Herbal Simples Approved for Modern Uses of Cure - William Thomas Fernie (best way to read an ebook txt) 📗

old English word denoting a privy, or house of office, and this in allusion to the fetid smell of the plant, and the usual place of its growth.

When gathered and eaten with boiled mutton, after having been first separately boiled, it makes an excellent vegetable, if picked as it approaches the flowering state. Formerly this herb was highly valued as an antiscorbutic, and was thought a most desirable pot herb.

(The Erysimum officinale (Hedge Mustard) and the Vervain (Verbena) make Count Mattaei's empirical nostrum Febrifugo: but this Erysimum is not the same plant as the Jack by the hedge.)

GOOSEBERRY.

The Gooseberry (Ribes grossularia) gets its name from krüsbar, which signifies a cross, in allusion to the triple spine of the fruit or berry, which is commonly cruciform. This is a relic of its first floral days, preserved like the apron of the blacksmith at Persia, when he came to the throne. The term grossularia implies a resemblance of the fruit to grossuli, small unripe figs.

[224] Frequently the shrub, which belongs to the same natural order as the Currant (Ribes), grows wild in the hedges and thickets of our Eastern counties, bearing then only a small, poor berry, and not supposed to be of native origin.

In East Anglia it is named Fabe, Feap, Thape, or Theab berry, probably by reason of a mistake which arose through an incorrect picture. The Melon, in a well-known book of Tabernaemontanus, was figured to look like a large gooseberry, and was headed, Pfebe. And this name was supposed by some wiseacre to be that of the gooseberry, and thus became attached to the said fruit. Loudon thinks it signifies Feverberry, because of the cooling properties possessed by the gooseberry, which is scarcely probable.

In Norfolk, the green, unripe fruit is called Thape, and the schoolboys in that county well know Thape pie, made from green Gooseberries. The French call the fruit Groseille, and the Scotch, Grosert. It contains, chemically, citric acid, pectose, gum, sugar, cellulose, albumen, mineral matter, and water. The quantity of flesh-forming constituents is insignificant. Its pectose, under heat, makes a capital jelly.

In this country, the Gooseberry was first cultivated at the time of the Reformation, and it grows better in Great Britain than elsewhere, because of the moist climate. The original fruit occurred of the hairy sort, like Esau, as the Uva crispa of Fuschius, in Henry the Eighth's reign; and there are now red, white, and yellow cultivated varieties of the berry.

When green and unripe, Gooseberries are employed in a sauce, together with bechamel, and aromatic spices, this being taken with mackerel and other rich fish, as an acid corrective condiment. Also, from the juice of the [225] green fruit, "which cureth all inflammations," may be concocted an excellent vinegar.

Gooseberry-fool, which comes to our tables so acceptably in early summer, consists of the unripe fruit foulé (that is, crushed or beaten up) with cream and milk. Similarly the French have a foulé des pommes, and a_ foulé des raisins_. To "play old Gooseberry" with another man's property is conjectured to mean smashing it up, and reducing it, as it were, to Gooseberry-fool.

The young and tender leaves of the shrub, if eaten raw in a salad; drive forth the gravel. And from the red Gooseberry may be prepared an excellent light jelly, which is beneficial for sedentary, plethoric, and bilious subjects. This variety of the fruit, whether hairy or smooth, is grown largely in Scotland, but in France it is little cared for.

The yellow Gooseberry is richer and more vinous of taste, suiting admirably, when of the smooth sort, for making Gooseberry wine; which is choice, sparkling, and wholesome, such as that wherewith Goldsmith's popular Vicar of Wakefield used to regale Farmer Flamborough and the blind piper, having "lost neither the recipe nor the reputation." They were soothed in return by the touching ballads of Johnny Armstrong's Last Good Night, and Cruel Barbara Allen.

