Part 2

Lastly, quaint old Fuller shall lend an appropriate Epilogue. "I stand ready," said he (1672), "with a pencil in one hand, and a spunge in the other, to add, alter, insert, efface, enlarge, and delete, according to better information. And if these my pains shall be found worthy to passe a second Impression, my faults I will confess with shame, and amend with thankfulnesse, to such as will contribute clearer intelligence unto me."

1895.

PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.

On its First Reading, a Bill drafted in Parliament meets with acquiescence from the House on both sides mainly because its merits and demerits are to be more deliberately questioned when it comes up again in the future for a second closer Reading, Meanwhile, its faults can be amended, and its omissions supplied: fresh clauses can be introduced: and the whole scheme of the Bill can be better adapted to the spirit of the House inferred from its first reception.

In somewhat similar fashion the Second Edition of "Herbal Simples" is now submitted to a Parliament of readers with the belief that its ultimate success, or failure of purpose, is to depend on its present revised contents, and the amplified scope of its chapters.

The criticism which public journalists, not a few, thought proper to pass on its First Edition have been attentively considered herein. It is true their comments were in some cases so conflicting as to be difficult of practical appliance. The fabled old man and his ass stand always in traditional warning against futile attempts to satisfy inconsistent objectors, or to carry into effect suggestions made by irreconcilable censors. "Quot homines, tot sententioe," is an adage signally verified when a fresh venture is made on the waters of chartered opinion. How shall the perplexed navigator steer his course when monitors in office accuse him on the one hand of lax precision throughout, and belaud him on the other for careful observance of detail? Or how shall he trim his sails when a contemptuous Standard-bearer, strangely uninformed on the point, ignores, as a leader of any repute, "one Gerard," a former famous Captain of the Herbal fleet? With the would-be Spectator's lament that Gerard's graphic drawings are regrettedly wanting here, the author is fain to concur. He feels that the absence of appropriate cuts to depict the various herbs is quite a deficiency: but the hope is inspired that a still future Edition may serve to supply this need. Certain botanical mistakes pointed out with authority by the Pharmaceutical Journal have here been duly corrected: and as many as fifty additional Simples will be found described in the present Enlarged Edition. At the same time a higher claim than hitherto made for the paramount importance of the whole subject is now courageously advanced.

To all who accept as literal truth the Scriptural account of the Garden of Eden it must be evident how intimately man's welfare from the first was made to depend on his uses of trees and herbs. The labour of earning his bread in the sweat of his brow by tilling the ground: and the penalty of and thistles produced thereupon, were alike incurred by Eve's disobedience in plucking the forbidden fruit: and a signified possibility of man's eventful share in the tree of life, to "put forth his hand, and eat, and live for ever," has been more than vaguely revealed. So that with almost a sacred mission, and with an exalted motive of supreme usefulness, this Manual of healing Herbs is published anew, to reach, it is hoped, and to rescue many an ailing mortal.

Against its main principle an objection has been speciously raised, which at first sight appears of subversive weight; though, when further examined, it is found to be clearly fallacious. By an able but carping critic it was alleged that the mere chemical analysis of old-fashioned Herbal Simples makes their medicinal actions no less empirical than before: and that a pedantic knowledge of their constituent parts, invested with fine technical names, gives them no more scientific a position than that which our fathers understood.

But, taking, for instance, the herb Rue, which was formerly brought into Court to protect a and the Bench from gaol fever, and other infectious disease; no one knew at the time by what particular virtue the Rue could exercise this salutary power. But more recent research has taught, that the essential oil contained in this, and other allied aromatic herbs, such as Elecampane, Rosemary, and Cinnamon, serves by its germicidal principles (stearoptens, methyl-ethers, and camphors), to extinguish bacterial life which underlies all contagion. In a parallel way the antiseptic diffusible oils of Pine, Peppermint, and Thyme, are likewise employed with marked success for inhalation into the lungs by consumptive patients. Their volatile vapours reach remote parts of the diseased air-passages, and heal by destroying the morbid germs which perpetuate mischief therein. It need scarcely be said the very existence of these causative microbes, much less any mode of cure by their abolishment, was quite unknown to former Herbal Simplers.

