The Cook and Housekeeper's Complete and Universal Dictionary; Including a System of Modern Cookery, in all Its Various Branches, Adapted to the Use of Private Families

TREATMENT OF THE SICK. Though an unskilful dabbling in cases of illness, which require the attention of the most medical practitioners, is both dangerous and presumptuous; yet it is quite necessary that those who have the care of a family should be able to afford some relief in case of need, as well as those whose duty it is more immediately to attend upon the sick. Uneasy symptoms are experienced at times by all persons, not amounting to a decided state of disease, which if neglected may nevertheless issue in some serious disorder that might have been prevented, not only without risk, but even with greater advantage to the individual than by an application to a positive course of medicine. Attention to the state of the bowels, and the relief that may frequently be afforded by a change of diet, come therefore very properly within the sphere of domestic management, in connection with a few simple medicines in common use. The sensations of lassitude or weariness, stiffness or numbness, less activity than usual, less appetite, a load or heaviness at the stomach, some uneasiness in the head, a more profound degree of sleep, yet less composed and refreshing than usual; less gaiety and liveliness, a slight oppression of the breast, a less regular pulse, a propensity to be cold, or to perspire, or sometimes a suppression of a former disposition to perspire, are any of them symptomatic of a diseased state, though not to any very serious or alarming degree. Yet under such circumstances persons are generally restless, and scarcely know what to do with themselves; and often for the sake of change, or on the supposition that their sensations proceed from lowness, they unhappily adopt the certain means of making them terminate in dangerous if not fatal diseases. They increase their usual quantity of animal food, leave off vegetables and fruit, drink freely of wine or other strong liquors, under an idea of strengthening the stomach, and expelling wind; all of which strengthen nothing but the disposition to disease, and expel only the degree of health yet remaining. The consequence of this mistaken management is, that all the evacuations are restrained, the humours causing and nourishing the disease are not at all attempered and diluted, nor rendered proper for evacuation. On the contrary they become sharper, and more difficult to be discharged. By judicious management it is practicable, if not entirely to prevent a variety of disorders, yet at least to abate their severity, and so to avert the ultimate danger. As soon as any of the symptoms begin to appear, the proper way is to avoid all violent or laborious exercise, and to indulge in such only as is gentle and easy. To take very little or no solid food, and particularly to abstain from meat, or flesh broth, eggs, and wine, or other strong liquors. To drink plentifully of weak diluting liquor, by small glasses at a time, at intervals of about half an hour. If these diluents are not found to answer the purpose of keeping the bowels open, stronger cathartics must be taken, or injections for the bowels, called lavements. By pursuing these precautions, the early symptoms of disease will often be removed, without coming to any serious issue: and even where this is not the case, the disorder will be so lessened as to obviate any kind of danger from it. When confirmed diseases occur, the only safe course is to resort to the most skilful medical assistance that can be obtained. Good advice and few medicines will much sooner effect a cure, than all the drugs of the apothecary's shop unskilfully administered. But the success of the best advice may be defeated, if the patient and his attendants will not concur to render it effectual. If the patient is to indulge longings for improper diet, and his friends are to gratify them, the advantage of the best advice may be defeated by one such imprudent measure. Patients labouring under accidents which require surgical assistance, must be required strictly to attend to the same directions. General regulations are all that a physician or surgeon can make respecting diet, many other circumstances will therefore require the consideration of those who attend upon the sick, and it is of consequence that they be well prepared to undertake their charge, for many fatal mistakes have arisen from ignorance and prejudice in these cases. A few rules that may be referred to in the absence of a medical adviser, are all that are necessary in the present instance, more especially when the patient is so far recovered as to be released from medicines, and put under a proper regimen, with the use of a gentle exercise, and such other regulations as a convalescent state requires. – When for example, persons are labouring under acute disorders, or accidents, they are frequently