The Great Abuse Of Blood-Letting On All
Trifling Occasions, Practised By The Rich Inhabitants, Produces Very
Bad Effects.
There is a well in the neighbourhood of this town, which possesses a
great many medicinal virtues; and though
I have not been able to
ascertain its mineral qualities, I have found, by using the water,
that it is extremely friendly to the stomach, that it excites appetite
and digestion, and lively spirits; that it is efficacious in the cure
of gravel and nephritic complaints; and in cases of foulness of the
blood, I have found it superior to any mineral waters I have met with
in Europe. It has completely cured my Jew servant of a most
inveterate scurvy, under which he had laboured for a very considerable
time.
Notwithstanding the Moors possess this inestimable treasure near one
of their most opulent and populous cities, yet, owing to fabulous
tales, handed down by tradition from one generation to another, these
superstitious people will never drink or disturb the water; to do so
is reckoned sacrilege, and the offender is severely punished: for they
positively affirm, that one of their great saints has been transmuted
into it, and that at some distant period he will resume his natural
form, to perform a great many miracles, and to render the Moors rich
and happy, more so indeed than Mahomet has promised them in the other
world.
While I have been here, I have had daily intercourse with the most
eminent of their Tweebs.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 124 of 146
Words from 33271 to 33521
of 39195
