Grandmother’s Cough Syrup

Take half a pound of dry hoarhound herbs, one pod of red pepper, four tablespoonfuls of ginger, boil all in three quarts of water, then strain, and add one teaspoonful of good, fresh tar and a pound of sugar. Boil slowly and stir often, until it is reduced to one quart of syrup. When cool, bottle for use. Take one or two teaspoonfuls four or six times a day.

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

Blackberry Diarrhoea Syrup

To two quarts of blackberries, add one pound of loaf sugar, half an ounce of nutmegs, half an ounce of ground cinnamon, half an ounce of ground cloves, quarter an ounce ground alspice. Boil the whole together, and when cold add a pint of fourth proof brandy. From a tea-spoonful to a wine-glassful, according to the age of the patient, till relieved. In 1832 this was very successful in cases of the cholera.

Source: Valuable Receipts, J.M. Prescott

Cough Syrup

One cup of hops, one cup of wild cherry bark, one cup of hoarhound, one and a half gills of tar, one gill of brandy and a half pound of loaf sugar. Soak the cherry bark in one pint of water twenty-eight hours; put the hops and hoarhound in two quarts of water and keep at a temperature below (but near) boiling for two hours; boil tar with one pint of water one hour; strain the hops and hoarhound; pour off the tar into the same vessel; add sugar and one pint of water; boil until you have> a rich syrup; then add the cherry and brandy, and make up for the water that has been lost. Caution.—Do not boil the cherry.

Source: 76: A Cook Book

Croup

Croup, it is said, can be cured in one minute, and the remedy is simply alum and sugar. Take a knife or grater and shave off in small particles about a teaspoonful of alum; then mix it with twice its amount of sugar, to make it palatable, and administer it as quickly as possible. Almost instantaneous relief will follow. Turpentine is said to be an excellent remedy for croup. Saturate a piece of flannel and apply it to the chest and throat, and take inwardly three or four drops on a lump of sugar.

Another remedy.–Give a teaspoonful of ipecacuanha wine every few minutes, until free vomiting is excited.

Another recipe said to be most reliable: Take two ounces of the wine of ipecac, hive syrup four ounces, tincture of bloodroot two ounces. Mix it well.

Dose for a child one year old, five to ten drops; two years, eight to twelve drops; three years, twelve to fifteen drops; four years, fifteen to twenty drops; five years, twenty to twenty-five drops, and older children in proportion to age. Repeat as often as shall be necessary to procure relief. If it is thought best to produce vomiting, repeat the dose every ten or fifteen minutes for a few doses.

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

To make a rare Medicine for the Chine-Cough

Make a Syrrop of Hysop-water and white Sugar Candy, then take the Powder of Gum Dragon, and as much of white Sugar Candy mixed together, and eat of it several times of the day, or take the above-named Syrrop, either of them will do the Cure.

Source: The Queen-like Closet or Rich Cabinet, Hannah Wolley

To make Syrrop of Ale, good for weak People to take inwardly, or to heal old Sores, applied thereto

Take two Gallons of Ale Wort, the strongest you can get, so soon as it is run from the Grounds, set it on the fire in a Pipkin, and let it boil gently and that you do perceive it to be as though it were full of Rags; run it through a strainer, and set it on the fire again, and let it boil until it be thick, and scum it clean, and when it is much wasted, put it into a lesser Pan to boil, or else it will burn; when it is thick enough, take it off, and when it is cold, put it into Gallipots, take as much as a Walnut fasting; and as much when you go to bed.

Source: The Queen-like Closet or Rich Cabinet, Hannah Wolley

For a Consumption

Take of Syrrop of Violets, Syrrop of Horehound, Syrrop of Maidenhair and Conserve of Fox Lungs, of each one ounce, mix them well together, and take it often upon a Liquoras stick in the day time, and at night.

Source: The Queen-like Closet or Rich Cabinet, Hannah Wolley

Banana Juice

In cases of chronic bronchitis, with difficult breathing and scanty expectoration, the use of banana juice has been highly praised. The juice is prepared by cutting up the bananas in small pieces and putting them with plenty of sugar into a closed glass jar. The latter is then placed in cold water, which is gradually made to boil. When the boiling-point is reached, the process is complete. Of the sirup so made, a teaspoonful every hour is the proper dose.

Source: Audel’s Household Helps, Hints and Receipts

Infusion of Catechu, commonly called Japonic Infusion

Take of

• Extract of catechu, two drachms and a half;
• Cinnamon, half a drachm;
• Boiling water, seven ounces;
• Simple syrup, one ounce.

Macerate the extract and cinnamon in the hot water, in a covered vessel, for two hours, then strain it, and add the syrup.

Extract of catechu is almost pure tan[n]in. This infusion is therefore a powerfully astringent solution. The cinnamon and syrup render it a very agreeable medicine, which will be found serviceable in fluxes proceeding from a laxity of the intestines. Its dose is a spoonful or two every other hour. As this preparation will not keep above a day or two, it must always be made extemporaneously. The two hours maceration, therefore, becomes very often extremely inconvenient; but it may be prepared in a few minutes by boiling, without in the least impairing the virtues of the medicine.

Source: The Edinburgh New Dispensatory, Andrew Duncan

A Syrup for Colds and Coughs

Take 18 ounces of perfectly sound onions, and after removing rind make several incisions, but not too deep. Boil together with 13 1/2 ounces of moist sugar and 2 3/4 ounces of honey in 35 ounces of water, for three-quarters of an hour; strain, and fill into bottles for use. Give one tablespoonful of this mixture (slightly warmed) immediately on attack, and then, according to requirement, five to eight half tablespoonfuls daily.

Source: Audel’s Household Helps, Hints and Receipts