Note 124 — HISTORICAL INTRODUCTION. (continued 2)

Bezoar, (from Pa-zahar, Persian, a destroyer of poison.) A morbid concretion formed in the bodies of land animals. Several of them were formerly highly celebrated for their medicinal virtues; they were considered as powerful Alexipharmics, in so much so, that other medicines, possessed of alexipharmic powers, were called Bezoardics: so efficacious were these substances formerly considered that they were bought for ten times their weight of gold. Avenzoar, an Arabian physician, who practised at Seville in Spain about the year One Thousand, first recommended it in medicine. A composition of Bezoar with absorbent powers, has been extensively used under the name of Gascoigne powder, and Gascoigne’s Ball; but the real bezoar was rarely used on this occasion; Gypsum, or pipe-clay tinged with ox-gall, proved a less expensive ingredient.