FAMILY HERBAL! 171 



the edges, of a rough surface, and white colour. 

 The flowers are white, and the points of their cups 

 are prickiy. 



The best part of the plant for medicinal use, is 

 the tops of the young shoot* ; a decoction of these 

 made very strong, and boiled into a thin syrup with 

 honey, is excellent against coughs, hoarsenesses 

 of long standing, and all disorders of the lungs. 

 The same decoction, if taken in large doses, and for 

 a continuance, promotes the menses, and opens all 

 obstructions. 



Black Horeiiound. Ballote. 



A common wild plant of a disagreeable smell, 

 thence also called by some stinking horehound. 

 The stalks are square, the leaves grow two at every 

 joint, and are broad, short, and of a blackish green 

 colour, but in shape not unlike those of the white 

 kind. The (lowers stand in clusters round the stalk 

 at the joints, as in the other, but they are red. 

 The whole plant has a dismal aspect. The root is 

 fibrous. 



The plant is to be used fresh and dried, and 

 it has more virtue than most imagine. It is to be 

 given in the form of tea : it promotes the menses, 

 and is superior to most things as a remedy in hysteric 

 cases, faint ings, convulsions, and low-spiritedness, 

 and all the train of those disorders. 



Horsetail. Equisctum segetale. 



A common, and yet very singular wild plant, 

 frequent in our corn-fields, and composed of 

 branches only, without leaves ; there are also many 

 other kinds of horsetail. It is a foot or more in 

 height, and is extremely branched ; the stalk is 



