To make a mixture. Two tablespoonfuls to be taken twice or three times a day, until relief be obtained.
Chalk is sometimes given in heartburn, but as it produces costiveness, it ought not in such a case to be used.
303. Piles are a common attendant upon pregnancy. They are small, soft, spongy, dark-red tumors, about the size either of a bean or of a cherry—they are sometimes as large as a walnut—and are either within or around the fundament; they are then, according to their situation, called either internal or external piles—they may be either blind or bleeding. If the latter, blood may be seen to exude from them, and blood will come away every time the patient has a stool; hence the patient ought to be as quick as possible over relieving her bowels, and should not at such times sit one moment longer than is absolutely necessary.
304. When the pile or piles are very large, they sometimes, more especially when she has a motion, drag down a portion of the bowel, which adds much to her sufferings.
305. If the bowel should protrude, it ought, by means of the patient’s index finger, to be immediately and carefully returned, taking care, in order that it may not scratch the bowel, that the nail be cut close.
306. Piles are very painful and are exceedingly sore, and cause great annoyance, and frequently continue, notwithstanding proper and judicious treatment, during the whole period of pregnancy.
307. A patient is predisposed to piles from the womb pressing upon the blood-vessels of the fundament. They are excited into action by her neglecting to keep her bowels gently opened, or by diarrhœa, or from her taking too strong purgatives, especially pills containing either aloes or colocynth, or both.
308. If the piles be inflamed and painful, they ought, by means of a sponge, to be well fomented three times a day, and for half an hour each time, with hot chamomile and poppy-head tea;[[62]] and at bedtime a hot white-bread poultice should be applied.
309. Every time after and before the patient has a motion, she had better well anoint the piles and the fundament with the following ointment:
Take of—Camphor (powdered by means of a few drops of