speculations of thirty-two pages. Gilbert tells us it depends upon
some fault of the digestive faculty of the liver, and he divides
it into four species, to-wit, leucoflantia, yposarcha, alchitis and
tympanitis, each of which has its special and appropriate treatment.
In the dreary waste of speculative discussion it is cheering, however,
to observe Gilbert's positive recognition of the sphere of percussion
indicated in the passage:

"_Et venter percussus sonat ad modum utris semipleni aqua et venta._"
(f. 250b.)

Ycteritia or jaundice receives equally thorough discussion through
eight weary pages, including the usual polypharmacal treatment.

The spleen, Gilbert says, is sometimes the name of an organ, sometimes
of a disease. As an organ it is spongy and loose in texture, and
attracts and retains the superfluities of the black-bile, expelled
from the liver for its own cleansing. Hence it is a servile and
insensitive organ, and accordingly suffers different diseases, such
as obstruction, tumors, hardening, softening, abscess, and sometimes
flatulence or repletion. The symptoms and treatment of each of these
morbid conditions, arising from either heat or cold, are discussed
with exasperating thoroughness, and the chapter concludes with
the composition and use of various specific remedies of compound
character, bearing the impressive titles of Dyasene, Dyacapparis,
Dyaceraseos (a mixture of cherry juice, honey, cinnamon, mastic and
scammony) and Agrippa.

Scrofulous swellings are carefully considered in a chapter entitled
"_De scrophulis et glandulis._" "Scrophulae and glandulae are hard