Molasses Possets

Put into a sauce-pan a pint of the best West India molasses; a tea-spoonful of powdered white ginger; and a quarter of a pound of fresh butter. Set it on hot coals, and simmer it slowly for half an hour; stirring it frequently. Do not let it come to a boil. Then stir in the juice of two lemons, or two table-spoonfuls of vinegar; cover the pan, and let it stand by the fire five minutes longer. This is good for a cold. Some of it may be taken warm at once, and the remainder kept at hand for occasional use.

It is the preparation absurdly called by the common people a stewed quaker.

Half a pint of strained honey mixed cold with the juice of a lemon, and a table-spoonful of sweet oil, is another remedy for a cold; a tea-spoonful or two to be taken whenever the cough is troublesome.

Source: Directions for Cookery, in its Various Branches, Eliza Leslie

Nose Bleed

Snuff powdered alum up the nose. This alum is also good for checking hemorrhage, sometimes caused by extracting teeth. Fill the cavity with the alum. Apply cold salt water to bleeding nose if you haven’t alum.

Source: Civic League Cook Book

To Make a Meath Good for the Liver and Lungs

Take of the Roots of Coltsfoot, Fennel and Fearn each four Ounces. Of Succory-roots, Sorrel-roots, Strawberry-roots, Bitter-sweet-roots, each two Ounces, of Scabious-roots and Elecampane-roots, each an Ounce and a half. Ground-ivy, Hore-hound, Oak of Jerusalem, Lung-wort, Liver-wort, Maiden-hair, Harts-tongue of each two good-handfulls. Licorish four Ounces. Jujubes, Raisins of the Sun and Currents, of each two Ounces; let the roots be sliced, and the herbs be broken a little with your hands; and boil all these in twenty quarts of fair running water, or, if you have it, in Rain water, with five Pints of good white honey, until one third part be boiled away; then pour the liquor through a jelly bag often upon a little Coriander-seeds, and Cinnamon; and when it runneth very clear, put it into Bottles well stopped, and set it cool for your use, and drink every morning a good draught of it, and at five in the afternoone.

Source: The Closet Of Sir Kenelm Digby Knight Opened, K. Digby

Summer Complaint or Diarrhoea

In early stages unless alarming symptoms appear, give the child or patient a generous dose of castor oil and keep patient on a light diet for a day or two or refrain from eating at all for twelve hours. If passages are green and full of mucous membrane call a physician immediately as delay may be fatal. Whites of two eggs mixed with a little water sipped frequently is often healing also to stomach and bowels.

Source: Civic League Cook Book

Antidote for Laudanum

When so large a quantity of laudanum has been swallowed as to produce dangerous effects, the fatal drowsiness has been prevented when all other remedies have failed, by administering a cup of the strongest possible coffee. The patient has revived and recovered, and no ill effects have followed.

Source: Directions for Cookery, in its Various Branches, Eliza Leslie