known to suffer from the injudiciousness of those about them, in covering them up in bed with a load of clothes that heat and debilitate them exceedingly, or in keeping them in bed when the occasion does not require it, without even suffering them to get up and have it new made, and by never allowing a breath of fresh air to be admitted into the room. The keeping patients quiet is undoubtedly of essential importance; they should not be talked to, nor should more persons be admitted into the room than are absolutely necessary. Every thing that might prove offensive should immediately be removed. Sprinkling the room sometimes with vinegar, will contribute to keep it in a better state. The windows should be opened occasionally for a longer or shorter time, according to the weather and season of the year, without suffering the air to come immediately upon the patient. Waving the chamber door backward and forward for a few minutes, two or three times in a day, ventilates the room, without exposing the sick person to chilness. Occasionally burning pastils in the room, or a roll of paper, is also useful. The bed linen, and that of the patient, should be changed every day, or in two or three days, as circumstances may require. A strict forbearance from giving sick persons any nourishment beyond what is prescribed by their medical attendant, should invariably be observed. Some persons think they do well in this respect to cheat the doctor, while in fact they cheat the patient out of the benefit of his advice, and endanger his life under a pretence of facilitating his recovery. In all cases it is important to wait with patience the slow progress of recovery, rather than by injudicious means to attempt to hasten it; otherwise the desired event will only be retarded. What has long been undermining the stamina of health, which is commonly the case with diseases, or what has violently shocked it by accident, can only be removed by slow degrees. Medicines will not operate like a charm; and even when they are most efficacious, time is required to recover from the languid state to which persons are always reduced, both by accident and by disease. When the period is arrived at which sick persons may be said to be out of danger, a great deal of patience and care will still be necessary to prevent a relapse. Much of this will depend on the convalescent party being content for some time with only a moderate portion of food, for we are not nourished in proportion to what we swallow, but to what we are well able to digest. Persons on their recovery, who eat moderately, digest their food, and grow strong from it. Those in a weak state, who eat much, do not digest it; instead therefore of being nourished and strengthened by it, they insensibly wither away. The principal rules to be observed in this case are, that persons in sickness, or those who are slowly recovering, should take very little nourishment at a time, and take it often. Let them have only one sort of food at each meal, and not change their food too often; and be careful that they chew their food well, to make it easy of digestion. Let them diminish their quantity of drink. The best drink for them in general is water, with a third or fourth part of white wine. Too great a quantity of liquids at such a time prevents the stomach from recovering its tone and strength, impairs digestion, promotes debility, increases the tendency to a swelling of the legs; sometimes it even occasions a slow fever, and throws back the patient into a languid state. Persons recovering from sickness should take as much exercise in the open air as they are able to bear, either on foot, in a carriage, or on horseback: the latter is by far the best. The airing should be taken in the middle of the day, when the weather is temperate, or before the principal meal. Exercise taken before a meal strengthens the organs of digestion, and therefore tends to health; but when taken after a meal, it is injurious. As persons in this state are seldom quite so well towards night, they should take very little food in the evening, in order that their sleep may be less disturbed and more refreshing. It would be better not to remain in bed above seven or eight hours; and if they feel fatigued by sitting up, let them lie down for half an hour to rest. The swelling of the legs and ancles, which happens to most persons in a state of weakness and debility, is attended with no danger, and will generally disappear of itself, if they live soberly and regularly, and take moderate exercise. The most solicitous attention must be paid to the state of the bowels; and if they are not regular, they must be kept open every day by artificial means, or it will produce heat and restlessness, and pains in the head. Care should be taken not to return to hard labour too soon after recovering from illness; some persons have never recovered their usual strength for want of this precaution. – Common colds, though