Skip Channel4 main Navigation

|Powered By Google


The Regency House Party
The Guests

Video Clips

Are you a Vulgarian?

Are you a Regency Catch?

History
Introduction & Timeline
Sex, Marriage & Power
The Regency Buck
The Role of the Chaperones
Regency Daily Life
Regency Science
Black Regency
Regency Cures

Photo Album

The Programme

The Book

Forum

 

History

Regency Cures
The following are taken from The Compleat Housewife by Eliza Smith.

For a swelling in the face
Take a handful of damask leaves; boil them in running water till they are tender; stamp them into a pulp and boil white bread and milk till it is soft; then put in your pulp, with a little hogs lard, and thicken it with the yolk of an egg, and apply it warm.

Regency Cures

Pills to purge the head
Take an extract of rudium two drachms, and pill foetida one drachm; mix these well together, and make into twelve pills; take two, or, if the constitution be strong, three of them, at six o'clock in the morning: drink warm gruel, thin broth, or poffet-drink, when they work.

For a canker in the mouth
Take celandine, columbine, sage and fennel, of each one handful; stamp and strain them, and to the juice put a spoonful of honey, half a spoonful of burnt alum, and as much bole-armoniac beaten fine; mix and beat all these together very well, and wrap a little about a stick, and rub the canker with it; if it bleeds, it is the better.

An excellent Vomit
Take a quarter of a pound of clear alum, beaten and sifted, divide it into three parts, the first the biggest; put a quarter of a pint of water in a saucepan, and put in your biggest paper of alum, and let it simmer over the fire, but not boil; take it off, cool it to blood warm; drink it off but take nothing after it; sit still till it has worked once; keep very warm and take nothing in the working; but you may walk about after it has worked once; take it three mornings together or more, if there be occasion, till the stomach is clear. There is no case where a vomit is proper but this is good.

For a Distemper got by an ill Husband
Take two penny worth of gum dragant, pick and clean it, and put it in an earthen pot; put to it as much red rose water as it will drink up, stir it two or three times a day, till it is all dissolv'd into a jelly: then put in three grated nutmegs, a little double-refin'd sugar, finely powder'd, and a little cinnamon water, no more than will leave it in a jelly: take the quantity of nutmeg in the morning fasting, and last at night; but first prepare the body for it , by taking six pennyworth of pulvis fancius in poffet-drink, and drink broth in the working.

To cure the Piles
Take two pennyworth of litharge of gold, an ounce of fallad-oil, a spoonful of white wine vinegar; put all into a new gallipot; beat it together with a knife, till it is as thick as an ointment, spread it on a cloth, and apply it to the place; if inward, put it up as far as you can.

An admirable Tincture for green Wounds
Take balsam of Peru one ounce, storax calamita two ounces, benjamin three ounces, succotrine aloes, myrrh, and frankincense, of each half an ounce; angelica-roots and flowers of St. John's wort, of each half an ounce, spirit of wine one pint; beat the drugs, scrape and slice the roots, and put it into a bottle; stop it well and let it stand in the sun July, August and September; then strain it through a fine linen cloth, put it in a bottle, stop it close and keep it for use. Apply it to a green wound by anointing it with a feather; then dip lint in it and put it on binding it up with a cloth but let no plaister touch it; twice a day wet the lint with a feather, put do not take it off till it is well.

A Poultice for a sore Breast, Leg or Arm
Boil wheat flour in strong ale very well and pretty thick; then take it of the fire and scrape in some boars grease, stir it well and apply it hot.

To break a Bile
Take the yoke of a new laid egg some honey and wheat flour; mix them well together, spread it on a rag and lay it on cold.

A purging diet drink in the spring
Take six gallons of ale, three ounces of rhubarb, fena, madder-roots, and dock-roots, of each twelve ounces; twelve ounces of scabious, and as much agrimony, three ounces of aniseeds; slice and cut these, put them in a bag, and let it work in the ale; drink it three or four times a day.

A very good medicine for the Bloody-flux
Take of the best rhubarb, finely powdered, half an ounce, of red faunders two drachms, cinnamon one drachm, crocus martis astringent three drachms, of Lucarellus balsam what suffices, make a mass of pills, of which take three every night and morning for a fortnight. This has cured some who have lost a vast quantity of blood, after other remedies have proved ineffectual.

Back to top

 

© 2004 Channel4. All rights reserved