_Directions for Pregnant Women._
The prevention of untimely births consists in removing the
aforementioned causes, which must be effected both before and after
conception.
Before conception, if the body be too hot, dry or moist, employ such
treatment as to counteract the symptoms; if the blood be vitiated purify
it, if plethoric, open the liver vein; if gross, reduce it; if too thin
strengthen and nourish it. All the diseases of the womb must be removed
as I have shown.
After conception, let the atmosphere be kept temperate, do not sleep too
much, avoid late hours, too much bodily exercise, mental excitement,
loud noises and bad smells, and sweet smells must also be avoided by
those who are hysterical. Refrain from all things that may provoke
either urine or menstruation, also salt, sour, and windy food, and keep
to a moderate diet.
If the bowels are confined, relieve the stomach with injections made of
a decoction of mallows and violets, with sugar and salad oil; or make a
broth with borage, buglos, beetroot, and mallows, and add a little manna
to it. If, on the other hand, she be troubled with looseness of the
bowels, do not check it with medical advice, for all the uterine fluxes
have some bad qualities in them, which must be evacuated before the
discharge is stopped.
A cough is another thing to which pregnant women are frequently liable,
and which causes them to run great danger of miscarrying, by the shock
and continual drain upon the vein. To prevent this shave off the hair
from the coronal commissures, and apply the following plaster to the
place.
Take half an ounce of resin, a drachm of laudanum, a drachm each of
citron peel, lignaloes and galbanum, with a sufficient quantity of
liquid and dry styrax. Dissolve the gum in vinegar and make a plaster,
and at night let her inhale the fumes of these lozenges, thrown upon
bright coals. Take also a drachm and a half each of frankincense, styrax
powder and red roses: eight drachms of sandrich, a drachm each of
mastic, benjamin and amber; make into lozenges with turpentine, and
apply a cautery to the nape of the neck. And every night let her take
the following pills:--Half an ounce each of hypocistides, terrae
sigilatae and fine bole; two drachms each of bistort, alcatia, styrax
and calamint, and one drachm of cloves, and make into pills with syrup
of myrtles.
In pregnant women, a corrupt matter is generated which, flowing to the
ventricle, spoils the appetite and causes sickness. As the stomach is
weak, and cannot digest this matter, it sometimes sends it to the bowels
which causes a flux of the stomach, which greatly adds to the weakness
of the womb. To prevent all these dangers the stomach must be
strengthened by the following means:--Take one drachm each of lignaloes
and nutmeg; a scruple each of mace, cloves, mastic, laudanum; an ounce
of oil of spikenard; two grains of musk, half an ounce each of oil of
mastic, quinces and wormwood, and make into an ointment for the stomach,
to be applied before meals. Instead of this, however, you may use
cerocum stomachile Galeni. Take half an ounce each of conserve of
borage, buglos and atthos; two drachms each of confection of hyacinths,
candied lemon peel, specierum, diamarg, pulo. de genunis: two scruples
each of nutmeg and diambra; two drachma each of peony roots and
diacoratum, and make into an electuary with syrup of roses, which she
must take twice a day before meals. Another affection which troubles a
pregnant woman is swelling of the legs, which happens during the first
three months, by the superfluous humours descending from the stomach and
liver. To cure this, take two drachms of oil of roses, and one drachm
each of salt and vinegar; shake them together until the salt is
dissolved, and anoint the legs with it hot, rubbing it well in with the
hand. It may be done without danger during the fourth, fifth and sixth
months of pregnancy; for a child in the womb is compared to an apple on
the tree. For the first three months it is a weak and tender subject,
like the apple, to fall away; but afterwards, when the membranes become
strengthened, the fruit remains firmly fastened to the womb, and not
subject to mischances, and so it remains, until the seventh month, until
when it is near the time, the ligaments are again relaxed (like the
apple that is almost ripe).
They grow looser every day, until the appointed time for delivery; if,
therefore, the body is in real need of purging, the woman may do it
without danger in the fourth, fifth or sixth month, but neither before
nor after that unless in the case of some violent illness, in which it
is possible that both mother and child may perish. Apply plasters and
ointments to the loins in order to strengthen the fruit in the womb.
Take one drachm each of gum Arabic, galangale, bistort, hypocistid and
storax, a drachm and a half each of fine bole, nutmeg, mastic, balaust,
dragon's blood and myrtle berries, and a sufficient quantity of wax and
turpentine and make into a plaster. Apply it to the loins in the winter,
and remove it every twenty-four hours, lest the loins should become
overheated by it. In the interim, anoint the private parts and loins
with _countess' balsam_ but if it be summer time and the loins hot, the
following plaster will be more suitable. Take a pound of red roses, two
drachms each of mastic and red Sanders, one drachm each of bole ammoniac
and red coral, two drachms and a half each of pomegranate seed and
prepared coriander seed, two scruples of barberries, one ounce each of
oil of mastic and of quinces, and plantain-juice.
Anoint the loins also with sandalwood ointment, and once a week wash
them with two parts of rose-water and one of white wine mixed together
and warmed at the fire. This will assuage the heat of the loins, get rid
of the oil of the plaster from the pores of the skin, and cause the
fresh ointment or plaster to penetrate more easily, and to strengthen
the womb. Some think that a load-stone laid upon the navel, keeps a
woman from abortion. The same thing is also stated of the stone called
_aetites_ or eagle-stone, if it is hung round the neck. Samian stone has
the same virtue.
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