Place.] They grow, both of them, wild in pastures, and untilled grounds in many places, and oftentimes both in one field.
Time.] They flower in June and July, and the seed is ripe in August.
Government and virtues.] Ragwort is under the command of Dame Venus, and cleanses, digests, and discusses. The decoction of the herb is good to wash the mouth or throat that hath ulcers or sores therein: and for swellings, hardness, or imposthumes, for it thoroughly cleanses and heals them; as also the quinsy, and the king’s evil. It helps to stay catarrhs, thin rheums, and defluxions from the head into the eyes, nose, or lungs. The juice is found by experience to be singularly good to heal green wounds, and to cleanse and heal all old and filthy ulcers in the privities, and in other parts of the body, as also inward wounds and ulcers; stays the malignity of fretting and running cankers, and hollow fistulas, not suffering them to spread farther. It is also much commended to help aches and pains either in the fleshy part, or in the nerves and sinews, as also the sciatica, or pain of the hips or knuckle-bone, to bathe the places with the decoction of the herb, or to anoint them with an ointment made of the herb bruised and boiled in old hog’s suet, with some Mastick and Olibanum in powder added unto it after it is strained forth. In Sussex we call it Ragweed.
RATTLE GRASS.
Of this there are two kinds which I shall speak of, viz. the red and yellow.
Descript.] The common Red Rattle hath sundry reddish, hollow stalks, and sometimes green, rising from the root, lying for the most part on the ground, some growing more upright, with many small reddish or green leaves set on both sides of a middle rib, finely dented about the edges: The flowers stand at the tops of the stalks and branches, of a fine purplish red colour, like small gaping hooks; after which come blackish seed in small husks, which lying loose therein, will rattle with shaking. The root consists of two or three small whitish strings with some fibres thereat.
The common Yellow Rattle hath seldom above one round great stalk, rising from the foot, about half a yard, or two feet high, and but few branches thereon, having two long and somewhat broad leaves set at a joint, deeply cut in on the edges, resembling the comb of a cock, broadest next to the stalk, and smaller to the end. The flowers grow at the tops of the stalks, with some shorter leaves with them, hooded after the same manner that the others are, but of a fair yellow colour, or in some paler, and in some more white. The seed is contained in large husks, and being ripe, will rattle or make a noise with lying loose in them. The root is small and slender, perishing every year.
Place.] They grow in meadows and woods generally through this land.
Time.] They are in flower from Midsummer until August be past, sometimes.
Government and virtues.] They are both of them under the dominion of the Moon. The Red Rattle is accounted profitable to heal up fistulas and hollow ulcers, and to stay the flux of humours in them, as also the abundance of women’s courses, or any other fluxes of blood, being boiled in red wine, and drank.