lightly regarded, are often of serious consequence. A cold is an inflammatory disease, though in no greater degree than to affect the lungs or throat, or the thin membrane which lines the nostrils, and the inside of certain cavities in the bones of the cheeks and forehead. These cavities communicate with the nose in such a manner, that when one part of this membrane is affected with inflammation, it is easily communicated to the rest. When the disorder is of this slight kind, it may easily be cured without medicine, by only abstaining from meat, eggs, broth, and wine; from all food that is sharp, fat, and heavy. Little or no supper should be eaten, but the person should drink freely of an infusion of barley, or of elder flowers, with the addition of a third or fourth part of milk. Bathing the feet in warm water before going to bed, will dispose the patient to sleep. In colds of the head, the steam of warm water alone, or of water in which elder flowers or some mild aromatic herbs have been boiled, will generally afford speedy relief. These also are serviceable in colds which affect the breast. Hot and close rooms are very hurtful in colds, as they tend to impede respiration; and sitting much over the fire increases the disorder. Spermaceti is often taken in colds and coughs, which must from its greasy nature impair the digestive faculty, and cannot operate against the cause of a cold; though the cure of it, which is effected in due time by the economy of nature, is often ascribed to such medicines as may rather have retarded it. Whenever a cold does not yield to the simple treatment already described, good advice should be procured, as a neglected cold is often the origin of very serious disorders. – A few observations on the nature of the diet and drink proper for sickly persons, will be necessary at the close of this article, for the information of those who occasionally undertake the care of the afflicted. As the digestion of sick persons is weak, and very similar to that of children, the diet suited to the latter is generally proper for the former, excepting in the two great classes of diseases called putrid and intermittent fevers. In case of putrid fever no other food should be allowed, during the first weeks of recovery, than the mildest vegetable substances. When recovering from agues and intermittent fevers, animal jellies, and plain animal food, with as little vegetable as possible, is the proper diet. Meat and meat broth, generally speaking, are not so well adapted for the re-establishment of health and strength, as more simple diets. Flesh being the food most used by old and young at all other times, is consequently that from which their distempers chiefly proceed, or at least it nourishes those disorders which other causes may have contributed to introduce. It is of a gross, phlegmatic nature and oily quality, and therefore harder of digestion than many other sorts of food, tending to generate gross humours and thick blood, which are very unfavourable to the recovery of health. The yolk of an egg lightly boiled or beaten up raw with a little wine may be taken, when animal food is not forbidden, and the party cannot chew or swallow more solid food. The spoonmeats and drinks directed for children, and simple puddings made as for them, may all be used for invalids, subject only to the restrictions imposed by their medical attendant. Puddings and panadoes made of bread are better for weak stomachs than those made of flour. – Diet drinks may be made of an infusion of herbs, grains, or seeds. For this purpose the herbs should be gathered in their proper season, then dried in the shade, and put into close paper bags. When wanted for use, take out the proper quantity, put it into a linen bag, suspend it in the beer or ale, while it is fermenting, from two to six or eight hours, and then take it out. Wormwood ought not to be infused so long; three or four hours will be sufficient, or it will become nauseous, and soon turn to putrefaction. The same is to be understood in infusing any sort of well-prepared herbs, and great care is required in all preparations of this kind that the pure properties are neither evaporated, nor overpowered by the bad ones. Beer, ale, or any other liquor in which herbs are infused, must be unadulterated, or the benefit of these infusions will be destroyed by its pernicious qualities. Nothing is more prejudicial to health than adulterated liquors, or liquors that are debased by any corrupting vegetable substance. Those things which in their purest state are of a doubtful character, and never to be trusted without caution, are by this means converted into decided poisons. – Herb Tea of any kind should always be made with a moderate proportion of the herb. When the tea is of a proper strength, the herb should be taken out, or it will become nauseous by long infusion. These kinds of tea are best used quite fresh. – Herb Porridge may be made of elder buds, nettle