Diseases > Domestic medicine

DOMESTIC MEDICINE. 463
began this course, her death was daily expected.
She continued it for above two years, with manifest
advantage ; but being told by an eminent surgeon,
that the bark would not cure a cancer, and that the
sores ought not to be washed, she discontinued the
practice, and died in a few weeks. This course was
not expected to cure the cancer, but to prolong the
patient’s life which it evidently did almost to a
miracle.
When all other medicines fail, recourse must be
had to opium, as a kind of solace. This will
not indeed cure the disease, but it will ease the
patient’s agony, and render life more tolerable while
it continues.
To avoid this dreadful disorder, people ought to
use wholesome food; to take sufficient exercise in
the open air; to be as easy and cheerful as possible ;
and carefully to guard against all blows, bruises,
and every kind of pressure upon the breasts or other
glandular parts. As hemlock is the principal medi¬
cine recommended in this disease, we would have
given some directions for the gathering and preparing
of that plant; but as its different preparations are
now kept in the shops, we think it much safer for
people to get them there, with proper directions for
using them.
CHAP. XLVI.
OF POISONS.
Evert person ought, in some measure, to be
acquainted with the nature and cure of poisons. They
are generally taken unawares, and their effects are
often so sudden and violent, as not to admit of delay,
or allow time to procure the assistance of physicians.
Happily indeed no great degree of medical knowledge