Diseases > Domestic medicine

DOMESTIC MEDICINE. 303
however must be kept gently open. A decoction of
tamarinds, with a little honey or manna, will answer
this purpose very well. The side affected must be
fomented in the manner directed in the foregoing
diseases. Mild laxative clysters should be frequently
administered; and, if the pain should notwithstanding
continue violent, a blistering plaster may be applied
over the part affected.
Medicines which promote the secretion of urine
have a very good effect here. For this purpose half
a drachm of purified nitre, or a tea-spoonful of the
sweet spirits of nitre, may be taken in a cup of the
patient’s drink three or four times a day.
When there is an inclination to sweat, it ought to
be promoted, but not by warm sudorifics. The only
thing to be used for that purpose is plenty of diluting
liquors drunk about the warmth of the human blood.
Indeed the patient in this case, as well as in all other
topical inflammations, ought to drink nothing that is
colder than the blood.
If the stools should be loose, and even streaked
with blood, no means must be used to stop them,
unless they be so frequent as to weaken the patient.
Loose stools often prove critical, and carry off the
disease.
If an abscess or an imposthume is formed in the
liver, all methods should be tried to make it break
and discharge itself outwardly, as fomentations, the
application of poultices, ripening cataplasms, &c.
Sometimes indeed the matter ol an abscess comes
away in the urine, and sometimes it is discharged by
stool, but these are efforts of Nature which no means
can promote. When the abscess bursts into the
cavity of the abdomen at large, death must ensue;
nor will the event be more favourable, when the
abscess is opened by an incision, unless in cases