| Betony dispels nightmare, cures sudden giddiness, and prevents drunkenness | ||
| Cress | cures | baldness and scurf |
| Wood lettuce | cures | dimness of vision |
| White poppy | ” | sleeplessness |
| Smear wort | ” | fevers |
| Asterion | ” | falling sickness |
| Everfern } | ” | headache and liver |
| Churmel } | ||
| Water lily | ” | dysentery |
| Leek wort | ” | bite of adder |
| Savine | ” | swollen feet |
| Wood dock | ” | stiff joints |
| Five leaf} | ” | sickness and sores |
| Madder } | ||
| Way-bread | ” | worms |
In the country house the ladies were all herbalists: in the towns, the herbalist kept a shop for the sale of her roots and flowers and leaves, and was the General Practitioner for the craftsmen and their households.
‘Recuyell of the Hist. of Troye,’ ‘Dictes and Sayings,’
c. 1471p. 1477
CAXTON’S PRINTING
[CHAPTER XII]
FIRE, PLAGUE, AND FAMINE
“London at that time was built of wood, consequently there was continual danger of fire.” This is a commonplace among historians. Let us examine into the statement. There were two great fires in London between the ninth and the seventeenth centuries, i.e. in 800 years—two fires, which swept the town almost from end to end, namely that of 1135 and that of 1666: between these two fires there were several others of considerable magnitude, one of which burned down the greater part of Southwark, then no more than a causeway and an embankment; and another the houses on the Bridge, and another which made a large gap among the streets; but there were only these two fires which devoured any considerable part of the City. Yet there was constant danger, we are told.
THE COUVRE-FEU