Gooseberry Shows are held annually in Lancashire, and excite keen competition; but after exhibition, the successful berries are "topped and tailed," so as to disqualify them from being shown elsewhere. Southey, in The Doctor, speaks about an obituary notice in a former Manchester newspaper, of a man who "bore a severe illness with Christian fortitude, and was much esteemed among Gooseberry growers." Prizes are given for the [226] biggest and heaviest berries, which are produced with immense pains as to manuring, and the growth of cool chickweed around the roots of the bushes. At the same time each promising berry is kept submerged in a shallow vessel of water placed beneath it so as to compel absorption of moisture, and thus to enlarge its size. Whimsical names, such as "Golden Lion," "The Jolly Angler," and "Crown Bob," etc., are bestowed on the prize fruit. Cuttings from the parent plant of a prize Gooseberry become in great request; and thus the pedigree scions of a single bush have been known to yield as much as thirty-two pounds sterling to their possessor. The Gooseberry Book is a regular Manchester annual.

A berry weighing as heavy as thirty-seven penny-weight has been exhibited; and a story is told of a Middleton weaver, who, when a thunder-storm was gathering, lay awake as if for his life, and at the first patter of rain against the window panes, rushed to the rescue of his Gooseberry bushes with his bed quilt. Green Gooseberries will help to abate the strange longings which sometimes beset pregnant women.

In Devon the rustics call Gooseberries "Deberries," and in Sussex they are familiarly known to village lads as Goosegogs.

An Irish cure for warts is to prick them with a Gooseberry thorn passed through a wedding ring.

By some subtle bodily action wrought through a suggestion made to the mind, warts undoubtedly disappear as the result of this and many another equally trivial proceeding; which being so, why not the more serious skin affections, and larger morbid growths?

The poet Southey wrote a Pindaric Ode upon a Gooseberry [227]
Pie, beginning "Gooseberry Pie is best," with the refrain:—

     "And didst thou scratch thy tender arms,
     Oh, Jane I that I should dine"?

GOOSEFOOT.

Among Curative Simples, the Goosefoot, or Chenopod order of British plants, contributes two useful herbs, the Chenopodium bonus Henricus (Good King Henry), and the Chenopodium vulvaria (Stinking Goosefoot).

This tribe derives its distinctive title from the Greek words, cheen, a goose, and pous, a foot, in allusion to the resemblance borne by its leaves to the webbed members of that waddling bird which raw recruits are wont to bless for their irksome drill of the goose-step. Incidentally, it may be said that goosegrease, got from the roasted bird, is highly emollient, and very useful in clysters; it also proves easily emetic.

The Goosefoot herbs are common weeds in most temperate climates, and grow chiefly in salt marshes, or on the sea-shore. Other plants of this tribe are esculent vegetables, as the Spinach, Beet, and Orach. They all afford "soda" in abundance.

The Good King Henry (Goosefoot) grows abundantly in waste places near villages, being a dark green, succulent plant, about a foot high, with thickish arrow-shaped leaves, which are cooked as spinach, especially in Lincolnshire. It is sometimes called Blite, from the Greek bliton, insipid; and, as Evelyn says, in his Acetaria, "it is well named, being insipid enough."

Why the said Goosefoot has been named "Good King Henry," or, "Good King Harry," is a disputed point. A French writer declares "this humble plant which grows on our plains without culture will confer a more lasting [228] duration on the memory of Henri Quatre than the statue of bronze placed on the Pont Neuf, though fenced with iron, and guarded by soldiers." Dodoeus says the appellation was given to distinguish the plant from another, a poisonous one, called Malus Henricus, "Bad Henry." Other authors have referred it to our Harry the Eighth, and his sore legs, for which the leaves were applied as a remedy; but this idea does not seem of probable correctness. Frowde tells us "the constant irritation of his festering legs made his terrible temper still more dreadful. Warned of his approaching dissolution; and consumed with the death-thirst, he called for a cup of white wine, and, turning to one of his attendants; cried, 'All is lost!'—and these were his last words." The substantive title, Henricus, is more likely derived from "heinrich," an elf or goblin, as indicating certain magical virtues in the herb.

