culp&ter'b comflets hsrbal. 117 



Place. — It is most uauallj sown in gardens and 

 groands for the porpoee, and is also found wild in many 

 pkcea 



Oovemment and Virtues. — Mercury hath the dominion 

 of this plant, and therefore to be sure it strengthens the 

 brain. The dill boiled and drank, is good to ease both 

 swellings and pains ; it also stajeth the belly and sto- 

 mach from casting. The decoction helpeth women that 

 are troubled with pains and windiness of the mother, if 

 they sit therein. It stayeth the hiccough, being boiled 

 in wine, and but smelled unto, being tied in a cloth. The 

 seed is of more use than the leaves, and more effectual to 

 digest raw and viscous humours, and is used in medicines 

 that serve to expel wind, and the pains proceeding there- 

 from. The seed being roasted or fried, and used in oils 

 or plaisters, dissolves the imposthumes in the fundament, 

 ana drieth up all moist ulcers especially in that part : 

 an oil made of Dill is effectual to warm or dissolve humours 

 or imposthumes, to ease pains, and to procure rest. The 

 decoction of Dill, be it herb or seed, (only if you boil the 

 seed you must bruise it) in white wine, being drunk, it 

 is a i^ant expeller of wind and provoker of terms. 



DITTANDEK-^ Lepidium Sativum.) 



Called also Pepper-wort 



Descrip. — The common Dittander has a small, whit^ 

 slender, creeping root, hard to be got out of a gardeo 

 where it has ueeu once planted. The lower leaves grow 

 on long foot-stalks, are smooth, oblong, sharp pointed* 

 and serrated, four or five inches long : the stalks grow to 

 be half a yard high, smooth, and having lesser and nar- 

 rower leaves growing alternately, sometimes indented 

 about the edges, and sometimes not The flowers that 

 grow on the top of the stalks are small, white, and four- 

 leaved, and the seed-vessels small and round. 



Place,^It arowi in moist places, and near rivera 



Time. — It flowers in June and July, The whole plant 

 has a hot and bitiiie taste, like pepper. 



Ocvemment and Virtues. — It is an herb of Venus. The 

 leaves of Dittander bruised and mixed with hogs-lard, and 

 applied as a cataplasm to the hip, help the sciatica ; chewed 

 in the mouth, they cause a great flux of rheum to run out 

 of it, and by that means are said to help scrofulous ta- 

 moors in the throat : the women in Suffolk give them 

 boiled In ale to hasten ths birth. 



