Corpus of Electronic Texts Edition
Rosa Anglica (Author: [unknown])
section 48
48
The following herbs are good for them: woodbine, parsley, mallows, endives, smallage, yellow-flag, not kail;228 and fresh meat is good for them; and they should eat dried figs, ginger and cassia,229 as these purge them well; kneaded230 bread,
p.117
boiled well with honey or wine, is good for them; also a bath of sweet water and wine, as it moistens them well. Also moderate exercise and sleep, for Galen says, they suffer much from want of sleep, hence they should get lettuce, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, spikenard, and lignum aloes. Wine, new or old, is not good, but only medium wine, and let them drink plenty of it; for Galen says, to give wine to youths is naught but adding fire to fire when the fuel is weak231: and he says to give it in moderation to young folk, but to the old as much as they wish, unless the head and the nerves be weak. Those whose veins are wide should take milk along with honey and salt, and dried figs with nettle seeds the first day: good claret helps them, made from sweet-smelling spices;232 and let them avoid blood-letting and coition, or too much of the same, or meditation or cogitation,233 though occasionally anger suits them well, as it heats them; but in moderation. Galen says no man ever died of it; and neither depression,234 nor repression, nor work is good for them, except a little, but instead of the work let them take a bath.