CHAP. VIII.
¶ Of Macir, Sugar, and the trees of the region Ariana.
THe Macir likewise is brought out of India. A reddish bark or rind it is, of a great root; and [unspec K] beareth the name of the tree it selfe: but the form of that tree I know not how to describe. This rind sodden in hony, & so condit as a Succade, is a singular good medicine for those that be troubled with the Dysentery or bloudy-flix: as for sugar, there is of it in Arabia; but the best comes out of India. * 1.1 A kind of hony it is, gathered and candied in certaine Canes: white this is like gum [Arabick] and brittle between a mans teeth. The graines hereof when they are at the bigst, exceed not a filberd nut, and serue only for physick. In the realm of Ariana (which confineth and boundeth vpon the Indians) there is a certain thorny plant, so ful of sharp pricks, that it is comberous to them who come about it; which yeeldes a precious liquor issuing out thereof, like to Myrrhe. In the same prouince there grows a pestilent venomous shrubbe called Rhaphanus, bearing leaues like the bay tree, which with their fragrant smell train horses thither [unspec L] to eat thereof; but they are so good for them, that they left not Alexander the Great scarce one horse of all his Cauallerie, they died so fast of that food at his first entrance into the countrey. The like accident befell to him also among the Gedrosians. In like manner, there is another thornie plant (by report) in that region, leaued like the Laurell: the iuice and liquor whereof, if it be sprinckled or dashed in the eies of any liuing creature whatsoeuer, puts them quite out and makes them blind. Moreouer, they haue an herb there, of a singular pleasant sauor, but coue∣red all ouer it is with little venomous serpents: their sting is present death. Onesicritus reports, That in the vales of Hircania there be trees like fig-trees, which the Hircanians call Occhi, out of which there distils or drops hony euery morning for the space of two houres. [unspec M]