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

For the Sting of a Bee

Rub the place with hartshorn or salaeratus water, immediately after it is stung, to prevent it from swelling; bruised peach leaves bound on, are also good, and laudanum, where it is very painful. If it swells very much, apply a poultice of onions and cream, or ley and bitter herbs.

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

Bites and Stings

Stings from wasps, bees, and ants need treatment with fruit acids — bathe in vinegar or apply a slice of raw apple or peach or a crushed grape. Instant sucking removes part of the poison and relieves the pain to a degree. Always suck bites, as of spiders, unless there are abrasions of tongue and lips. After sucking bathe freely with fresh peroxide of hydrogen, boracic acid, or sugar-of-lead water. A leaf of green plantain, well bruised, bound on a bite or sting when nothing else is at hand keeps down inflammation and mitigates pain. In case of stings make sure the sting proper has not been left in the wound, since its presence might induce blood poisoning.

Source: Harper’s Household Handbook: A guide to easy ways of doing woman’s work, Martha McCulloch-Williams

Wasps and Bees, Stings From

Mix together a little spirits of hartshorn with double its quantity of olive oil, and apply to the part affected.

Another very simple remedy, which is asserted to be unfailing, is to rub with an onion the part of the flesh which is stung.

The application of either oil of tartar or a solution of potash will give instant ease.

Perhaps the most convenient thing will be to mix a little oil with common soda. This will allay both the pain and the irritation.

Source: Recipes for the Million

Gnat Stings

Wherever gnats abound the following compound should always be kept at hand, as it is useful, not only as a cure, but also as the best preventive against the attack of these insects. Take two ounces of spermaceti, half an ounce of white wax, one ounce of camphor, and two ounces of olive oil. Melt the whole together, stirring frequently the while. Pour into small pots for use.

Source: Recipes for the Million

Bees’ Stings

As the bee when it stings always leaves its weapon behind, it is necessary first of all to extract it from the flesh, which may readily be done with a fine needle or a pair of small tweezers, then anoint the wound with a mixture of equal parts of hartshorn and olive oil. Or a little alkaline lotion or even common whiting will take away the pain. To a person in good health stings from these insects are not dangerous, except when they occur in the mouth, throat, or on the eyelid. It is never advisable to knock a bee off when it settles upon one ; if left entirely alone it will generally fly away of its own accord without inflicting any damage. One of the best-known remedies for a sting in the mouth or throat is to chew a strong onion and, if necessary, swallow the juice.

Source: Recipes for the Million

For the Sting of a Bee or Wasp

Rub the part with hot tallow, or with hartshorn, or wet clay.

Source: The Philadelphia Housewife, Mary Hodgson

For Insect Stings

Extract the sting, if left in, with a watch key or tweezers, and apply ammonia and water, or a paste of bicarbonate of soda with sal volatile.

Common soda or the blue bag will also relieve the pain.

Source: Household Management, E. Stoddard Eckford & M.S. Fitzgerald

Stings

Extract sting if it remains imbedded in flesh. Apply household ammonia, diluted with a little water, or solution of bicarbonate of soda (1 tsp. soda to 1 cup water).

Mud, wet salt, slice of onion, arnica, witch hazel, camphor are soothing. If there is much swelling, apply cracked ice. Apply spirit of camphor or alcohol to mosquito bites.

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

Musquito Bites

Salt wetted into a sort of paste, with a little vinegar, and plastered on the bite, will immediately allay the pain; and if not rubbed, no mark will be seen next day. It is well to keep salt and vinegar always in a chamber that is infested with musquitoes[sic]. It is also good for the sting of a wasp or bee; and for the bite of any venomous animal, if applied immediately. It should be left on till it becomes dry, and then renewed.

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