In the 6th century Alexander of Tralles used colchicum for gout, iron for anaemia, and rhubarb in liver weakness and dysentery.
Iron waters are used in anaemia and the affections which are frequently associated with it.
In chronic cases the eventual effects are anaemia, melanosis, enlargement of the spleen and liver, and general cachexia.
The origin of the corpuscles, previously a matter of so much difference of opinion, is now pretty fairly set at rest, and has proved the key to the interpretation of the pathology of many diseases of the blood, such as the different forms of anaemia, of leucocythaemia, &c.
Thus Echinococci contains a leucomaine which sets up an urticaria; Cysticercus tenuicollis occasions anaemia and death if injecte-1 into rabbits; and the cystic fluid of the common Coenurus serialis is said to be used by Kirghizes to poison wolves.