168 
THE COMPLETE HERBAL 
Government and virtues.] They are both 
of them herbs of the Moon. The Saxifrages 
are hot as pepper; and Tragus saith, by his 
experience, that they are wholesome. They 
have the same properties the parsleys have, 
but in provoking urine, and easing the pains 
thereof, and of the wind and colic, are much 
more effectual, the roots or seed being used 
either in powder, or in decoctions, or any 
other way; and likewise helps the windy 
pains of the mother, and to procure their 
courses, and to break and void the stone 
in the kidneys, to digest cold, viscous, and 
tough phlegm in the stomach, and is an 
especial remedy against all kind of venom. 
Castoreum being boiled in the distilled 
water thereof is singularly good to be given 
to those that are troubled with cramps and 
convulsions. Some do use to make the seeds 
into comfits (as they do carraway seeds) 
which is effectual to all the purposes afore- 
said. The juice of the herb dropped into 
the most grievous wounds of the head dries 
up their moisture, and heals them quickly. 
Some women use the distilled water to take 
away freckles or spots in the skin or face; 
and to drink the same sweetened with sugar 
for all the purposes aforesaid. 
SCABIOUS, THREE SORTS. 
Descript.] Common field Scabious grows 
up with many hairy, soft, whitish green 
leaves, some whereof are very little, if at 
all jagged on the edges, others very much 
rent and torn on the sides, and have threads 
in them, which upon breaking may be 
plainly seen; from among which rise up 
divers hairy green stalks, three or four feet 
high, with such like hairy green leaves on 
them, but more deeply and finely divided 
and branched forth a little: At the tops 
_ thereof, which are naked and bare of leaves 
for a good space, stand round heads of 
flowers, of a pale blueish colour, set 
_ together in a head, the outermost whereof 
are larger than the inward, with many 
threads also in the middle, somewhat flat at 
the top, as the head with the seed is like- 
wise; the root is great, white and thick, 
growing down deep into the ground, and 
abides many years. 
There is another sort of Field Scabious 
different in nothing from the former, but 
only it is smaller in all respects. 
The Corn Scabious differs little from the 
first, but that it is greater in all respects, 
and the flowers more inclining to purple, 
and the root creeps under the upper crust 
of the earth, and runs not deep into the 
ground as the first doth. 
Place.| The first grows more usually in 
meadows, especially about London every 
where. 
The second in some of the dry fields 
about this city, but not so plentifully as the 
former. 
The third in standing corn, or fallow 
fields and the borders of such like fields. 
Time.] They flower in June and July, 
and some abide flowering until it be late in 
August, and the seed is ripe in the mean 
time. f 
There are many other sorts of Scabious, 
but I take these which I have here described 
to be most familiar with us; The virtues of 
both these and the rest, being much alike, 
take them as follows. 
Government and virtues.] Mercury owns 
the plant. Scabious is very effectual for 
all sorts of coughs, shortness of breath, and 
all other diseases of the breast and lungs, 
ripening and digesting cold phlegm, and 
other tough humours, voids them forth by 
coughing and spitting: It ripens also all 
sorts of inward ulcers and imposthumes; 
pleurisy also, if the decoction of the herb 
dry or green be made in wine, and drank 
for some time together. Four ounces of 
the clarified juice of Scabious taken in the 
morning fasting, with a dram of mithridate, 
or Venice treacle, frees the heart from any 2 