tops, clivers, and water cresses. Mix up a proper quantity of oatmeal and water, and set it on the fire. When just ready to boil, put in the herbs, cut or uncut; and when ready again to boil, lade it to and fro to prevent its boiling. Continue this operation six or eight minutes, then take it off the fire, and let it stand awhile. It may either be eaten with the herbs, or strained, and should not be eaten warmer than new milk. A little butter, salt, and bread, may be added. Another way is, to set some oatmeal and water on a quick fire; and when it is scalding hot, put in a good quantity of spinage, corn salad, tops of pennyroyal, and mint cut small. Let it stand on the fire till ready to boil, then pour it up and down six or seven minutes, and let it stand off the fire that the oatmeal may sink to the bottom. Strain it, and add butter, salt, and bread. When it is about milk-warm it will be fit to eat. This is an excellent porridge, pleasant to the palate and stomach, cleansing the passages by opening obstructions. It also breeds good blood, thus enlivens the spirits, and makes the whole body active and easy. – A Cooling Drink may be made of two ounces of whole barley, washed and cleansed in hot water, and afterwards boiled in five pints of water till the barley opens. Add a quarter of an ounce of cream of tartar, and strain off the liquor. Or bruise three ounces of the freshest sweet almonds, and an ounce of gourd melon seeds in a marble mortar, adding a pint of water, a little at a time, and then strain it through a piece of linen. Bruise the remainder of the almonds and seeds again, with another pint of water added as before; then strain it, and repeat this process a third time. After this, pour all the liquor upon the bruised mass, stir it well, and finally strain it off. Half an ounce of sugar may safely be bruised with the almonds and seeds at first; or if it be thought too heating, a little orange-flower water may be used instead. – Currant Drink. Put a pound of the best red currants, fully ripe and clean picked, into a stone bottle. Mix three spoonfuls of good new yeast with six pints of hot water, and pour it upon the currants. Stop the bottle close till the liquor ferments, then give it as much vent as is necessary, keep it warm, and let it ferment for about three days. Taste it in the mean time to try whether it is become pleasant; and as soon as it is so, run it through a strainer, and bottle it off. It will be ready to drink in five or six days. – Boniclapper is another article suited to the state of sickly and weakly persons. Boniclapper is milk which has stood till it has acquired a pleasant sourish taste, and a thick slippery substance. In very hot weather this will be in about twenty-four hours from the time of its being milked, but longer in proportion as the weather is colder. If put into vessels which have been used for milk to be soured in, it will change the sooner. New milk must always be used for this purpose. Boniclapper is an excellent food at all times, particularly for those who are troubled with any kind of stoppages; it powerfully opens the breast and passages, is itself easy of digestion, and helps to digest all hard or sweeter foods. It also cools and cleanses the whole body, renders it brisk and lively, and is very efficacious in quenching thirst. No other sort of milkmeat or spoonmeat is so proper and beneficial for consumptive persons, or such as labour under great weakness and debility. It should be eaten with bread only, and it will be light and easy on the stomach, even when new milk is found to disagree. If this soured milk should become unpleasant at first, a little custom and use will not only render it familiar, but agreeable to the stomach and palate; and those who have neither wisdom nor patience to submit to a transient inconvenience, will never have an opportunity of knowing the intrinsic value of any thing. To these may be added a variety of other articles adapted to a state of sickness and disease, which will be found under their respective heads; such as Beef Tea, Flummery, Jellies of various kinds, Lemon Whey, Vinegar Whey, Cream of Tartar Whey, Mustard Whey, Treacle Posset, Buttermilk, Onion Porridge, Water Gruel, and Wormwood Ale.

