CULPEPER'S COMPLETE HERBAL

ORACH

Description. Under the article arrach, atriplex, is described a species of the herb. This grows to four feet high; the stalks are whitish, the leaves are of a faint green, and the flowers of a light greenish white. The seeds which follow these are olive-coloured.

Place. It grows in many places wild upon waste ground, but cultivation has improved it, and the seeds of the manured kind are the best for use.

Time. It fowers in July; and the seed is ripe soon after.

Government and virtues. It is under the government of Venus. It is an herb so innocent, that it may be eaten in the leaf in sallad; but the great virtues of it lie in the seeds. These are to be gathered when just ripe; for, if suffered to stand longer, they lose part of their virtue. A pound of these bruised, and put into three quarts of spirit of a middle strength, between brandy and rectified spirit of wine, after standing six weeks, afford a light and not unpleasant tincture; a table spoonful of which, taken in a cup of water gruel, has the same effect as a dose of ipecacuanha, only that its operation is milder, and it does not bind the bowels afterwards. After the operation, the patient should go to bed, and a gentle sweat will follow, carrying off whatever offending matter the motions had dislodges; and thus preventing many a long disease. It cures the head-achs, wandering pains, and the first attacks of the rheumatism. As some stomachs are harder to move than others, if the first does not perform its office, a second table spoonful may be taken without fear.