Tuesday, February 19, 2019

Old Cures for Cancer, Freckles, Baldness, etc


The following receipts written by DR. J. H. GUNN will be found of great value, especially in emergencies:

How to Cure Consumption.—Take one tablespoonful of tar, and the yolks of three hen's eggs, beat them well together. Dose, one tablespoonful morning, noon and night.

How to Cure Bad Breath.—Bad or foul breath will be removed by taking a teaspoonful of the following mixture after each meal: One ounce liquor of potassa, one ounce chloride of soda, one and one-half ounces phosphate of soda, and three ounces of water.
2. Chlorate of potash, three drachms; rose-water, four ounces. Dose, a tablespoonful four or five times daily.

How to Cure Cancer.—Boil down the inner bark of red and white oak to the consistency of molasses; apply as a plaster, shifting it once a week; or, burn red-oak bark to ashes; sprinkle it on the sore till it is eaten out; then apply a plaster of tar; or, take garget berries and leaves of stramonium; simmer them together in equal parts of neatsfoot oil and the tops of hemlock; mix well together, and apply it to the parts affected; at the same time make a tea of winter-green (root and branch); put a handful into two quarts of water; add two ounces of sulphur and drink of this tea freely during the day.

How to Cure Cold.—Take three cents' worth of liquorice, three of rock candy, three of gum arabic, and put them into a quart of water; simmer them till thoroughly then add three cents' worth paregoric, and a like quantity of antimonial wine.

Cure for Deafness.—Take ant's eggs and union juice. Mix and drop them into the ear. Drop into the ear, at night, six or eight drops of hot sweet oil.

Remedies for Diarrhoea.—1. Take one teaspoonful of salt, the same of good vinegar, and a tablespoonful of water; mix and drink. It acts like a charm on the system, and even one dose will generally cure obstinate cases of diarrhoea, or the first stages of cholera. If the first does not bring complete relief, repeat the dose, as it is quite harmless. 2. The best rhubarb root, pulverized, 1 ounce; peppermint leaf, 1 ounce, capsicum, 1/8 ounce; cover with boiling water and steep thoroughly, strain, and add bicarbonate of potash and essence of cinnamon, of each 1/2 ounce; with brandy (or good whisky); equal in amount to the whole, and loaf sugar, four ounces. Dose—for an adult, 1 or 2 tablespoons; for a child, 1 to 2 teaspoons, from 3 to 6 times per day, until relief is obtained. 3. To half a bushel of blackberries; well mashed, add a quarter of a pound of allspice, 2 ounces of cinnamon, 2 ounces of cloves; pulverize well, mix and boil slowly until properly done; then strain or squeeze the juice through home-spun or flannel, and add to each pint of the juice 1 pound of loaf sugar, boil again for some time, take it off, and while cooling, add half a gallon of the best Cognac brandy.

Cure for Chronic Diarroea.—Rayer recommends the association of cinchona, charcoal and bismuth in the treatment of chronic diarrh a, in the following proportions: Subnitrate of bismuth, one drachm; cinchona, yellow, powdered, one-half drachm; charcoal, vegetable, one drachm. Make twenty powders and take two or three a day during the intervals between meals.

Cure for Drunkenness.—- The following singular means of curing habitual drunkenness is employed by a Russian physician. Dr. Schreiber, of Brzese Litewski: It consists in confining the drunkard in a room, and in furnishing him at discretion with his favorite spirit diluted with two-thirds of water; as much wine, beer and coffee as he desires, but containing one-third of spirit: all the food—the bread, meat, and the legumes are steeped in spirit and water. The poor devil is continually drunk and dort. On the fifth day of this regime he has an extreme disgust for spirit; he earnestly requests other diet: but his desire must not be yielded to until the poor wretch no longer desires to eat or drink: he is then certainly cured of his penchant for drunkenness. He acquires such a disgust for brandy or other spirits that he is ready to vomit at the very sight of it.

How to Remove Freckles.—Freckles; so persistently regular in their annual return, have annoyed the fair sex from time immemorial, and various means have been devised to eradicate them, although thus far with no decidedly satisfactory results. The innumerable remedies in use for the removal of these vexatious intruders, are either simple and harmless washes, such as parsley or horseradish water, solutions of borax, etc., or injurious nostrums, consisting principally of lead and mercury salts.
If the exact cause of freckles were known, a remedy for them might be found. A chemist in Moravia, observing the bleaching effect of mercurial preparations, inferred that the growth of a local parasitical fungus was the cause of the discoloration of the skin, which extended and ripened its spores in the warmer season. Knowing that sulpho-carbolate of zinc is a deadly enemy to all parasitic vegetation (itself not being otherwise injurious), he applied this salt for the purpose of removing the freckles. The compound consists of two parts of sulpho-carbolate of zinc, twenty-five parts of distilled glycerine, twenty-five parts of rose-water, and five parts of scented alcohol, and is to be applied twice daily for from half an hour to an hour, then washed off with cold water. Protection against the sun by veiling and other means is recommended, and in addition, for persons of pale complexion, some mild preparation of iron.

Preparation for the Cure of Baldness.—Rum, one pint; alcohol, one ounce; distilled water, one ounce, tincture of cantharides, a half drachm; carbonate of potash, a half drachm; carbonate of ammonia, one drachm. Mix the liquids after having dissolved the salts, and filter. After the skin of the head has been wetted with this preparation for several minutes, it should be washed with water.

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