TREES. Several different methods have been proposed of preventing the bark being eaten off by hares and rabbits in the winter season; such as twisting straw-ropes round the trees; driving in small flat stakes all about them; and the use of strong-scented oils. But better and neater modes have lately been suggested; as with hog's lard, and as much whale-oil as will work it up into a thin paste or paint, with which the stems of the trees are to be gently rubbed upwards, at the time of the fall of the leaf. It may be done once in two years, and will, it is said, effectually prevent such animals from touching them. Another and still neater method, is to take three pints of melted tallow to one pint of tar, mixing them well together over a gentle fire. Then, in the month of November, to take a small brush and go over the rind or bark of the trees with the composition in a milk-warm state, as thin as it can be laid on with the brush. It is found that such a coating does not hinder the juices or sap from expanding in the smallest degree; and the efficacy of the plan is proved, in preventing the attacks of the animals, by applying the liquid composition to one tree and missing another, when it was found that the former was left, while the latter was attacked. Its efficacy has been shewn by the experience of five years. The trees that were gone over the first two years have not been touched since; and none of them have been injured by the hares. – The Mossing of trees is their becoming much affected and covered with the moss-plant or mossy substance. It is found to prevail in fruit-grounds of the apple kind, and in other situations, when they are in low, close, confined places, where the damp or moisture of the trees is not readily removed. It is thought to be an indication of weakness in the growth, or of a diseased state of the trees, and to require nice attention in preventing or eradicating it. The modes of removing it have usually been those of scraping, rubbing, and washing, but they are obviously calculated for trees only on a small scale. How far the use of powdery matters, such as lime, chalk, and others, which are capable of readily absorbing and taking up the wetness that may hang about the branches, and other parts of the trees, by being well dusted over them, may be beneficial, is not known, but they would seem to promise success by the taking away the nourishment and support of the moss, when employed at proper seasons. And they are known to answer in destroying moss in some other cases, when laid about the stems of the plants, as in thorn-hedges, &c. The mossing in all sorts of trees is injurious to their growth by depriving them of a portion of their nourishment, but more particularly hurtful to those of the fruit-tree kind, as preventing them from bearing full good crops of fruit by rendering them in a weak and unhealthy state. – The following are substances destructive of insects infesting fruit shrubs and trees in gardening, or of preventing their injurious ravages and effects on trees. Many different kinds of substances have been recommended for the purpose, at different times; but nothing perhaps has yet been found fully effectual in this intention, in all cases. The substances and modes directed below have lately been advised as useful in this way. As preventives against gooseberry caterpillars, which so greatly infest and injure shrubs of that kind, the substances mentioned below have been found very simple and efficacious. In the autumnal season, let a quantity of cow-urine be provided, and let a little be poured around the stem of each bush or shrub, just as much as merely suffices to moisten the ground about them. This simple expedient is stated to have succeeded in an admirable manner, and that its preventive virtues have appeared to extend to two successive seasons or years. The bushes which were treated in this manner remained free from caterpillars, while those which were neglected, or intentionally passed by, in the same compartment, were wholly destroyed by the depredations of the insects. Another mode of prevention is proposed, which, it is said, is equally simple and effectual; but the good effects of which only extend to the season immediately succeeding to that of the application. This is, in situations near the sea, to collect as much drift or sea-weed from the beach, when occasion serves, as will be sufficient to cover the whole of the gooseberry compartment to the depth of four or five inches. It should be laid on in the autumn, and the whole covering remain untouched during the winter and early spring months; but as the fruiting season advances, be dug in. This method, it is said, has answered the most sanguine expectations; no caterpillars ever infesting the compartments which are treated in this manner. Another method, which is said to have been found successful, in preventing or destroying caterpillars on the above sort of fruit shrubs, is this: as the black currant and elder bushes, growing quite close to those of the gooseberry kind, were not attacked by this sort of vermin, it was conceived that an infusion of their leaves might be serviceable, especially when prepared with a little quick-lime, in the manner directed below. Six pounds each of the two first sorts of leaves are to be boiled in twelve gallons of soft water; then fourteen pounds of hot lime are to be put into twelve gallons of water, and, after being well incorporated with it, they are both to be mixed well together. With this mixture the infested gooseberry bushes by fruit trees are to be well washed or the hand garden-engine; after which a little hot lime is to be taken and laid about the root