Natural History, Vol. 3

of foul odor. There is still another similar to this, but with whiter and fleshier leaves, with finer stems, growing in vineyards. Another, however, is two cubits tall, with slender, triangular branches, the leaf of a fern, a long stalk, and the seed of a beet; all are preeminent for wounds. Our people call the one with the very broad leaf scopas regias. It heals the quinsy of pigs. Teucer also discovered in the same age the teucrion, which some call hermion, spreading thin rushes, [with] small leaves, growing in rough places, with an austere taste, never flowering; nor does it generate seed. It heals spleens. And it is maintained that it was discovered thus: when entrails were thrown upon it, they adhered to the spleen, and it emptied it. For that reason, it is called splenion by some. They relate that pigs that eat its root are found without a spleen. Some call the branched [plant] with branches like hyssop, [and] the leaf of a bean, by the same name, and they command that it be collected while still flowering; so little do they doubt that it flowers, and they praise it most from the mountains of Cilicia and Pisidia. The fame of Melampus is known by the arts of divination. One type of hellebore is named melampodion after him. Some hand down that a shepherd of the same name discovered it, observing that his goats were purged by grazing on it, and that when their milk was given, the raging daughters of Proetus were cured. For which reason it is appropriate to speak of all its types together. There are two primary ones, white and black. Most hand down that this is understood only by the roots. Others [describe] the leaves of the black [type] as similar to a plane tree, but smaller and darker, and cut with more divisions. Those of the white [are like] a sprouting beet. These also are darker, and reddish on the ridge of the channels. Both have a stalk a palm long, like a ferula, wrapped in bulb skins, and a fibrous root like onions. Horses, cattle, and pigs are killed by the black; thus they avoid it when