The Description.

            1. The first Lentil grows up with slender stalks, and leaves which be somewhat hard, growing aslope from both sides of the rib or middle stalk, narrow and many in number like those of Tares, but narrower and lesser: the flowers be small, tending somewhat towards a purple: the cods are little and broad: the seeds in these are in number three or four; little, round, plain, and flat: the roots are small and thready.

            2. The second kind of Lentil hath small tender and pliant branches a cubit high, whereon do grow leaves divided or consisting of sundry other small leaves, like the wild Vetch, ending at the middle rib with some clasping tendrils, wherewith it taketh hold of such things as are near unto it: among these come forth little brownish flowers mixed with white, which turn into small flat cods, containing little brown flat seed, and sometimes white.

The Place.

            These Pulses do grow in my garden; and it is reported unto me by those of good credit, that about Watford in Middlesex and other places of England the husbandmen do sow them for their cattle, even as others do Tares.

The Time.

            They both flower and wax ripe in July and August.

The Names.

            They are called in Latin, Lens, and Lenticula: in High Dutch Linsen: in French, Lentille: in Italian, Lentichia: in Spanish, Lenteia: in English, Lentils.

The Temperature and Virtues.

            A. Lentils, as Galen saith, are in a mean between hot and cold, yet are they dry in the second degree: their skin is astringent or binding, and the meat or substance within is of a thick aend earthy juice, having a quality that is a little austere or something harsh, much more the skin thereof; but the juice of them is quite contrary to the binding quality; wherefore if a man shall boil them in fair water, and afterwards season the water with salt and pickle, aut cum ipsis oleo condiens ["or as pleases his taste"], and then take it, the same drink doth loose the belly.

            B. The first decoction of Lentils doth loose the belly; but if they be boiled again, and the first decoction cast away, then do they bind, and are good against the bloody flux or dangerous lasks.

            C. They do their operation more effectually in stopping or binding, if all or any of these following be boiled therewith, that is to say, red Beets, Myrtles, peels of Pomegranates, dried Roses, Medlars, Service berries, unripe Pears, Quinces, Plantain leaves, Galls, or the berries of Sumach.

            D. The meal of Lentils mixed with honey doth mundify and cleanse corrupt ulcers and rotten sores, filling them with flesh again; and is most singular to be put into the common digestives used among our London surgeons for green wounds.

            E. The Lentil having the skin or coat taken off, as it loseth that strong binding quality, and those accidents that depend on the same, so doth it more nourish than if it had the skin on.

            F. It engendereth thick and naughty juice, and slowly passeth through the belly, yet doth it not stay the loosness as that doth which hath his coat on; and therefore they that eat too much thereof do necessarily become lepers, and are much subject to cankers, for thick and dry nourishments are apt to breed melancholy.

            G. Therefore the Lentil is good food for them that through waterish humours be apt to fall into the dropsy, and it is a most dangerous food for dry and withered bodies; for which cause it bringeth dimnness of sight, though the sight be perfect, through his excessive dryness, whereby the spirits of the sight be wasted; but it is good for them that are of a quite contrary constitution.

            H. It is not good for those that want their terms; for it breedeth thick blood, and such as slowly passeth through the veins.

            I. But it is singular good to stay the menses, as Galen in his book Of the Faculties of Nourishments affirmeth.

            K. It causeth troublesome dreames (as Dioceorides doth moreover write;) it hurteth the head, sinews, and lungs.

            L. It is good to swallow down thirty grains of Lentils shelled or taken from their husks, against the overcasting of the stomach.

            M. Being boiled with parched barley meal and laid to, it assuageth the pain and ache of the gout.

            N. With honey it filleth up hollow sores, it breaketh aschares, cleanseth ulcers: being boiled in wine it wasteth away wens and hard swellings of the throat.

            O. With a Quince, and Melilot, and oil of Roses it helpeth the inflammation of the eyes and fundament; but in greater inflammations of the fundament, and great deep ulcers, it is boiled with the rind of a pomegranate, dry Rose leaves, and honey.

            P. And after the same manner against eating sores that are mortified, if sea water be added; it is also a remedy against pushes, the shingles, and the hot inflammation called St. Anthony's fire, and for kibes, in such manner as we have written being boiled in sea water and applied, it helps women's breasts in which the milk is cluttered, and cannot suffer too great abundance of milk.