Page:Sushruta Samhita Vol 1.djvu/206

102 Nalina, Kumuda, Pundarika, and the common zoophytes which live in clear waters.

Authoritative verse on the subject:—The non-venomous leeches swim about in sweet scented waters, live on non-poisonous weeds, lie on the leaves of flowering water plants instead of on the dank and oozy beds of pools, and suck blood from the affected part of a human organism without causing any discomfort.

Leeches should be caught hold of with a piece of wet leather, or by some similar article, and then put in to a large-sized new pitcher filled with the water and ooze or slime of a pool. Pulverised zoophytes and powder of dried meat and aquatic bulbs should be thrown into the pitcher for their food, and blades of grass and leaves of water-plants should be put into it for them to lie upon. The water and the edibles should be changed every second or third day, and the pitchers should be changed each week, (the leeches should be transferred to a new pitcher at the end of every consecutive seven days).

The authoritative verse on the subject:—Leeches that are venomous, thick about the middle, elongated, of slow locomotion, look fatigued, do not readily take to the part they are applied to, and capable of sucking only a small quantity of blood, should be looked upon as not belonging to the proper or the commendable type.