of each bush or tree so washed, which completes the work. Thus the caterpillars will be completely destroyed, without hurting the foliage of the bushes or trees in any way. A dull day is to be preferred for performing the work of washing, &c. As soon as all the foliage is dropped off from the bushes or trees, they are to be again washed over with the hand-engine, in order to clean them of all decayed leaves, and other matters; for which purpose any sort of water will answer. The surface of the earth, all about the roots of the bushes and trees, is then to be well stirred, and a little hot lime again laid about them, to destroy the ova or eggs of the insects. This mode of management has never failed of success, in the course of six years' practice. It is noticed, that the above quantity of prepared liquid will be sufficient for about two acres of ground in this sort of plantation, and cost but little in providing. The use of about a gallon of a mixture of equal proportions of lime-water, chamber-ley, and soap-suds, with as much soot as will give it the colour and consistence of dunghill drainings, to each bush in the rows, applied by means of the rose of a watering-pot, immediately as the ground between them is dug over, and left as rough as possible, the whole being gone over in this way without treading or poaching the land, has also been found highly successful by others. The whole is then left in the above state until the winter frosts are fairly past, when the ground between the rows and bushes are levelled, and raked over in an even manner. By this means of practice, the bushes have been constantly kept healthy, fruitful, and free from the annoyance of insects. The bushes are to be first pruned, and dung used where necessary. A solution of soft soap, mixed with an infusion of tobacco, has likewise been applied with great use in destroying caterpillars, by squirting it by the hand-syringe upon the bushes, while a little warm, twice in the day. But some think that the only safety is in picking them off the bushes, as they first appear, together with the lower leaves which are eaten into holes: also, the paring, digging over, and clearing the foul ground between the bushes, and treading and forcing such foul surface parts into the bottoms of the trenches. Watering cherry-trees with water prepared from quick-lime new burnt, and common soda used in washing, in the proportion of a peck of the former and half a pound of the latter to a hogshead of water, has been found successful in destroying the green fly and the black vermin which infest such trees. The water should stand upon the lime for twenty-four hours, and be then drawn off by a cock placed in the cask, ten or twelve inches from the bottom, when the soda is to be put to it, being careful not to exceed the above proportion, as, from its acridity, it would otherwise be liable to destroy the foliage. Two or three times watering with this liquor, by means of a garden engine, will destroy and remove the vermin. The application of clay-paint, too, has been found of great utility in destroying the different insects, such as the coccus, thrips, and fly, which infest peach, nectarine, and other fine fruit trees, on walls, and in hot-houses. This paint is prepared by taking a quantity of the most tenacious brown clay, and diffusing it in as much soft water as will bring it to the consistence of a thick cream or paint, passing it through a fine sieve or hair-searce, so as that it may be rendered perfectly smooth, unctuous, and free from gritty particles. As soon as the trees are pruned and nailed in, they are all to be carefully gone over with a painter's brush dipped in the above paint, especially the stems and large branches, as well as the young shoots, which leaves a coat or layer, that, when it becomes dry, forms a hard crust over the whole tree, which, by closely enveloping the insects, completely destroys them, without doing any injury to either the bark or buds. And by covering the trees with mats or canvas in wet seasons, it may be preserved on them as long as necessary. Where one dressing is not effectual, it may be repeated; and the second coating will mostly be sufficient. Where peach and nectarine trees are managed with this paint, they are very rarely either hide-bound or attacked by insects. This sort of paint is also useful in removing the mildew, with which these kinds of trees are often affected; as well as, with the use of the dew-syringe, in promoting the equal breaking of the eyes of vines, trained on the rafters of pine stoves. Watering the peach tree borders with the urine of cattle, in the beginning of winter, and again in the early spring, has likewise been thought beneficial in destroying the insects which produce the above disease. Careful and proper cleaning and washing these trees, walls, and other places in contact with them, has, too, been found of great utility in preventing insects from accumulating on them.