The Sully County watchman. (Clifton, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1894, 1891-12-26

its clingipg to the palate and causing
water to boil when immersed. it actually
has the property of ronQlv adhering to
the tongue, and when put into water emits
rapid streams of minute bubbles of air.
Ii has strong siiceous odor, but after
absorbing an equal bulk of water be-
comes transparent, like Colorado hy-
drophane described 10y the writer several
years ago before the New York academy
of sciences
Although this substance is mentioned in
nearly all of the text books, very little of
it has reached the United States. 1t is
highly interesting, since we have here an
organic product scarcelyt to be distinguish
ed from a similar opallike body found
by Arnold Hague In the geysers of
the Yellowstone Park. Both tabasheer
and Lydrophane were probably what was
called "Oculus bell," 0culus mundi" and
"Lapis mutabilis" by Thomas Nicol, Rob-
ert Bo, lie and other writer's of the seven.
teenth century, and Weltauge" by the
Germans.
The great capacity of this substance for
absorbing a fluid would undoubtedly rem
der il as efficacious for the purpose of abb
sorbing poison as any other known stone,
providing the wound is open enough; and
its internal use today as medicine is pos
sibly also due to this property.
Tabasheer, as known among mineral
ogists, is corruption of the word tabixir,
a name which was used even in the time
of Avicenna, the grand vizier and body
surgeon of the sultan Of Persia in the
10th century. Ii played very important
part in medicine during the middle ages.
As to its origin, Sir David Brewster says
that tabas heHr is only formed in diseased
or injured bamboo joints or st;lks.
Gullbourt differs from Brewster, mas
much as he attributes the different rates
of growth to the fact that when there is a
superabundance of sap the tabasheer is
formed from the residum More recently
Henry Cecil says: I'm the onrush of
tropical growth in the young shoot, nature
after flooring the knot, has poured in, as
it were, sap and silica sufficient for nor
mai length and width of stem to the knot
next above it. Blu. by some check to the
impulse, or by irregularity of conditions,
the portion of stem thus provided for is
shorter or narrower than intended, and the
unused silica is left behind as a sediment,
compacted by TIE drying residum of sap"
DR.. Huth discusses the name, history,
origin and reputed virtues of this sub
stsinCe VIII IluCH Iuiiutss. III IcRdIu W
its use in medicine during the middle
ages, he quotes remarkable list of ap-
piications to the ills that flesh is heir to.
Here it is cited as remedy for affec-
tions of the eyes, the chest, and of the
stomach. for coughs, fevers and hillary
complaints, auI especially for melancholia
arising from solitude, dread of the past,
and fear for the future. Other writers
speak of its use in bilious fevers and
dysentery, internal and external heat, and
Il variety of injuries and maladies.
The writer has examined Il large num-
Der of so-called mad-stones, and they
have all provedto be an aluminous shale or
other absorptive properties to n greater de-
gree than any other mineral substance
that have examined, and il is strange
that it has never been mentioned as being
used as an antidote. ltmly be confdenti-
ally recommended to the creJence of any
person who may d sire to believe in
mad-stone.-N. Y. Sun.