regained it. The time of his death is not exactly known; but it must
have been prior to the year 1311, when Pope Clement V. wrote a
circular letter to all the clergy of Europe who lived under his
obedience, praying them to use their utmost efforts to discover the
famous treatise of Arnold on "The Practice of Medicine." The author
had promised, during his lifetime, to make a present of the work to
the Holy See, but died without fulfilling it.

In a very curious work by Monsieur Longeville Harcouet, entitled
"The History of the Persons who have lived several centuries, and then
grown young again," there is a receipt, said to have been given by
Arnold de Villeneuve, by means of which any one might prolong his life
for a few hundred years or so. In the first place, say Arnold and
Monsieur Harcouet, "the person intending so to prolong his life must
rub himself well, two or three times a week, with the juice or marrow
of cassia (moelle de la casse). Every night, upon going to bed, he
must put upon his heart a plaster, composed of a certain quantity of
Oriental saffron, red rose-leaves, sandal-wood, aloes, and amber,
liquified in oil of roses and the best white wax. In the morning, he
must take it off, and enclose it carefully in a leaden box till the
next night, when it must be again applied. If he be of a sanguine
temperament, he shall take sixteen chickens -- if phlegmatic,
twenty-five -- and if melancholy, thirty, which he shall put into a
yard where the air and the water are pure. Upon these he is to feed,
eating one a day; but previously the chickens are to be fattened by a
peculiar method, which will impregnate their flesh with the qualities
that are to produce longevity in the eater. Being deprived of all
other nourishment till they are almost dying of hunger, they are to be
fed upon broth made of serpents and vinegar, which broth is to be
thickened with wheat and bran." Various ceremonies are to be performed