It is further known as English Marquery, or Mercury, and Tota bona; or, Allgood, the latter from a conceit of the rustics that it will cure all hurts; "wherefore the leaves are now a constant plaster among them for every green wound." It bears small flowers of sepals only, and is grown by cottagers as a pot herb. The young shoots peeled and boiled may be eaten as asparagus, and are gently laxative. The leaves are often made into broth, being applied also externally by country folk to heal old ulcers; and the roots are given to sheep having a cough.

Both here and in Germany this Goosefoot is used for feeding poultry, and it has hence acquired the sobriquet of Fat-hen.

The term, English Mercury, has been given because of its excellent remedial qualities against indigestion, and bears out the proverb: "Be thou sick or whole, put [229] Mercury in thy koole." Poultices made from the herb are applied to cleanse and heal chronic sores, which, as Gerard teaches, "they do scour and mundify." Certain writers associate it with our good King Henry the Sixth. There is made in America, from an allied plant, the oak-leaved Goosefoot (Chenopodium glaucum), or from the aphis which infests it, a medicinal tincture used for expelling round worms.

The Stinking Goosefoot, called therefore, Vulvaria, and Garosmus, grows often on roadsides in England, and is known as Dog's Orach. It is of a dull, glaucous, or greyish-green aspect, and invested with a greasy mealiness which when touched exhales a very odious and enduring smell like that of stale salt fish, this being particularly attractive to dogs, though swine refuse the plant. It has been found very useful in hysteria, the leaves being made into a conserve with sugar; or Dr. Fuller's famous Electuarium hystericum may be compounded by adding forty-eight drops of oil of amber (Oleum succini) to four ounces of the conserve. Then a piece of the size of a chestnut should be taken when needed, and repeated more or less often as required. It further promotes the monthly flow of women. But the herb is possessed odoris virosi intolerabilis, of a stink which remains long on the hands after touching it. The whole plant is sprinkled over with the white, pellucid meal, and contains much "trimethylamine," together with osmazome, and nitrate of potash; also it gives off free ammonia. The title, Orach, given to the Stinking Goosefoot, a simple of a "most ancient, fish-like smell," and to others of the same tribe, is a corruption of aurum, gold, because their seeds were supposed to cure the ailment known popularly as the "yellow jaundice." These plants afford no nutriment, [230] and, therefore, each bears the name, atriplex, not, trephein, to nourish:—

     "Atriplicem tritum cum nitro, melle, et aceto
     Dicunt appositum calidum sedare podagram
     Ictericis dicitque Galenus tollere morbum
     Illius semen cum vino saepius haustum."

     "With vinegar, honey, and salt, the Orach
     Made hot, and applied, cures a gouty attack;
     Whilst its seeds for the jaundice, if mingled with wine,
     —As Galen has said—are a remedy fine."

"Orach is cooling," writes Evelyn, "and allays the pituit humors." "Being set over the fire, neither this nor the lettuce needs any other water than their own moisture to boil them in." The Orach hails from Tartary, and is much esteemed in France. It was introduced about 1548.

GOOSEGRASS.

"Goosey, goosey, gander, whither do ye wander?" says an old nursery rhyme by way of warning to the silly waddling birds not to venture into hedgerows, else will they become helplessly fettered by the tough, straggling coils of the Clivers, Goosegrass, or, Hedgeheriff, growing so freely there, and a sad despoiler of feathers.

The medicinal Goosegrass (Galium aparine), which is a highly useful curative Simple, springs up luxuriantly about fields and waste places in most English districts. It belongs to the Rubiaceous order of plants, all of which have a root like madder, affording a red dye. This hardy Goosegrass climbs courageously by its slender, hairy stems through the dense vegetation of our hedges into open daylight, having sharp, serrated leaves, and producing small white flowers, "pearking on the tops of the sprigs." It is one of the Bedstraw tribe, and bears [231] a number of popular titles, such as Cleavers, Clithers, Robin run in the grass, Burweed, Loveman, Gooseherriff, Mutton chops, Clite, Clide, Clitheren, and Goosebill, from the sharp, serrated leaves, like the rough-edged mandibles of a goose.

Its stalks and leaves are covered with little hooked bristles, which attach themselves to passing objects, and by which it