Gentians and Nightshades 199enteenth century,^53 and in several English counties ‘felon-wort’ and ‘felon-
wood’, names it shares with masterwort (Peucedanum ostruthium), have per-
sisted in currency down to more recent years. In Essex,^54 Warwickshire^55 and
Oxfordshire^56 the juice was mixed with lard to produce an ointment valued
for chilblains—an allied complaint.
In Ireland a herb recorded in Limerick as ‘guinea goul’ and clearly this
from the description has been used for cuts that have festered.^57 In the Isle of
Man a decoction made from bittersweet was said to be effective in healing
inward bruises^58 ;boiled in a pint of beer, the plant has also enjoyed a reputa-
tion there as a strengthening tonic.^59 Each of these uses could be ascribed to
its claimed ability to cleanse the system of impurities (hence its popularity in
official medicine for skin diseases, rheumatism and gout), but how is its use
in Kerry^60 for inducing blistering to be explained?
Datura stramoniumLinnaeus
thorn-apple
near-cosmopolitan weed
Like henbane (Hyoscyamus niger),Datura stramonium also appears unex-
pectedly after lying long dormant, especially in hot summers, and is no less
dangerous for its violent action on the nervous system; it differs, though, in
having no claim to be considered indigenous to the British Isles. It seems in
fact to have been introduced from the East and reputedly owes much of its
European dispersal to gypsies. The name Datura is of Sanskrit origin, and
related species are popular in India as intoxicants.
Probably because East Anglia experiences the hottest temperatures in
Britain it is from there that almost all the few records of the plant’s use in
folk medicine have come. The most interesting of these is an ointment made
from boiling the juice in pork fat which was applied by a village herb woman
in Norfolk c. 1920 to burns, scalds and inflammation in general^61 —exactly
the same recipe as for a cure recommended more than three centuries earlier
by John Gerard, who instanced the perfect healing it had achieved of a seri-
ous lightning burn suffered by a merchant’s wife at Colchester in Essex.^62 It
is also in Essex that the soporific fumes given off by the plant’s juice (like that
of henbane) have been harnessed as a pain-reliever, with vinegar added to
make doubly sure.^63 Norfolk, too, is one county where the practice of smok-
ing the dried leaves (or seeds) to relieve asthma, introduced into Britain by
General Gent in 1802 and formerly widespread, has persisted at the folk level
down to the twentieth century.^64