Book 7
1
1 First then the displacements, in whatever part of the body they are, ought to be immediately treated, so that the skin is several times incised with a sharp scalpel where the pain is, and the blood as it issues wiped off with the back of the knife. But if relief is rather slow in coming and there is now redness as well, and if, where the redness is, there is swelling in addition, wherever there is swelling this treatment is best. Repressants are then to be applied, in particular unscoured wool soaked in vinegar and oil. In a slighter case the same applications may afford relief even without the scalpel; and if there is nothing else at hand, wood-ash, preferably of vine twigs, or failing that any other kind, stirred to a paste in vinegar, or even in water.
