gar shade;
But poplar wreathes around his temples spread,
And tears of amber trickled down his head.

Amber is, however, assuredly not derived from any poplar tree: it comes
from a species of pine long ago extinct, called by Goeppert the _pinites
succinifer_.

Gilbert does not go into the medicinal uses, real or fancied, that have
been ascribed to amber in almost as great variety as to loadstone. Pliny
mentions some of these in his _Natural Historie_ (English version of 1601,
p. 609):

"He [Callistratus] saith of this yellow Amber, that if it be worne about
the necke in a collar, it cureth feavers, and healeth the diseases of the
mouth, throat, and jawes: reduced into pouder and tempered with honey and
oile of roses, it is soveraigne for the infirmities of the eares. Stamped
together with the best Atticke honey, it maketh a singular eyesalve for to
help a dim sight: pulverized, and the pouder thereof taken simply alone, or
else drunke in water with Masticke, is soveraigne for the maladies of the
stomacke."

Nicolaus Myrepsus (Recipe 951, _op. citat._) gives a prescription for {36}
dysentery and diabetes confiding chiefly of "Electri vel succi Nili (Nili
succum appellant Arabes Karabem)."

[112] PAGE 47, LINE 22. Page 47, line 26. _Sudauienses seu Sudini._--Cardan
in _De Rerum Varietate_, lib. iii., cap. xv. (Editio Basil., 1556, p. 152),
says of amber:

"Colligitur in quadam pene insula Sudinorum, qui nunc uoc[=a]tur Brusci, in
Prussia, nunc Borussia, juxta Veneticum sinum, & sunt orientaliores ostiis
Vistulae fluuii: ubi triginta pagi huic muneri destinati sunt," etc. He
rejects the theory that it consists of hardened gum.

There exists an enormous literature concerning Amber and the Prussian amber
industry. Amongst the earliest works (after Theophrastus and Pliny) are
those of Aurifaber (_Bericht ueber Agtstein oder Boernstein_, Koenigsberg,
1551); Goebel (_De Succino, Libri duo, authore Severino Goebelio, Medico
Doctore_, Regiomont., 1558); and Wigand (_Vera historia de Succino
Borussico_, Jena, 1590). Later on Hartmann, P. J. (_Succini Prussici
Physica et civilis Historia_, Francofurti, 1677); and the splendid folio of
Nathaniel Sendel (_Historia Succinorum corpora aliena involventium_,
Lipsiae, 1742), with its wealth of plates illustrating amber specimens,
with the various included fossil fauna and flora. Georgius Agricola (_De
natura Fossilium_, liber iv.), and Aldrovandi (_Musaeeum Metallicum_, pp.
4