
He kept the boy waiting ten minutes, and then wrote the reply: "Impossible to leave here at present." Then he sat at the window again and let the city put its cup of mandragora to his lips again. After all it isn't a story; but I wanted to know which one of the heroes won the battle against the city. So I went to a very learned friend and laid the case before him.
The progress of the history hath hitherto been slow; but after this period so little matter worth of mark occurred at Martindale, that we must hurry over hastily the transactions of several years. Cleopatra. Give me to drink mandragora, That I may sleep away this gap of time. Antony and Cleopatra.
It may have been these writings that stimulated Arnald to search for such an anaesthetic. In a book usually credited to him, medicines are named and methods of administration described which will make the patient insensible to pain, so that "he may be cut and feel nothing, as though he were dead." For this purpose a mixture of opium, mandragora, and henbane is to be used.
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