_Take fever powder_ (L), _thirty grains; calomel_ (N), _one
grain; elixir of vitriol_ (G), _sixty, or seventy drops;
essential oil of peppermint_ (U), _four drops upon a little lump
of sugar; to which add water, half a tea cup full._
This draught will not only promote perspiration, but help to dissolve
the siziness in the blood; and may therefore be repeated every six
hours, for a few days. But the patient should always be kept moderately
warm upon it, that it may work by perspiration.—This simple method I
have known put the patient to rights again, after a severe onset.
But sometimes this wretched disorder will require more powerful
medicines to keep it in subjection. When the fibres are debilitated, and
the blood still retains its viscid corruptive quality, the ague is apt
to hang on the patient a long time, the succeeding fever apt to melt the
patient down to a mere skeleton, and even destroy him. In this it is
requisite to brace up the solids, and to infuse an astringency into the
blood.
To this intent, the Peruvian bark is now frequently prescribed, and if
judiciously administered it is an excellent medicine; but as it is
liable however, to be improperly given, and then productive of
irreparable mischief, I have purposely omitted it in this catalogue;
nevertheless, I shall give in its stead a medicine, superior both in
virtue, and by far more safe in the application; not only in this kind
of complaint, but in scorbutic cases, as I shall hereafter take notice
of. The medicine is this,