Pudding Paste. This for baked puddings may resemble the last. For boiled puddings (or indeed for any), the paste may be either ordinary ‘short paste,’ or one made with 2 to 6 oz. of butter or lard, or 3 to 8 oz. of chopped beef suet, to each lb. of flour, with or without an egg, and a little sugar, according to the means of the parties. The first is most appropriate for those containing fresh fruit, and that with suet for meat puddings, and those containing dried fruit, as grocers currants, plums, &c. Milk or milk-and-water is often
used instead of simple water to make the dough. Ginger, spices, savory herbs, &c., are common additions to the crusts of puddings. Where economy is an object, and especially among the lower classes, kitchen fat is frequently substituted for suet, and lard for butter. When ‘Jones’s patent flour’ is employed, an excellent plain pudding paste may be made by simply mixing it up with very cold water, and immediately putting it into the water, which should be boiling, and kept in that state until the pudding is dressed.
PA′TENT MED′ICINES. Syn. Medicamenta arcana, L. The majority of the preparations noticed under this head are the nostrums popularly termed ‘quack medicines,’ and which are sold with a Government stamp attached to them. A few other secret or proprietary remedies are also, for convenience, included in the list. An alphabetical arrangement, based on the names of the reputed inventors or proprietors of the articles, has been adopted, as being the one best suited for easy reference. The composition of a number of them is given from careful personal inspection and analysis (by Mr Cooley), and that of the remainder on the authority of Gray, Griffith, Paris, Redwood, the members of the Philadelphia College of pharmacy, and other respectable writers. A variety of articles, not included in the following list, is noticed along with other preparations for the class to which they belong, or under the names of their proprietors. See Balsam, Cerate, Drops, Essence, Tincture, Ointment, Pills, &c.
Abernethy’s Pills. See Abernethy Medicines.
Albinolo’s Ointment. See Holloway’s Ointment (below).
Ali Ahmed’s Treasures of the Desert. There are three preparations included under this name:—
a. (Antiseptic Malagma.) From lead plaster, 3 parts; gum, thus and salad oil, of each 2 parts; beeswax, 1 part; melted together by a gentle heat, and spread upon calico.
b. (Pectoral, Antiphthisis, or Cough Pills.) From myrrh, 31⁄2 lbs.; squills and ipecacuanha, of each 1 lb. (all in powder); white soft soap, 10 oz.; oil of aniseed, 11⁄4 oz; treacle, q. s. to form a pill mass.
c. (Sphairopeptic or Antibilious Pills.) From aloes, 28 lbs.; colocynth pulp, 12 lbs.; rhubarb, 7 lbs.; myrrh and scammony, of each 31⁄2 lbs.; ipecacuanha, 3 lbs.; cardamom seeds, 2 lbs. (all in powder); soft soap, 9 lbs.; oil of juniper, 7 fl. oz.; treacle, q. s. This, as well as the last, is divided into 31⁄2 gr. pills, which are then covered with tin foil or silver leaf. An excellent aperient pill, no doubt, and one likely to prove useful in all those cases in which the administration of a mild diaphoretic and stomachic purge is indicated. Unlike many of the advertised nostrums of the day, there is nothing in their composition that can
by any possibility, prove injurious; but beyond this they are destitute of virtue.