11. (Wine punch.) From white sugar, 1 lb.; yellow peel of 3 lemons; juice of 9 lemons; arrack, 1 pint; port or sherry (hot), 1 gall.; cinnamon, 1⁄4 oz.; nutmeg, 1 dr.; mix.
12. (Yankee punch.) Macerate sliced pineapple, 3 oz.; vanilla, 6 gr.; and ambergris (rubbed with a little sugar), 1 gr., in the strongest pale brandy, 1 pint, for a few hours, with frequent agitation; then strain with expression; add, of lemon juice, 1 pint; lemon syrup, and either claret or port wine, of each 1 bottle; with sugar, 1⁄2 lb., dissolved in boiling water, 11⁄2 pint. See Shrub.
PURG′ATIVES. Syn. Dejectoria, Purgantia, Purgativa, L. These have been divided into five orders or classes, according to their particular actions. The following are the principal of each class:—
1. (Laxatives, LENITIVES, or MILD CATHARTICS.) Manna, cassia pulp, tamarinds, prunes,
honey, phosphate of soda; castor, almond, and olive oils; ripe fruit.
2. (Saline or COOLING LAXATIVES.) Epsom salt, Glauber’s salt, phosphate of soda (tasteless salt), seidlitz powders, &c.
3. (Active cathartics, occasionally acrid, frequently tonic and stomachic.) Rhubarb, senna, aloes, &c.
4. (Drastic or VIOLENT CATHARTICS.) Jalap, scammony, gamboge, croton oil, colocynth, elaterium, &c.
5. (Mercurial purgatives.) Calomel, blue-pill, quicksilver with chalk, &c.
In prescribing purgatives regard should be had to the particular portion of the alimentary canal on which we desire more immediately to act, as well as to the manner in which the medicine effects its purpose. Thus, Epsom salt, sulphate of potassa, and rhubarb, act chiefly on the duodenum; aloes on the rectum; blue-pill, calomel, and jalap on the larger intestines generally; and tartrate and bitartrate of potassa, and sulphur on the whole length of the intestinal canal. Again, others are stimulant, as aloes, croton oil, jalap, scammony, &c.; others are refrigerant, as most of the saline aperients; magnesia and its carbonate are both aperient and antacid; whilst another class, including rhubarb, damask roses, &c., are astringent. Further, some produce only serous or watery dejections, without greatly increasing the peristaltic action of the bowels; whilst a few occasion a copious discharge of the fæces in an apparently natural form. See Draught, Mixture, Pills, Prescribing, &c.