AND ENGLISH PHYSICIAN ENLARGED. 137 



by lire, yea, and the leprosy, being drank j The ordinary Female Peony hath as 

 and outwardly applied : Boiled in wine! many stalks, and more leaves on them than 

 with honey and salt, it helps the tooth-ache, j the Male; the leaves not so large, but nickea 

 It helps the cold griefs by the joints, taking! on the edges, some with great and deep, 

 away the pains, and warms the cold part, \ others with small cuts and divisions, of a 

 being fast bound to the place, after a ! dead green colour. The flowers are of a 

 bathing or sweating in a hot house. Pliny \ strong heady scent, usually smaller, and of 

 adds, that Pennyroyal and Mints together, ! a more purple colour than the Male, with 

 help faintings, being put into vinegar, and \ yellow thrums about the head, as the Male 

 smelled unto, or put into the nostrils or | hath. The seed vessels are like horns, as in 

 mouth. It eases head-aches, pains of the j the Male, but smaller, the seed is black, 

 breast and belly, and gnawings of the j but less shining. The root consists of many 

 stomach ; applied with honey, salt, and | short tuberous clogs, fastened at the end of 

 vinegar, it helps cramps or convulsions of I long strings, and all from the heads of the 

 the sinews: Boiled in milk, and drank, ill roots, which is thick and short, and of the 

 is effectual for the cough, and for ulcers i like scent with the Male. 



and sores in the mouth; drank in wine it: 



Place and Time.'] They grow in gardens, 



provokes women's courses, and expels the j and flower usually about May. 



dead child, and after-birth. Matthiolusj Government and virtues.'] It is an herb of 



saith, The decoction thereof being drank, 

 helps the jaundice and dropsy, all pains of 

 the head and sinews that come of a cold 



the Sun, and under the Lion. Physicians 

 say, Male Peony roots are best ; but Dr. 

 Reason told me Male Peony was best for 



cause, and clears the eye-sight. It helps j men, and Female Peony for women, and he 

 the lethargy, and applied with barley -meal, j desires to be judged by his brother Dr. 

 helps burnings ; and put into the ears, eases \ Experience. The roots are held to be of 

 the pains of them. j more virtue than the seed; next the flowers; 



MALE AND PEMALE PEONY. | f^^J/f l *"' ^ ^^ ^ *?**. f 



| the Male Peony, fresh gathered, having 



Descript.'] MALE Peony rises up with j been found by experience to cure the fall- 

 brownish stalks, Avhereon grow green and \ ing sickness ; but the surest way is, besides 

 reddish leaves, upon a stalk without any j hanging it about the neck, by which children 

 particular division in the leaf at ah. The? have been cured, to take the root of the 

 flowers stand at the top cf the stalks, con- 1 Male Peony washed clean, and stamped 

 sisting of five or six broad leaves, of a fair j some what small, and -laid to infuse in sack 

 purplish red colour, with many yellow ; for 24 hours at the least, afterwards strain 

 threads in the middle standing about the lit, and take it first and last, morning and 

 head, which after rises up to be the seed } evening, a good draught for sundry days 

 vessels, divided into two, three, or four j together, before and after a full moon : and 

 crooked pods like horns, which being full ; this will also cure old persons, if the clis- 

 ripe, open and turn themselves down back- j ease be not grown too old, and past cure, 

 wards, shewing with them divers round, especially if there be a due and orderly 

 black, shining seeds, having also many | preparation of the body with posset-drink 

 crimson grains, intermixed with black, j made of Betony, &c. The root is also 

 whereby it makes a very pretty shew. The j effectual for women that are not sufficiently 

 roots are great, thick and long, spreading \ cleansed after child-birth, and such as are 

 and running down deep in the ground. j troubled with the mother ; for which like- 



