Page:The Perfumed Garden - Burton - 1886.djvu/118

102 were they as rich as Karoun." And it has further been said, "Beware of mounting old women; and if they cover you with favours." And again, "The coitus of old women is a venomous meal."

Know that the man who works a woman younger than he is himself acquires new vigor; if she is of the same age as he is he will derive no advantage from it, and, finally, if it is a woman older than himself she will take all his strength out of him for herself. The following verses treat on this subject:—

A proverb says also, "Do not serve an old woman, even, if she offers to feed you with semolina and almond bread."

The excessive practice of the coition injures the health on account of the expenditure of too much sperm. For as butter made of cream represents the quitessencequintessence [sic] of the milk, and if you take the cream off, the milk loses its qualities, even so does the sperm form the quintessence of nutrition, and its loss is debilitating. On the other hand, the condition of the body, and consequently the quality of the sperm depends directly upon the food you take. If, therefore, a man will passionately give himself up to the enjoyment of coition, without undergoing too great fatigue, he must live upon strengthening food,