336 MEALS MEDICINAL. 
sweetened with a little sugar candy, will afford liquors so pleasant 
to the eye, so grateful to the palate, and so beneficial to the body, 
that the wonder is they have not been courted, and ushered 
into our Publick Houses, so great are the extraordinary beauty, 
and virtues of these berries.” Purple, aromatic J uniper berries 
grow commonly in England on a low, stiff evergreen Conifer shrub, 
about heathy ground. They serve to make a capital liqueur, 
half a pound of the crushed berries being infused for a fortnight 
in two quarts of brandy, with six ounces of loaf sugar, closely 
stopped down, then strained off, filtered, bottled, and corked 
securely. The prophet Job has told about rude wanderers 
driven forth from among men to dwell in caves and rocks, who 
taunted him with cruel derision: ‘ They cut up mallows by the 
bushes, and Juniper roots (bitter, and harsh fodder) for their 
meat.” In much more modern times, as saith The Hushandman 
(1750), “* When women chide their husbands for a long while 
together it is commonly said they ‘ give them a J uniper lecture,’ 
which, I am informed, is a comparison taken from the long 
lasting of the live coals of that wood, not from its sweet smell ; 
but comparisons run not upon all four.” In France the Thrush 
is specially esteemed for table use because of the Juniper berries 
on which it grows fat. When this bird is cooked its crop, 
redolent of the woodland Juniper, is left untouched ; whilst to 
each plump breast an apron of sliced fat bacon is fitted, the bird 
being then threaded with others on a thin spit, and set twirling 
to roast before a brisk fire of vine trimmings. Juniper berries, 
besides being fragrant of smell, have a warm sweet, pungent 
flavour, which becomes bitter on further mastication. Sprays 
of the Juniper shrub are sometimes strewn over floors of apart- 
ments so as to give out when trodden-upon their agreeable odour, 
which is thought to promote sleep. The Prophet Elijah was 
sheltered from the persecutions of King Ahab by a Juniper tree ; 
since which time the shrub has been always regarded as a place. 
of refuge, and as a symbol of succour. The berries are said to 
have performed wonders in curing the stone. Evelyn has named 
them the Foresters’ Panacea, “one of the most universal 
remedies in the world to our crazy Forester.” In a case of any 
painful local swelling, rheumatic, or neuralgic, some of the 
bruised berries, if applied topically, will afford prompt, and 
lasting relief. 
Formerly by the use of Juniper berries one Sir Theodore 
