FAMILY HERBAL. 137 



also the Strasburg and sonic other of -be turpentines. 

 The larch tree and turpentine tree lui'i-HLjiii^; the 

 others, as will be seen in their pk<:es The wrod 

 is piled in heaps, and ''.ghted at the top, and 'he 

 tar sweats out at the lower parts. This being 

 boiled, becomes hard, and is called pitch. 



The turpentines are balsamic, and very pow- 

 erful promoters of urine, but of these more in 

 their places : the tar has been of late rendered 

 famous by the water made from it ; but it was a 

 fashionable remedy, and is now out of repute 



again. 



Sweet flag. Acorns calamus aromaticus dictus* 



A common wild plant that grows undistinguished 

 among the flags and rushes, by our ditch sides. 

 The old physicians meant another thing by calamu9 

 aromaticus : they gave this name to the dried stalks 

 of a piant, but at present it is used as the name of 

 the root of this. The sweet flag grows three feet 

 high, but consists only of leaves without a stalk 

 They are long, narrow, and of a pale green colour 

 Among these there are commonly three or four in 

 all respects like the rest, but that they have a cluster 

 of (lowers breaking out at one side, within five or 

 six inches of the top. This is long, brown, and 

 thick, and resembles a catkin of a filbert tree, only it 

 is longer and thicker. The root is long, flattish, and 

 creeping : it is of a strong and rather unpleasant 

 smell when fresh, but it becomes very fragrant, and 

 aromatic in drying. Our own has its value, because 

 we can have it fresh, but the dried root \:\ better had 

 of the druggists ; they have it from warmer countries, 

 where it is more fragrant. 



The juice of the fresh root of acorns is excel- 

 lent to promote the menses, it works by urine 



T 



