Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 39.djvu/391

Rh confervaceous vegetation, commonly found floating on the surface of pools and sluggish streams, and known by the vulgar name of "frog-spit" is used as an application for inflamed eyes, no doubt in the full belief that, as a kind of spittle, it possesses all the healing powers of that substance. I remember, when a child, in northern Ohio, hearing older people say that sore eyes could usually be cured by anointing them with spittle upon awakening for three mornings in succession. Among the Gaelic community on Cape Breton, above mentioned, I find that a popular cure either for a sty or for ophthalmia is to wet one or both eyes, as the case may be, for nine mornings in succession with fasting saliva. Dr. Buck reports that the Swabians also believe in the efficacy of fasting spittle for sore eyes; and our never-failing Pliny records the Roman belief that ophthalmia may be cured by anointing the eyes every morning with fasting spittle. From Black's Folk Medicine I quote: "Hilarion cured a (blind) woman in Egypt by spitting on her eyes. Vespasian so cured a blind man of Alexandria." Many other examples could be quoted to show the general occurrence of this mode of treatment of disorders of the eyes, both in earlier times and at the present day. It will be noticed that in a majority of the instances just mentioned it is morning or fasting spittle that is recommended to be used in order to accomplish a cure. A belief in the specific qualities of fasting spittle ranges far and wide. Besides the general recommendation of morning or fasting saliva for ophthalmia, Pliny states that the Romans generally considered that a woman's fasting spittle was highly efficacious for bloodshot eyes. If the woman had abstained from food and wine the day before, better results were to be expected. Scot, in the Discoverie of Witchcraft, records an accredited method "To heale the kings or queenes evill, or any other sorenesse in the throte: Let a virgine, fasting, laie hir hand on the sore and saie: Apollo denieth that the heate of the plague can increase where a naked virgine quenchith it, and spet three times upon it." Fasting spittle is popularly supposed to have both curative and poisonous properties. Black quotes the following from a correspondent: "Two old-fashioned ladies we know (they are Scotch, by the way) hold firmly to the belief that it is very hurtful to swallow the saliva that is in the mouth on first waking. They would not do it on any account." In Madagascar the first spittle in the morning is called "bitter or disagreeable" saliva, and it is thought to have medicinal virtue in healing diseases either of the ear or of the eye.

It is a very common habit throughout the United States and New Brunswick to moisten a mosquito-bite, a slight bee-sting, or the bite of a fly or other insect with saliva. Dr. Buck says that the Swabians also treat fly and bee stings with saliva, morning or