1. Of the un-common pieces of Coral red and white; of both which some are ramified in solid massy bodies; others (the rarer sort,) are Corallin incrustations upon truly woodden and branchy sticks, and do terminate in small and tender Corallin buttons or flowers; in some of which the Presenter affirm'd to have, upon squeezing them, found a lacteous Juice. Himself having been present at the Coral-fishing in the Channel of Messina, which separates Calabria from Sicily, relates in a letter of his, written on that subject to Signor Marchetti, Professor of the Mathematiques at Pisa, that, before the Coral-fishers drew their nets out of the water, he immersed his hand and arm into the Sea to feel, whether the Coral was soft under the water before it was drawn up into the air, and found it altogether hard, except the round end, above-mentioned under the name of button; which having been bruised with his nails, he found it made up of five or six little cells, full of a white and somewhat mucilaginous liquor, resembling that milky Juice, found in Summer in the long cods of the herb, call'd Fluvialis pistana foliis denticulatis, spoken of by Joh. Bauhinus. This Corallin juice he calls Leven, because having tasted it himself, as well as the Mariners did, they always found it of a sharp and adstringent taste, in such pieces as came recently out of the Se; those that are dried loosing that part of the taste which is acrimonious, and retaining only that which is adstringent: Which change of taste he affirms to be made in about six hours after the Coral hath been drawn up; in which time also the said Leven, that is inclosed in the pores, is dried, and hath changed its colour. He inclines strongly to the opinion of those who conceive, that the long concoction of the ferment fixes the parts, and produces the red colour, especially being near to the hard coral, and the red vermillion, which surrounds it.