SWELLED LIPS. 271 



that it was good in maniacal and hypochondriacal disorders. 

 In Scotland it was formerly carried about as a charm against 

 witchcraft and enchantment ! " 



From whatever cause it arises, the sore face ascribed to 

 the effects of St. John's-Wort is readily cured by sulphur 

 ointment, composed of sulphur and hog's lard. If, as Mr. 

 Morrell supposes, it produces "violent inflammation of the 

 bowels," I should not like to trust either to tar or lard, 

 but would resort to the treatment appropriate in the case 

 of vegetable poisons. (See Poisons.) 



SWELLED LIPS. Sheep are sometimes quite suddenly 

 affected with sore lips in the winter and I think this oftenest 

 occurs to the lambs of the preceding spring. The lips 

 become swollen to several times their natural thickness, are 

 hard, crack open, and are so stiff and sore that the animal 

 eats with difficulty. This disease visited a flock owned by 

 me five or six years since, and included nearly the entire 

 number. It promptly disappeared on smearing their lips with 

 tar rendered thin and soft by butter and slightly mixed with 

 sulphur. A neighbor's sheep which were thus attacked, were 

 simply, on my suggestion, smeared over the lips with pot- 

 grease ; and it likewise immediately relieved them. There 

 appeared to be no observable constitutional disease in either 

 case. Several other such attacks and cures have occurred 

 within flocks which I am familiar with. 



The causes of this affection are unknown. Some attribute 

 it to St. John's-Wort, or other noxious weeds in the hay 

 but, in my own case, it can not possibly be explained in this 

 way. A tun of the hay would have scarcely contained a 

 handful of St. John's-Wort, and it contained no other weed 

 even suspected of being noxious while the malady was 

 simultaneously exhibited by nearly every animal in the same 

 flock. The hay, however, came from a new field, and 

 contained an excessive quantity of bull-thistles. Whether 

 the dry prickles of these had anything to do in producing the 

 effect on the lips, I am unable to say. I have occasionally 

 seen it stated in Agricultural papers that a disease of which 

 swelled lips are one of the most prominent and characteristic 

 symptoms, has resulted mortally. I think it must be a 

 different malady from the one under consideration. I have 

 never witnessed any instance of swelled lips which I think 

 would have been likely to produce death without the applica- 

 tion of any remedy. 



