An Account of the Foxglove and some of its Medical Uses: With Practical Remarks on Dropsy and Other Diseases

history of its effects in diseases from the time of Fuchsius, who first describes it, but I have been anticipated in this intention by my very valuable friend, Dr. Stokes of Stourbridge, who has lately sent me the following Historical View of the Properties of Digitalis. Fuchsius in his hist. stirp. 1542, is the first author who notices it. From him it receives its name of Digitalis , in allusion to the German name of Fingerhut , which signifies a finger-stall, from the blossoms resembling the finger of a glove. Sensible Qualities. Leaves bitterish, very nauseous. Lewis Mat. med. i. 342. Sensible Effects. Some persons, soon after eating of a kind of omalade, into which the leaves of this, with those of several other plants, had entered as an ingredient, found themselves much indisposed, and were presently after attacked with vomitings. Dodonæus pempt. 170. It is a medicine which is proper only for strong constitutions, as it purges very violently, and excites excessive vomitings. Ray. hist. 767. Boerhaave judges it to be of a poisonous nature, hist. plant. but Dr. Alston ranks it among those indigenous vegetables, "which, though now disregarded, are medicines of great virtue, and scarcely inferior to any that the Indies afford." Lewis Mat. med. i. p. 343. Six or seven spoonfuls of the decoction produce nausea and vomiting, and purge; not without some marks of a deleterious quality. Haller hist. n. 330 from Aerial Infl. p. 49, 50. The following is an abridged Account of its Effects upon Turkeys . M. Salerne , a physician at Orleans, having heard that several turkey pouts had been killed by being fed with Foxglove leaves, instead of mullein, he gave some of the same leaves to a large vigorous turkey. The bird was so much affected that he could not stand upon his legs, he appeared drunk, and his excrements became reddish. Good nourishment restored him to health in eight days. Being then determined to push the experiment further, he chopped some more leaves, mixed them with bran, and gave them to a vigorous turkey cock which weighed seven pounds. This bird soon appeared drooping and melancholy; his feathers stared, his neck became pale and retracted. The leaves were given him for four days, during which time he took about half a handful. These leaves had been gathered about eight days, and the winter was far advanced. The excrements,…