Fox-Glove

Descript : It has many long and broad leaves lying upon the ground dented upon the edges, a little soft or woolly, and of a hoary green colour, among which rise up sometimes sundry stalks, but one very often, bearing such leaves thereon from the bottom to the middle, from whence to the top it is stored with large and long hollow reddish purple flowers, a little more long and eminent at the lower edge, with some white spots within them, one above another with small green leaves at every one, but all of them turning their heads one way, and hanging downwards, having some threads also in the middle, from whence rise round heads, pointed sharp at the ends, wherein small brown seed lies. The roots are so many small fibres, and some greater strings among them; the flowers have no scent, but the leaves have a bitter hot taste.

Place : It grows on dry sandy ground for the most part, and as well on the higher as the lower places under hedge-sides in almost every county of this land.

Time : It seldom flowers before July, and the seed is ripe in August.

Government and virtues : The plant is under the dominion of Venus, being of a gentle cleansing nature, and withal very friendly to nature. The herb is familiarly and frequently used by the Italians to heal any fresh or green wound, the leaves being but bruised and bound thereon; and the juice thereof is also used in old sores, to cleanse, dry, and heal them. The decoction hereof made up with some sugar or honey, is available to cleanse and purge the body both upwards and downwards, sometimes of tough phlegm and clammy humours, and to open obstructions of the liver and spleen. It has been found by experience to be available for the king's evil, the herb bruised and applied, or an ointment made with the juice thereof, and so used; and a decoction of two handfuls thereof, with four ounces of Polipody in ale, has been found by late experience to cure divers of the falling sickness, that have been troubled with it above twenty years. I am confident that an ointment of it is one of the best remedies for scabby head that is.