Again, in past times a large number of our native, plants acquired a well-deserved, but purely empirical celebrity, for curing scrofula and scurvy. But later discovery has shown that each of these several herbs contains lime, and earthy salts, in a subtle form of high natural sub-division: whilst, at the same time, the law of cure by medicinal similars has established the cognate fact that to those who inherit a strumous taint, infinitesimal doses of these earth salts are incontestably curative. The parents had first undergone a gradual impairment of health because of calcareous matters to excess in their general conditions of sustenance; and the lime proves potent to cure in the offspring what, through the parental surfeit, was entailed as a heritage of disease. Just in the same way the mineral waters of Missisquoi, and Bethesda, in America, through containing siliceous qualities so sublimated as almost to defy the analyst, are effective to cure cancer, albuminuria, and other organic complaints.

Nor is this by any means a new policy of cure. Its barbaric practice has long since obtained, even in African wilds, where the native snake doctor inoculates with his prepared snake poison to save the life of a victim otherwise fatally bitten by another snake of the same deadly virus. To Ovid, of Roman fame (20 B.C.), the same sanative axiom was also indisputably known as we learn from his lines:--

"Tunc observatas augur descendit in herbas; Usus et auxilio est anguis ab angue dato."

"Then searched the Augur low mid grass close scanned For snake to heal a snake-envenomed hand."

And with equal cogency other arguments, which are manifold, might be readily adduced, as of congruous force, to vindicate our claim in favour of analytical knowledge over blind experience in the methods of Herbal cure, especially if this be pursued on the broad lines of enlightened practice by similars.

So now, to be brief, and to change our allegory, "on the banks of the Nile," as Mrs. Malaprop would have pervertingly put it, with "a nice [xviii] derangement of epitaphs," we invite our many guests to a simple "dinner of herbs." Such was man's primitive food in Paradise: "every green herb bearing seed, and every tree in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed:" "the green herb for meat for every beast of the earth, and every fowl of the air." What better Preface can we indite than a grace to be said before sitting down to the meal? "Sallets," it is hoped, will be found "in the lines to make the matter savoury." Far be it from our object to preach a prelude of texts, or to weary those at our board I with a meaningless long benediction. "'Tis not so plain as the old Hill of Howth," said tender-hearted witty Tom Hood, with serio-comic truth, "a man has got his belly full of meat, because he talks with victuals in his mouth." Rather would we choose the "russet Yeas and honest kersey Noes" of sturdy yeoman speech; and cheerfully taking the head of our well-stocked table, ask in homely terms that "God will bless these the good creatures of His Herbal Simples to our saving uses, and us to His grateful service."

1897.

CONTENTS.

Absinthe . . . 614 Acorn . . . 15 Agaric, Fly . . . 368 Agrimony . . . 18 Alexanders . . . 313 Allspice . . . 386 Amadou . . . 378 Anemone, Wood . . . 20 Angelica . . . 23 Aniseed . . . 24 Apple . . . 26 Arsmart . . . 606 Artichoke, Globe . . . 548 " Jerusalem . . . 549 Arum . . . 33 Asafetida . . . 269 Ash, Mountain . . . 350 Asparagus . . . 35 Asphodel, Bog . . . 482 Avens . . . 47

Balm . . . 39 Barberry . . . 42 Barley . . . 44 Basil, Sweet . . . 45 Bean . . . 415 Bedstraw . . . 231 Bee sting . . . 260 Beet . . . 507 Belladonna . . . 388 Bennet Herb . . . 47 Betony, Water . . . 50, 198 " Wood . . . 42 Bilberry . . . 652 Bistort, Great . . . 607 Blackberry . . . 53 Black Pot Herb . . . 312 Blackthorn . . . 517 Bladderwrack . . . 503 Blessed Thistle . . . 557 Blue Bell . . . 57 Bog Bean . . . 58 Borage . . . 60 Bracken . . . 184 Brooklime . . . 431 Broom . . . 62 Bryony, Black . . . 68 " White . . . 65 Buckthorn . . . 69 Bugle . . . 510 Bullace . . . 520 Bulrush . . . 481 Burdock . . . 162 Burnet Saxifrage . . . 430 Butcher's Broom . . . 64 Butterbur . . . 119 Buttercup . . . 71

