Page:Cyclopaedia, Chambers - Supplement, Volume 1.djvu/64

 A G A

A G A

AgaLloctium is otherwife called Lignum akcs and Xykaloe, q. &. aloe- wood, not that it is produced from the common aloe plant, which yields the irifpiffated juice of that name. It is the produce of a tree of a very different kind, grow- ing in the Eaft-IndieS, particularly Sumatra and Cochinchina. Some call it likewife Lignum Paradifi.

The Agalhchum fpbke of by the antients, is thought not to be the fame as ours : theirs refembled the aloes-wood, but was different.

The Agallociium is of a bluifh purple colour, marked with veins and fpots, very heavy and hitter ; when burnt it yields drops of an aftringent liquor, and a fwect aromatic fume. It is hot and drying, and eftecmed a great ftrengthener of the nerves in general, but particularly of the head and ftomach. V. ^uinc Difpenf. P. 2. Sett. 1. p. 77. Gorr. Def. Med. p. 1. Call. Lex. Med. p. 24. Blanc. Lex. Med. p. 17. Savar. Diet. Cbm. T. I. p. 34. feq.

AGALMATA, in antiquity originally denoted the ornaments of temples, and ftatutes ; But came afterwards to be popu- larly ufed for the ftatues and temples themfelvcs. V. Salmaf. Exerc. ad Soliri. p. I92. Piiifc. Lex. Ant. T. 1. p. 55.

AGAPIS Lapis, in natural hiftory, a name given by antient writers, to a ftbne of a dufky yellow, or the colour of a lion's fkin ; it was held in great efteem in many nations, on account of its fuppofed virtues, as an anodyne and vulne- rary. It w?is faid to take off the pain of Wounds, on being moiftened with water and applied to them ; and was one of the many ftones in thofe dark times, fuppofed to have a power of curing the bites of ferp'ents and other venomous creatures.

AGARENIj or AgarEnians, a name grven by fome to the followers of the religion of Mahomet. The word is derived from Agar, or Hagar, handmaid of Abraham, and mother of Ifhmael.

Pratcolus *j and after him divers modern writers b, confider Agareni as the name of a religious feet, anfvvering to what we btherwife call Mahometans, tho' improperly ; it ought rather to b'e eftecmed the name of a people, viz. the Araos, called alfo Hhmaelites, and by later writers Sarazens.—

CE'lcnch. H*ret. 1. i. n, 17. p. 12. feq. b Hoffin. Lex. , niv. X. 1. p. 104. Trcv. Diet. Univ. T. 1. p. 192.] AGARIC, {Cycl.) — in botany, the name of a genus of plants, the characters of which are thefe. The whole ftm&ure and fubftance refemblcs the common mulhroom, and it grows ufually but of the trunks of trees.

The Latin iiame of Agaric is Agaricum, ayx^xov, not Aga- ricus, as fome write it. V. Burgrav. Lex. Med. in voc. The fpecies of -Agaric enumerated by Mr. Tournefort, are thefe.

k. The common Agaric. 2. The horfefhoe Agaric. 3. The ear fhaped Agaric, commonly called 'Jews ears, 4. The fquamrhofe various coloured Agaric. 5. The lichen like va- riegated Agaric. 6. The hard black orbiculated Agaric of the am. 7. The endive like Agaric. 8. The great efculent Agaric. 9. The Agaric refembling the Fallopian tube. 10. The foliated buck's horn Agaric, n. The early, crefted, blueifh white Agaric. 12. The great crefted wood Agaric. 13. The great branched Wood Agaric. 14. The hairy jagged Agaric. 15. The blueifh green excavated oak ^wiV, or Dx- dalian Agaric. 16. The "black digitated fmall Agaric. 17. The fmall black digitated Agaric with white tops. 18. The fmall autumnal black bifid Agaric. Tournef. Inft. p. 562. Hdore plainly declares the Agaric of the antients, to have been wholly different from the Agaric of thefe times ; he fup- pofes it to be the root of the vitis alba, or white vine, a name by which he urfderftands white bryony root. Hefychius defcribes it as a root, and Galen plainly fpeaks of it as a root. See GaRicon.

Agaric was a purge in much efteem among the antients, but it has very difcrvedly fallen into difrepute of later years ; for it is very flow and tedious in its operation, and in its long ftay in the ftomach, frequently qccafions vomitings and unfu'pportable haufeas, which are often fucceeded by fweats and faiirtings which laft a. long time ; and after all this, it leaves upon the ftomach a lafting difrelifh for food. The antients, not having fo many purging medicines to choofe out of as we have, were not very niee in their potions of this kind.

