68 THE COMPLETE HERBAL 



sweet in scent; after which come small! the eyes, assuages them; the iuice of the 

 blackish berries, full of juice while they are | leaves snuffed up into the nostrils, purges 

 liesh, wherein is small hard kernels, or seed. I the tunicles of the brain ; the juice of the 

 The root doth creep unerd the upper crust I berries boiled with honey and dropped 

 of the ground, springing in divers places, I into the ears, helps the pains of them ; the 

 being of the bigness of one's finger or | decoction of the berries in wine, being 

 thumb sometimes. $ drank, provokes urine ; the distilled water 



P/ce.] The Elder tree grows in hedges, I of the flowers is of much use to clean the 

 being planted there to strengthen the fences \ skin from sun-burning, freckles, morphew, 

 and partitions of ground, and to hold the j or the like; and takes away the head-ache, 

 banks by ditches and water-courses. \ coming of a cold cause, the head being 



The Dwarf Elder grows wild in many; bathed therewith. The leaves or flowers 

 places of England, where being once gotten { distilled in the month of May, and the legs 

 into a ground, it is not easily gotten forth 5 often washed with the said distilled water, 

 again. lit takes away the ulcers and sores of them, 



Time.'] Most of the Elder Trees, flower \ The eyes washed therewith, it takes away 

 in June, and their fruit is ripe for the mosU the redness and bloodshot ; and the hands 

 part in August. But the Dwarf Elder, or j washed morning and evening therewith, 

 Wall-wort, flowers somewhat later, and his \ helps the palsy, and shaking of them, 

 fruit is not ripe until September. | The Dwarf Elder is more powerful than 



Government and virtues^] Both Elder and j the common Elder in opening and purging 

 Dwarf Tree are under the dominion ofjcholer, phlegm, and water; in helping the 

 Venus. The first shoots of the common j gout, piles, and women's diseases, colours 

 Elder boiled like Asparagus, and the young \ the hair black, helps the inflammations of 

 leaves and stalks boiled in fat broth, doth j the eyes, and pains in the ears, the biting ol 

 mightily carry forth phlegm and choler. \ serpents, or mad dogs, burnings and scald- 

 The middle or inward bark boiled in water, $ ings, the wind cholic, cholic, and stone, the 

 and given in drink, works much more \ difficulty of urine, the cure of old sores and 

 violently ; and the berries, either green or \ fistulous ulcers. Either leaves or bark of 

 dry, expel the same humour, and are often ; Elder, stripped upwards as you gather it, 

 given with good success to help the dropsy;! causes vomiting. Also, Dr. Butler, in a 

 the bark of the root boiled in wine, or the : manuscript of his, commends Dwarf Elder 



juice thereof drank, works the same effects, to the sky for dropsies, viz. to drink it, 

 but more powerfully than either the leaves | being boiled in white wine ; to drink the 

 or fruit. The juice of the root taken, doth j decoction I mean, not the Elder, 

 mightily procure vomitings, and purges the J 



" t * nil rrn 1 IHJ5 JEJjJB 1 JK. <Ji. 



watery humours of the dropsy. Ihe de-j 



coction of the root taken, cures the biting \ THIS tree is so well known, growing 



of an adder, and biting of mad dogs. It ! generally in all counties of this land, that it 



mollifies the hardness of the mother, if I is needless to describe it. 



women sit thereon, and opens their veins, j Government and virtues.'] It is a cold and 



and brings down their courses : The berries | saturnine plant. The leaves thereof bruised 



boiled in wine perform the same effect;! and applied, heal green wounds, being 



and the hair of the head washed therewith 5 bound thereon with its own bark. The 



is made black. The juice of the green ! leaves or the bark used with vinegar, cures 



leaves applied to the hot inflammations of I scurf and leprosy very effectually : The 



