56 THE COMPLETE HERBAL 



two ounces at a lime; it makes an excellent i and the worms, and being either drank 01 

 salve to cleanse and heal old ulcers, being j injected, for the disease called Tenesmus, 

 boiled with oil of olive, and Adder's tongue j which is an often provocation to the stool 

 with it, and after it is strained, put a little j without doing any thing. The green leaves 

 wax, rosin, and turpentine, to bring it to a | bruised, and laid to any green wound, stays 

 convenient body. i tlie bleeding, and heals it up quickly. The 



\ juice of the herb taken in wine and milk, 



CUDWEED, OR COTTONWEED. \ J . -p,,. . , 



ps, as l j liny saith, a sovereign remedy 



BESIDES Cudweed and Cotton weed, it is ! against the mumps and quinsey ; and further 

 also Called Chaffweed, Dwarf Cotton, and ; saith, That whosoever shall so take it, shall 

 Petty Cotton. \ never be troubled with that disease again. 



Descn'pf.l The common Cudweed rises i 

 up with one stalk sometimes, and some-! COWSLIPS, OR PEAGLES. 



times with two or three, thick set on all j BOTH the wild and garden Cowslips are 

 sides with small, long and narrow whitish \ so well known, that I neither trouble my- 

 or woody leaves, from the middle of the self nor the reader with a description of 

 stalk almost up to the top, with every leaf 

 stands small flowers of a dun or brownish 



them. 



Time.~\ They flower in April and May. 



yellow colour, or not so yellow as others ; 5 Government and virtues.] Venus lays 

 in which herbs, after the flowers are fallen, j claim to this herb as her own, and it is 

 come small seed wrapped up, with the down \ under the sign Aries, and our city dames 

 therein, and is carried away with the wind ; >'"" - i11 ~r,,v, ^^ ;*.,,+ . ^;=f;n^j 

 the root is small and thready. 



There are other sorts hereof, which are 

 somewhat less than the former, not much 

 different, save only that the stalks and 

 leaves are shorter, so that the flowers are 



know well enough the ointment or distilled 

 water of it adds beauty, or at least restores 

 it when it is lost. The flowers are held to 

 be more effectual than the leaves, and the 

 roots of little use. An ointment being 

 made with them, takes away spots and 



paler and more open. I wrinkles of the skin, sun-burning, and 



Placed] They grow in dry, barren, sandy, {freckles, and adds beauty exceedingly; 

 and gravelly grounds, in most places of j they remedy all infirmities of the head 

 this land. i coming of heat and wind, as vertigo, ephi- 



TimeJ] They flower about July, some Suites, false apparitions, phrensies, falling- 

 earlier, some later, and their seed is ripe in I sickness, palsies, convulsions, cramps, pains 

 August. 5 in the jierves ; the roots ease pains in the 



Government and virtues.~] Venus is Lady \ back and bladder, and open the passages of 

 of it. The plants are all astringent, bind- 1 urine. The leaves are good in wounds, 

 ing, or drying, and therefore profitable for and the flowers take away trembling. If 

 defluctions of rheum from the head, and to I the flowers be not well dried, and kept in 

 stay fluxes of blood wheresoever, the de- \ a warm place, they will soon putrefy and 

 coction being made into red wine and $ look green : Hare a special eye over them, 

 drank, or the powder taken therein. It also { If you let them see the Sun once a month, 

 helps the bloody-flux, and eases the tor- j it will do neither the Sun nor them harm 

 inents that corne thereby, stays the immode-j Because they strengthen the brain and 

 rate courses of women, and is also good for j nerves, and remedy palsies, the Greeks 

 inward or outward wounds, hurts, and i gave them the name Paralysis. The flowers 

 bruises, and helps children both of burstings * preserved or conserved, and the quantity of 



