Pharmacologia: comprehending the art of prescribing upon fixed and scientific principles : together with the history of medicinal substances (Volume 2).

  • John Ayrton Paris
Date:
1823-24
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Pharmacologia: comprehending the art of prescribing upon fixed and scientific principles : together with the history of medicinal substances (Volume 2). Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    ALL 1.' rectly assigns the title to that which is the Rectitied Spirit of the other Colleges. Solvent Powers. Alcohol dissolves soap; vegetable extract; sugar; oxalic, camphoric, tartaric, gallic, and benzoic acids; volatile oils ; resins, and balsams, it combines also with sulphur, and the pure fixed alkalies, but not with their carbonates : for its other habitudes and applica- tions, see Spiritus Rectijicatus. ALLII RADIX. L.E.D. Allium Savitum. Garlic* Qualities. This bulbous root has when recent a foetid smell, and acrid taste which are extracted by watery infusion; bv decoction they are nearly lost; by expression, the root fur- nishes almost one-fourth of its weight of a limpid juice, and by distillation, an odorous, acrid, essential oil is procured, in which the existence of sulphur may be detected. Garlic has a considerable analogy to squill and onion, and like them, exerts a diuretic, diaphoretic, expectorant, and stimulant ope- ration ; (see vol. I. p. 134,) it is however but rarely used in modern practice, as it possesses no superiority over remedies less nauseous and objectionable ; the bruised root, externallv applied, is highly stimulant and rubefacient. Officinal Pre- paration. SyrapusAllii.T).] ■ Garlic, leeks, and onions constitute a tribe of culinary vegetables that lias undergone great vicissitudes in reputation : among-the Egyptians the onion and leek were esteemed a* divinities, thus Juvenal, O sanctas gentes quibus baec nascuntur in hortis Numina ! while, by the Greeks, garlic was detested, although their husbandmen had been from the most remote antiquity in the habit of eating it, which iEmilius Macer explains by supposing that its strong odour was useful in driving away the venomous serpents and insects by which they Were infested. Horace alludes to this custom in his 3d Epode, which he composed in consequence of having been made violently sick by garlic at a supper with Mecpenas. Cicutis Allium nocentius O dura Messorum ilia ! The most powerful antidotes to the flavour of this tribe of vegetables are the aromatic leaves and seeds of the Umbellifer^: ; thus the disagreeable odour of a person's breath after the ingestion of an onion is best counteracted by parsley ; and if leek or garlic be mixed with a combination of aromatic ingredients, its virulence will be greatly mitigated and corrected, nor does the fact seem to have escaped the observation of the husbandman in Virgil, Allia, Serpyllumque,herbas contundit olentes. Eclog. 2. line 11. And the fact itself offers an additional illustration of the important princi- ple of combination, discussed in vol. 1. p. 180. t Taylor's Remedy for Deafness. Garlic infused in oil of almonds, and coloured by alkanet root.