caused by either renal or vesical calculi.  But I have myself thoroughly experienced the utility of an oil I make myself, whereof scorpions form a very large portion of the ingredients.  If only the region of the heart and all the pulses of the body be anointed with it, it will free the patients from the effects of all kinds of poisons taken by the mouth, corrosive ones excepted.”  Decoctions of Egyptian mummies were much commended, and often prescribed with due academical solemnity; and the bones of the human skull, pulverized and administered with oil, were used as a specific in cases of renal calculus. (See Petri Andreae Matthioli Opera, 1574.)

These remarks were made to me by a medical gentleman to whom I mentioned the Chinese doctor’s prescription of scorpion tea, and they seem to me so curious that I insert them for comparison’s sake.

THE BADGER’S MONEY

It is a common saying among men, that to forget favours received is the part of a bird or a beast:  an ungrateful man will be ill spoken of by all the world.  And yet even birds and beasts will show gratitude; so that a man who does not requite a favour is worse even than dumb brutes.  Is not this a disgrace?

Once upon a time, in a hut at a place called Namekata, in Hitachi, there lived an old priest famous neither for learning nor wisdom, but bent only on passing his days in prayer and meditation.  He had not even a child to wait upon him, but prepared his food with his own hands.  Night and morning he recited the prayer “Namu Amida Butsu,"[80] intent upon that alone.  Although the fame of his virtue did not reach far, yet his neighbours respected and revered him, and often brought him food and raiment; and when his roof or his walls fell out of repair, they would mend them for him; so for the things of this world he took no thought.

[Footnote 80:  A Buddhist prayer, in which something approaching to the sounds of the original Sanscrit has been preserved.  The meaning of the prayer is explained as, “Save us, eternal Buddha!” Many even of the priests who repeat it know it only as a formula, without understanding it.]

One very cold night, when he little thought any one was outside, he heard a voice calling “Your reverence! your reverence!” So he rose and went out to see who it was, and there he beheld an old badger standing.  Any ordinary man would have been greatly alarmed at the apparition; but the priest, being such as he has been described above, showed no sign of fear, but asked the creature its business.  Upon this the badger respectfully bent its knees, and said—­

“Hitherto, sir, my lair has been in the mountains, and of snow or frost I have taken no heed; but now I am growing old, and this severe cold is more than I can bear.  I pray you to let me enter and warm myself at the fire of your cottage, that I may live through this bitter night.”

When the priest heard what a helpless state the beast was reduced to, he was filled with pity, and said—­