But in some parts of Wales the Stitchwort bears the names of Devil's-eyes and Devil's-corn. Boys in Devonshire nickname the herb Snapjack, Snapcrackers, and Snappers.
Parkinson tells us that in former days it was much commended by some to clear the eyes of dimness by dropping the fresh juice into them. Again, Galen said: "The seed is sharp and biting to him that tastes it."
As a modern curative Simple, the Stitchworts, greater and less, stand related to silica, a powerfully remedial preparation of highly pulverised flint. This is because of the exquisitely subdivided flint found abundantly dispersed throughout the structures of Stitchwort plants; which curative principle is eminently useful in chronic diseases, such as cancer, rickets, and scrofula. It exercises a deep and slow action, such as is remedially brought to bear by the Bethesda waters of America, and the powdered oyster shells of Sir Spencer Wells.
The fresh infusion should be steadily taken, a tea-cupful three times daily, for weeks or months together. It may be made with a pint of boiling water to an ounce of the fresh herb. Likewise, the fresh plant should be boiled and eaten as "greens," so as to secure medicinally the insoluble parts of the silica. This further serves against albumen, and sugar in the urine.
[537] STONE CROP (See House Leek, page 273).
STRAWBERRY.
Properly, our familiar Strawberry plant is a native of cold climates, and so hardy that it bears fruit freely in Lapland. When mixed with reindeer cream, and dried in the form of a sausage, this constitutes Kappatialmas, the plum pudding of the Polar regions.
"Strawberry" is from the Anglo-Saxon Strowberige, of which the first syllable refers to anything strewn. The wild woodland Strawberry (Fragaria vesca) is the progenitor of our highly cultivated and delicious fruit. This little hedgerow and sylvan plant has a root which is very astringent, so that when held in the mouth it will stay any flow of blood from the nostrils. Its berries are more acid than the garden Strawberry, and make an excellent cleanser of the teeth, the acid juice dissolving incrustations of tartar without injuring the enamel.
A medicinal tincture is ordered (H.) from the berries of this Woodland Strawberry, which is of excellent service for nettle rash, or allied erysipelas: also for a suffocative swelling of the swallowing throat. "Ipsa tuis manibus sylvestri nata sub umbrâa: mollia fraga leges," says Ovid. An infusion of the leaves is of excellent service in Dysentery.
It is incorrect to call the fruit a berry, because the edible, succulent pulp is really a juicy cushion over which numerous small seeds are plentifully dotted; whilst the name Strawberry is a corruption of Strayberry, in allusion to the trailing runners, which stray in all directions from the parent stock.