CULPEPER'S COMPLETE HERBAL

SLOE BUSH

Name. Called also black thorn.

Description. This is a bush, or small tree, whose tough branches are full of hard sharp thorns, sending forth its white five-leaved flowers early in the spring, before the leaves appear, which are small and oblong, finely indented about the edges. The flowers are succeeded by small round fruit growing on short stalks, green at first, but when ripe of a fine purplish black colour, of a rough sour austere taste, and not fit to be eaten till mellowed by the frosts.

Place. The sloe-bush grows every where in the hedges.

Government and virtues. This is a Saturnine plant. The fruit is chiefly used, being restringent and binding, and good for all kind of fluxes and hæmorrhages. It is likewise of service in gargarisms for sore mouths and gums, and to fasten loose teeth. The juice of sloes being boiled to a consistence, is the acacia germanica, off of the shops, which is now-a-days made use of instead of the true, and put into all the great compositions. It is of a darkish colour on the outside, and reddish within.

It is the juice of this berry that makes the famous marking ink to write upon linen; it being so strong an acid that no other acid known will discharge it. An handful of the flowers infused, is a safe and easy purge; and taken in wine and water, is excellent to dispel the windy cholic. The bark reduced to power, and taken in dosesof two drachms, has cured some agues. The juice expressed from the unripe fruit is a very good remedy for fluxes of the bowels; it may be reduced by a gentle boiling to a solid consistence, in which state it will keep the whole year round.