Ingredient: Onion

The uses of the onion are many and varied. Fresh onion juice promotes perspiration, relieves constipation and bronchitis, induces sleep, is good for cases of scurvy and sufferers from lead colic. It is also excellent for bee and wasp stings.

Onions are noted for their nerve-soothing properties. They are also beautifiers of the complexion. But moderation must be observed in their use or they are apt to disagree. Not everyone can digest onions, although I believe them to be more easily digested raw than cooked.

A raw onion may be rubbed on unbroken chilblains with good results. If broken, the onion should be roasted. The heart of a roasted onion placed in the ear is an old-fashioned remedy for earache.

Raw onions are a powerful antiseptic. They also attract disease germs to themselves, and for this reason may be placed in a sickroom with advantage. Needless to say, they should afterwards be burnt or buried. Culpeper, the ancient herbalist, says that they “draw corruption unto them.” It is possibly for this reason that the Vedanta forbids them to devout Hindoos.

Garlic possesses the same properties as the onion, but in a very much stronger degree. Leeks are very much milder than the onion.

Source: Food Remedies: Facts About Foods And Their Medicinal Uses, Florence Daniel

Remedy for the Ear-ache

Mix a few drops of French brandy with sweet oil and a drop of laudanum, and pour it in the ear a little warm.

Another valuable remedy is to take a few wood lice, and stew them in a little lard, (which should be very pure,) for three or four minutes; then strain it and pour some in the ear before it gets cool.

This gives almost immediate relief. The heart of a roasted onion put warm in the ear, and tie around the head a silk handkerchief, has given relief.

Source: Domestic Cookery, Useful Receipts, and Hints to Young Housekeepers, Elizabeth E. Lea

For Bugs in the Ear

If a bug or other small insect gets in the ear and causes severe pain, pour a little melted butter in the ear and there will be instant relief.

Source: Fowler’s Household Helps, A.L. Fowler

For the Tooth-ache

Each of the following remedies have been known to alleviate suffering. Turn up a wine-glass, put a little powdered alum on the round part, rub it to a paste with sweet spirits of nitre, and apply it directly to the cavity of the tooth, if there be one, if not, on the gum round it. Repeat this often.

Or: mix 2 drachms of alum, in impalpable powder, and 2 drachms of nitrous spirits of ether.

Or: 2 drachms of alum powdered very fine, with 7 drachms of nitrous spirits of ether.

Or: a drop of ether and of laudanum on cotton: this will also relieve the ear-ache.

Or: 1 oz. tincture of myrrh, 1 oz. tincture of gumlac, 1/2 oz. tincture of bark: mix the two last, shake well, add the myrrh by degrees, and shake well together. 1 table-spoonful to 2 of hot water; wash the mouth frequently, holding it in for some time.

Source: The English Housekeeper, Anne Cobbett

Earache

A little black pepper in some cotton dropped in sweet oil is said to be the quickest remedy known for the earache.

Source: Tried and True Recipes, F.D.P. Jermain

Earache

Caused sometimes by bad teeth, but generally by cold or hardened ear wax.

Hold ear over cloth wrung out of hot water, on which are several drops of alcohol. Syringe ear with warm bicarbonate of soda water — 1 tsp. to a cup; or peroxide of hydrogen water — 1 tbsp. to a cup of water.

One drop laudanum, or one drop arnica to three drops very warm olive oil, dropped into ear with a medicine dropper, often relieves pain; or cotton may be saturated with the warm olive oil and placed in the ear and covered with dry cotton. To prevent hardening of wax: keep ear anointed with ordinary red vaseline (unbleached vaseline). For watery discharge of ear, dust with dry boric acid.

Source: The Mary Frances First Aid Book, Jane Eayre Fryer

A Sovereign Remedy for Earache

As soon as a child complains of earache, give it sufficient syrup of ipecac to vomit it freely. It will act like a charm, and the child will be asleep and free from the pain fifteen minutes afterwards. If a mother will only use this remedy she will save her child from a great deal of suffering, and herself from many sleepless nights. My plan is to give a teaspoonful of ipecac, after waiting ten or fifteen minutes (giving the child in the mean time plenty of water to drink,) if it then does not produce the desired effect, give another spoonful, this last will usually be sufficient.

Source: The Housekeeper’s Friend: A Practical Cookbook

To Cure Earache

Take a bit of cotton batting, put on it a pinch of black pepper, gather it up and tie it, dip it in sweet oil, and insert it in the ear; put a flannel bandage over the head to keep it warm; it often gives immediate relief.

Tobacco smoke, puffed into the ear, has often been effectual.

Another remedy: Take equal parts of tincture of opium and glycerine. Mix, and from a warm teaspoon drop two or three drops into the ear, stop the ear tight with cotton, and repeat every hour or two. If matter should form in the ear, make a suds with castile soap and warm water, about 100° F., or a little more than milk warm, and have some person inject it into the ear while you hold that side of your head the lowest. If it does not heal in due time, inject a little carbolic acid and water in the proportion of one drachm of the acid to one pint of warm water each time after using the suds.

Source: The White House Cookbook, F.L. Gillette

Earache

There are various ways of treating earache: the most old fashioned are the appliance of a roasted onion, or a hot bag of salt to the ear, and putting in the ear a small piece of cotton wet with camphorated oil, or simple olive-oil with a drop of chloroform; better still, to puff tobacco smoke into the ear. This remedy is very soothing and effective.

Or, take a small wax taper, pare one end quite small, envelop it in a dry linen rag, insert it into the ear; then light the taper. Odd as this remedy may seem, it is wonderfully rapid and effective; it is practised by all Italian sailors and fishermen.

In Kentucky, a cockroach is drowned in whiskey, then wrapped in hot cotton, and applied to the ear.

Source: The Unrivalled Cook-Book and Housekeeper’s Guide, Mrs Washington

Remedy for Earache

Olive oil, one ounce; chloroform, one drachm. Mix, and shake well together. Pour twenty-five or thirty drops into the ear, and close it up with a piece of raw cotton to exclude the air and retain the moisture.

Source: Audel’s Household Helps, Hints and Receipts