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Ovum Anguinum, Druid's Bead

Ostracias, Marcasite Page of 384 Ovum Anguinum, Druid's Bead Text size:minus plus Restore normal size   Mail page  Print this page
OVUM ANGUINUM.                           251
" Moreover, there is a kind of egg in mighty reputation in the Gallic provinces, of which Greek writers have no men­tion. Innumerable snakes, twining together in summer, make a ball, by a skilful combination, out of the froth from their jaws and the slime of their bodies. It is called the Ovum Anguinum. The Druids assert that it is tossed on high by the serpents' breath, and must be caught in a cloak before it touch the ground : the robber makes his escape on horseback, the snakes following him till they are stopped by the intervention of a running water. The test of its reality is, that it should float against the stream, even though set in gold ; and, so ingenious are magicians in disguising their impositions, they declare it must (to have any virtue) be captured at a particular age of the moon— as though it were within the will of man that such an operation should coincide with any determined time. I have myself certainly seen the egg, which is of the size of a small, round apple, covered with a cartilaginous crust, with many excrescences, like the suckers on the arms of the cuttle-fish. It was being worn at the moment as the badge of a Druid. It is marvellously extolled for its effect in giving success in battle and in petitions to princes : a proof of the falsity of which is the fact, that to my know­ledge a Roman knight from Vocontii was put to death by
Ostracias, Marcasite Page of 384 Ovum Anguinum, Druid's Bead
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