Natural Magick. $00^4.*

ved in vineger: but because vineger doth mar the taste os them, therefore we willnot speak ot such preserving?. But hereby we have learned to preserve, time ourof mind,

All things with diflillcd wine :

for wine is of it self subject to putrefaction many wayes: but when it is often di-stilled, that the quintessence be extracted from it, this extraction is free from allputrefaction whatsoever: wherefore ali things that arc drenched in this kind of li-quor, if the vessel be carefully closed up, must needs last unputrified even for awhole age, nay for all eternity. At Rome, I saw a fish that was drenched in thewater that had been distilled out of the Vine, and she was preserved five andtwenty years, as fresh as while (he was alive: and at Florence, I saw the like offourty years continuance: the vessel was made of glass, and made up with the sealof Hermes. And I make no question, but that all things that arc soweed in thiskind of liquor, will last found and good for many ages. How many forts ok things1 have preserved by this one means, it were too long here to rehearse.

Chap. XT.

'That fruits may he very well preserved in [all-waters.

N Ext aster wine, salt-water is of special use for preserving from putrefaction/for such things as have been drenched therein, have lasted long very foundand good. The Ancients law that whatsoever was preserved in salt, was keptthereby from putrifying: wherefore, that they might preserve fruits from corrupti-on, they have used co drench them in salc-waters. Homer calls salt a divine thing,because it hath a special vercue against putrefaction, and by it, bodies are preservedto all eternity. Plato calls it the friend of God, because no sacrifices were welcometo him, without salt. /Y^r^ faith that the Antients were wont to call it a divineinfluence, because the bodies of creatures that were seasoned with fait from above,were thereby acquitted from corruption. Salt binds, and dries, and knits together,and doth priviledge bodies from putrefaction, that in their own nature must needsputrifie: as the /Egyptians custome manifestly fheweth, who were wont to seasontheir dead bodies with salt, as Herodotus writetb. But let us come to examples. Be-r itint faith, that

Pomegranates are preserved in salt-water s,

You must take sea-water, or else brine, and make it boil, and so put your Pome*gtanaies into it ; and afterward when they are thorough cold, dry them, and hangthem up in the Sun ; and whensoever you would use them, you must steep them infresh-water two da^es before. Columella rehearses the opinion of a certain C artha-ginian touching this matter. Mago would have, faith he, that Sea-water should bemade very hot, and Pomegranates being tied together with thread or ^room-twigs,to be drenched in it till they change their colour, and then to be taken forth anddried in the Sun for three dayes, and afterward to be hanged up: and when youWould use them, you must steep them in fresh and sweet water for the ipace of fourand twenty hours before, and so they will be fit for your use. ‘Pliny also reportsout of the fame Author, that Pomegranates are first to be hardened in hot Sea-water, and then to be dried in the Sun three dayes, and so to be hung up, that theevening dew-come not at them; and when you would use them, to steep them first infresh-water. Palladius writes the fame out of Pliny ; and he fheweth also, that

Damofinsmay he preserved in [alt waters.

They must be fresh gathered, and then drenched cither in brine, or else in sea-water icaldiog hot, and then taken forth, and dried either in the Sun, or else in a-warm Oven. Columella would have them drenched in new wine, sodden wine,andvineger; but he gives a special charge also to cast some salt amongst them, lest the