If a trembling of the muscular system is observed, then give
| Powdered ginger, | half a tea-spoonful. |
| Powdered cinnamon, | half a tea-spoonful. |
| Powdered golden seal, | half a tea-spoonful. |
To be given at a dose, in half a gallon of catnip tea. Aid the vital powers in producing a crisis by the warmth and moisture, as directed in the treatment of colds, &c.
It is necessary to keep the rectum empty by means of injections, forms of which will be found in this work.
The remedies we here recommend can be safely and successfully used by those unskilled in medicine; and, when aided by proper attention to the diet, ventilation, and comfort of the patient, we do not hesitate to say (provided, however, they are resorted to in the early stages) they will cure forty-nine cases out of fifty, without the advice of a physician.
FOOTNOTES:
[28]The American farmers are just beginning to wake up on this subject, and before long we hope to see our pasture lands free from all poisonous plants. Dr. Whitlaw says, "A friend of mine had two fields cleared of buttercups, dandelion, ox-eye, daisy, sorrel, hawk-weed, thistles, mullein, and a variety of other poisonous or noxious plants: they were dried, burnt, and their ashes strewed over the fields. He had them sown as usual, and found that the crops of hay and pasturage were more than double what they had been before. I was furnished with butter for two successive summers during the months of July and August of 1827. The butter kept for thirty days, and proved, at the end of that time, better than that fresh churned and brought to the Brighton or Margate markets. It would bear salting at that season of the year."
[29]Unfortunately, they do not all practise it. Dr. Graff says, "There is a murderous practice now carried on in certain districts, in which the inhabitants will not themselves consume the butter and cheese manufactured; but, with little solicitude for the lives or health of others, they send it, in large quantities, to be sold in the cities of the west, particularly Louisville, Kentucky, and St. Louis, Missouri. Of the truth of this I am well apprised by actual observation; and I am as certain that it has often caused death in those cities, when the medical attendants viewed it as some anomalous form of disease, not suspecting the means by which poison had been conveyed among them. Physicians of the latter city, having been questioned particularly on this subject, have mentioned to me a singular and often fatal disease, which appeared in certain families, the cases occurring simultaneously, and all traces of it disappearing suddenly, and which I cannot doubt were the result of poisoned butter or cheese. This recklessness of human life it should be our endeavor to prevent; and the heartless wretches who practise it should be brought to suffer a punishment commensurate with the enormity of their crime. From the wide extent of the country in which it is carried on, we readily perceive the difficulties to be encountered in the effort to put a stop to the practice. This being the case, our next proper aim should be to investigate the nature of the cause, and establish a more proper plan of treatment, by which it may be robbed of its terrors, and the present large proportionate mortality diminished."