Mr. Bbulduc, who was very curious in his experiments on all the purgative medicines, did not omit this in his difqui- frtions ; he tried upon it the two great diiFolvents, the aque- ous and the fulphureous, he drew a tincture from it with ■fpirit of wine ; this was of an infupportable tafte and fmell, and a fingle drop of it, received upon the tongue, would let a perfoh a vomiting, and give a diftate to every thing for the whole day. Farther experiments proved, that the bark of the Agaric was the only part that contained the purgative virtue, the farinaceous internal fubftance being ufelefs. So that whenever Agaric is to be ufed, it would be beft to take only the bark ; but this is fo naufeous, that it ought never to be given alone, but mixed with other purgatives. Water alone 'extract's nothing from Agaric ; but with the addition of fait of tartar, its makes a fort of mucilaginous liquor with the Agaric, which, after fome time ftanding, becomes clear at

top, and depofits fseculae of a folid confidence at the bottom; 1 rom the clear liquor fwimming at top, there may be fepafated by evaporation, a refmous extract, of a good confidence : this purges much more gently than the tincture with fpirit of wine, and without giving thofe intolerable naufeas. The matter which fettled to the bottom, appeared on tryal to be only the earthy part of the Agaric, and not at all pur- gative. Diftilled vinegar, ufed t nit cad of fait of tartar and water, gives an extract of the fame kind, and pofleued of the fame virtues, but in fmaller quantity.

Agaric affords on diftillation a large quantity of volatile fait* with a very fmall quantity of eflential fait j and the caput mortuum contains very little fixt or lixivial fait. In the writings of the moft antient phyficians, we find the name Agaric, and we often wonder at its being made an ingredient in compofitions, which feem of a contrary inten- tion to thofe that might be expected to be anfwered by this drug, which we generally look on as a naufeous bitter and purgative. But it is an error to fuppofe, the Agaric of the antients the fame as ours ; and a ftrict enquiry into the works of Diofcorides, Theophraftus, and the other old authors will prove it to be fo.

We very well know that the fubftance, which we call Agaric^ is a fort of fungus, or mufiiroom, growing on the trunk and branches of the Larix or Larch tree, and on fome other frees. But Diofcorides plainly tells us, that Agaric is a root, or at leaft, that this drug was ufually fuppofed to be fo ; it is not to be imagined that any body could miftake fuch a light porous fubftance, as what we call agaric, for a root, or in- deed take it for any thing elk than what it really is, a fun- gus. But this is not all that makes againft it in this author ; he adds, that it was like the root of fdphium ; we are there- fore to have recourfe to the defcription of the fdphium, in order to know what was the fhape and figure of the Agaric of thofe times. Theophraftus fays, that the root of the filphium was a cubit long, and had a protuberance or head at the top, which ftood prominent out of the ground j it is plain that our Agaric is of no fuch fhape as this, and therefore, not tha fame with the Agaric of Diofcorides, and of the antients in general. Another reafon is, the fcarcity of it in Greece : our Agaric is common on the larch and other trees in Greece, Italy, and other parts of Europe ; and therefore the Greeks needed not to have fent from far for it, as it is evident they did : the name is fufficient to prove this. Diofcorides tells us, tlrat this drug had its name from the place where it grew, which was in Sarmatia ; he has indeed left us a falfe fpelling of the word, and as the text ftands, it is faid to come from. Agria in Sarmatia : but were this the cafe, the name would have been Agricon or Agriacon, not Agaricon. The inter- preters have miftaken fo far as not to fuppofe Agria the name of any peculiar place, but have explained the paffage, by faying, that it grew in the wild and uncultivated places of Sarmatia. Stephens indeed fays, Agroi fignifies a people, living between the mountains of PLemus and Rhodope ; and Strabo makes them a people of the Mseotis. Ptolemy leads us to the truth, by telling us, that there is a river and pro- montory called Agarus, in the European Sarmatia ; and that thence the Agarican Iheep fo famous for their tafte, were brought into Greece. This agrees with the account Diofco- rides gives of the place, whence the Agaric was brought, which tho' he mifpels it, yet he fays truly that it was in Sar- matia. It appears from the whole, that the antient Greeks fent a great way for their Agaric, and their not knowing whether it was a root, or fome other vegetable production, is a fufficient proof of its not being our Agaric, which both then and now grows commonly In their country. Tho' the Agaric of Diofcorides, therefore, is not the fame with the Agaric of thefe times, yet many have been of opi- nion, that the Agaric of Pliny, and of the authors fince his time, is the fame with ours. His words feem to exprefs this too clearly to leave any doubt ; but as they accufe him of an error, they are not fuch exprefs teftimonies, as they feem at firft fight. He fays, that the glandiferous trees, as the oak, and others of that kind, are the principal ones which pro- duce Agaric, and that this Agaric is a white fweet-fcented fungus, or mufhroom, good in antidotes. He adds, that it grows principally on the upper branches of trees ; and that it fhines in the dark, and is gathered by people employed for that purpofe in the night time, difcovering itfelf by the light it cafts forth at this time, and not being fo eafily found in the day. Diofcorides fays not a word about this fort of Agaric, nor makes any mention of a fungus as being really that drug ; yet in the account he gives of the male and fe- male Agaric, and the opinions he cites of others, as to its origin, he has fome things that may have given rife to thefe words of Pliny. Diofcorides fays, fome were of opinion, that Agaric was not a root, but that it was produced on fome parts of trees, by putrefaction, in the fame manner that fun- gus's were produced. Such was the opinion of his times, about the origin of fungus's ; and it is plain that he diftin- guiihes Agaric from a fungus, by comparing it to one. This account of Diofcorides feems to have given rife to Pliny's hiftory of the Agaric ; and the Agaric of that author, tho' a fungou| fubftance, teems not to have been truly a fungus

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