Cabbage . . . 74 " Sea . . . 76 Calamint . . . 343 Camphor . . . 337 Capsicum . . . 78 Caraway . . . 81 Carline Thistle . . . 558 Carraigeen Moss . . . 500 Carrot . . . 88 Cascara Sagrada . . . 70 Cat Mint . . . 344 Cat Thyme . . . 565 Cat's Tail . . . 482 Celandine, Greater . . . 92 " Lesser . . . 90 Celery . . . 94 Centaury . . . 96 Chamomile . . . 84 " Bitter . . . 86 Cherry . . . 98 Chervil . . . 100 Chestnut, Horse . . . 102 " Sweet . . . 104 Chickweed . . . 105 Chicory . . . 542 Christmas Rose . . . 107 Cider . . . 30 Cinnamon . . . 390 Cinquefoil, Creeping . . . 516 Clary . . . 492 Cleavers . . . 230 Clover, Meadow . . . 110 " Sweet . . . 112 Clovers . . . 395 Club Moss . . . 113 Colchicum . . . 483 Coltsfoot . . . 116 Comfrey . . . 120, 595 " Prickly . . . 122 Coriander . . . 122 Couch Grass . . . 242 Cow . . . 126 Cowslip . . . 124 Crab Apple . . . 29 Cresses . . . 127 Cress, Garden . . . 128 " Water . . . 129 Crowfoot . . . 71 Cuckoo Flower . . . 134 Cuckoo Pint . . . 33 Cumin . . . 135 Currants, Red, White, and Black . . . 137

Daffodil . . . 141 Daisy . . . 143 Damson . . . 520 Dandelion . . . 147 Darnel . . . 242 Date . . . 152 Dill . . . 155 Dock . . . 157 " Great Water . . . 164 " Yellow Curled . . . 163 Dodder . . . 112 Dog's Mercury . . . 332 Dropwort, Water . . . 603 Dulse . . . 501

Earthnut . . . 372 Egg . . . 150 Elder . . . 164 " Dwarf . . . 171 Elecampane . . . 172 Eryngo . . . 499 Eyebright . . . 175

Fairy rings . . . 374 Fennel . . . 179 " Water . . . 604 Ferns . . . 182 " Female (Bracken) . . . 184 " Hart's-tongue . . . 187 " Maidenhair . . . 188 " Male . . . 183 " Polypody . . . 189 " Royal . . . 186 " Spleenwort . . . 190 " Wall Rue . . . 191 Feverfew . . . 192 Fig . . . 194 Figwort . . . 54 Flag, Blue . . . 199 " Yellow . . . 200 " Stinking (Gladdon) . . . 201 " Sweet . . . 201, 480 Flax . . . 202 " Purging . . . 204 Fly Agaric . . . 368 Foxglove . . . 205 Fumitory . . . 201 Furze . . . 63

Gage, Green . . . 521 Garlic . . . 214 " Poor Man's . . . 222 Ginger . . . 392 Gipsy Wort (Water Hore-hound) . . . 269 Good King Henry . . . 227 Gooseberry . . . 223 Goosefoot . . . 227 " Stinking . . . 229 Goosegrass . . . 230 Goutweed . . . 235 Grapes . . . 236 Grasses . . . 241 Ground Ivy . . . 283 Groundsel . . . 243

Hawthorn . . . 245 Hellebore, Stinking . . . 109 Hemlock . . . 248 " Water . . . 251 Hemp Agrimony . . . 19 Henbane . . . 252 Herb, Bennet . . . 47 Hoglouse . . . 564 Honey . . . 256 Hop . . . 262 Horehound, Black . . . 268 " White . . . 267 Horse Radish . . . 269 House Leek . . . 273 Hyssop . . . 277 " Hedge . . . 279

Iceland Moss . . . 500 Irish Moss . . . 500 Ivy . . . 280 " Ground . . . 283

John's Wort, Saint . . . 287 Juniper . . . 291

Knapweed, the Lesser . . . 296