CURE FOR PRICKLY HEAT.—Mix a large portion of wheat bran with either cold or lukewarm water, and use it as a bath twice or thrice a day. Children who are covered with prickly heat in warm weather will be thus effectually relieved from that tormenting eruption. As soon as it begins to appear on the neck, face, or arms, commence using the bran-water on these parts repeatedly through the day, and it may probably spread no farther. If it does, the bran-water bath will certainly cure it, if persisted in.
BROWN MIXTURE FOR A COUGH.—Mix in a large bottle, half an ounce of liquorice; a quarter of an ounce of gum-arabic; two tea-spoonfuls of antimonial wine; sixty drops of laudanum; and half a pint of water. Shake it well, and when the ingredients are thoroughly amalgamated it will be fit for use. For a cold and cough, take a dessert-spoonful three or four times a day, shaking or stirring it first.
RED LIP SALVE.—Mix together equal portions of the best suet and the best lard. There must be no salt about them. Boil slowly, and skim and stir the mixture. Then add a small thin bag of alkanet chips; and when it has coloured the mixture of a fine deep red, take it out. While cooling, stir in, very hard, sufficient rose or orange-flower water to give it a fine perfume. A few drops of oil of rhodium will impart to it a very agreeable rose-scent.
Cold cream for excoriated nostrils, chafed upper lips, or chapped hands may be made nearly as above, but with one-third suet, and two-thirds lard, and no alkanet. When it has boiled thoroughly, remove it from the fire, and stir in, gradually, a large portion of rose-water, or a little oil of rhodium, beating very hard. Put it into small gallicups, with close covers.
MUSTARD PLASTERS.—Mustard plasters are frequently very efficacious in rheumatic or other pains occasioned by cold. It is best to make them entirely of mustard and vinegar without any mixture of flour. They should be spread between two pieces of thin muslin, and bound on the part affected. As soon as the irritation or burning becomes uncomfortable, take off the plaster. They should never remain on longer than twenty minutes; as by that time the beneficial effect will be produced, if at all. When a mustard plaster has been taken off, wash the part tenderly with a sponge and warm water. If the irritation on the skin continues troublesome, apply successive poultices of grated bread-crumbs wetted with lead water.
A mustard plaster behind the ear will often remove a toothache, earache, or a rheumatic pain in the head. Applied to the wrists they will frequently check an ague-fit, if put on as soon as the first symptoms of chill evince themselves.