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Updated: July 27, 2025
At any rate he was learned in healing all sick creatures, and in especial falcons, horses, and hounds, by means of whispered spells, the breath of his mouth, potions, and electuaries; and I myself have seen him handle a furious old she-wolf which had been caught in a trap, so that no man dared go nigh her, as though it were a tame little dog.
But I will not delay to speak of each thing severally. I will turn my tale of Thessala, who does not cease to make and mix potions. Thessala crushes her potion; she puts therein spices in plenty for sweetening and blending.
All that certain silly women and quacks do is to turn men mad with potions and poisons, pretending that they have power to cause love, for, as I say, it is an impossibility to compel the will."
One cannot help, in reading these words, smiling sadly at the strange magic by which Death metamorphoses those whom he has taken in the eyes of the survivors; at the strange potions by means of which he makes love spring up in the hearts where it has ceased to exist, saving us from hypocrisy by making us really feel what is false to our nature, enabling us to lie to ourselves instead of lying to others.
But he dealt not in love potions, he said; he would, however, take Diomed's daughter to one who did the witch who dwelt on the slopes of Vesuvius.
Hereupon I promised that his case should be brought to the Cardinal's knowledge by Ann, and then he gave me to understand that it was his desire that Ann should come to see him, inasmuch as that her presentment only had brought him more comfort than the strongest of Master Ulsenius' potions. He could not be happy to die without her forgiveness, and without blessing her by hand and word.
By going to surgery you could very frequently escape evening chapel a very desirable event if you had a "big brew" coming off in class-room, for you could get things cooked and have plenty of room on the fire before the others were out. But one always had to pay for the advantage, the old doctor being very much addicted to potions.
Hereupon I promised that his case should be brought to the Cardinal's knowledge by Ann, and then he gave me to understand that it was his desire that Ann should come to see him, inasmuch as that her presentment only had brought him more comfort than the strongest of Master Ulsenius' potions. He could not be happy to die without her forgiveness, and without blessing her by hand and word.
I now saw it was mistaken kindness to give him money, as I had learned that he indulged in his potions according to the extent of his means, so that to be temperate, it was expedient that he should be poor.
According to the principles of the same doctors, women with child were allowed to make themselves miscarry by certain potions, and even to murder those children whom they brought into the world against their will; insomuch, that such unnatural cruelties were daily committed, and nothing was more common in the kingdom of Bungo, than those inhuman mothers: Some of them, to save the charges of their food and education, others to avoid the miseries attending poverty, and many to preserve the reputation of chastity, however debauched and infamous they were.
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