Page:Husbandman and Housewife 1820.djvu/93

 tea spoonfull of sugar to half a pint of mustard is a great improvement, and softens it.

TAKE a bean, after splitting it apply one half (flat side) to the wound, bind it on, let it remain till it comes off itself, and the poison will be extracted and the wound healed.

THE common stinging nettle, apparently as useless and troublesome a plant as any that has been stigmatized with the name of weed, is one of the most efficacious medicines we have in the vegetable kingdom: in the form of a strong decoction or infusion taken in the quantity of a pound a day, it is a most valuable strengthener of general or partial relaxation. In that of a weak decoction or infusion, it proves an admirable alterative, and deobstruent in impurities of the blood, and in obstructions of the vessels. And in that of expressed juices, taken by spoonfuls as the exigency of the case requires—it is the most powerful styptic in internal bleedings known. Externally applied as a fermentation or poultice, it amazingly discusses inflammation, resolves swellings. In the common sore throat, thus applied and, internally as a gargle dependence may safely be put on this common plant.