Olive Tree
Description. The olive-tree grows to a great bigness in its native climate, being full of branches, whose twigs are of a grey or ash-colour, having two leaves set opposite at a joint, of a hard firm texture, of a long oval shape, whitish underneath, and of a sad green above: among these grow bunches of small yellow monopetalous flowers, cut into four sections; and after them come oval fruit, of different magnitude, some being as big as a large plum, as the Spanish and several others; and some, as the Lucca olive, a great deal less: they are green at first, and black when ripe, having a hard stone in the middle, which is sharp-pointed at both ends: when ripe, they are hot and burning in the mouth.
Place. It is a native of several parts of Europe, but will not bear the cold of our winters without the shelter of a green-house. Time. While it is under the cover of a green-house, it is needless to point out the time of its flowering, as that is the effect of nature forced. Government and virtues. This is a tree of the Sun. The fruit of this tree has a bitter, austere, disagreeable taste; but when pickled, as they come from abroad, they are less ungrateful, and promote appetite and digestion; it also cuts and attenuates tough phlegm in the stomach and first passages. the Lucca olives are smaller than the others, and have the weakest taste; and the Spanish, or larger, the strongest; those brought from Provence, which are of a middling size, are most esteemed. But the principal consumption of this fruit is in making the common salad-oil, which is obtained by grinding and pressing them when ripe; the finer, and most pure oil, issues first on their being gently pressed, and the inferior sorts on heating the mass, and pressing it more strongly. This oil, in its virtues, does not differ materially from the other tasteless expressed oils, but it is preferred to all of them for esculent purposes; and is chiefly used in the preparation of plaisters, ointments, & c. Oil is moderately healing and molifying, rendering the body lax and soluble; it is good for disorders of the breast and lungs, tempering the sharp choleric humours in the bowels. What is drawn from the unripe olives is called omphacinum, and is accounted drying and restringent, and fitter for some external remedies; what is pressed out of the ripe fruit is called oil of olives, being what is generally eaten, and made use of in medicines; the different fineness being from the different care and management in the making it; the sweetest, and what we esteem most, comes from Florence. ONION.
Description. This plant is well known to have a large bulbous root, hung with a cluster of thick white fibres at the base. The leaves are long, hollow, round, and sharp-pointed, of a dark green colour. The stem is round, firm, upright, not branched, and two feet high. The flowers are produced in a large round tuft or umbel, at the top of them; they are small, and of a greenish white colour. The seeds are small and round.
Place. It is not a native of England, but is much cultivated with us for the sake of its root, which is applicable to a variety of esculent purposes. Time. The flowers appear early in summer.
Government and virtues. Mars owns them; and they have gotten this quality, to draw any corruption to them; for if you peel one, and lay it upon a dunghill, you shall find him rotten in half a day, by drawing putrefaction to it; then being bruised and applied to a plague sore, it is very probable it will do the like. Onions are flatulent, or windy; yet they do somewhat provoke appetite, increase thirst, ease the belly and bowels, provoke womens' courses, help the biting of a mad-dog, and of other venomous creatures, used with honey and rue; increase sperm, especially the seed of them: they also kill worms in children, if they drink the water, fasting, wherein they have been steeped all night. Being roasted under the embers, and eaten with honey, or sugar and oil, they much conduce to help an inveterate cough, and expectorate the tough phlegm. The juice being snuffed up the nostrils, purges the head, and helps the lethargy; yet the often eating them is said to procure pains in the head. It has been held by divers country people a great preservative against infection, to eat onions fasting, with bread and salt; as also to make a great onion hollow, filling the place with good treacle, and after to roast it well under the embers: which, after taking away the outermost skin thereof, being beaten together, is a sovereign salve for either plague or sores, or any other putrified ulcer. The juice of onions is good for either scalding or burning by fire, water, or gunpowder; used with vinegar, takes away all blemishes, spots, and marks in the skin; and dropped in the ears, eases the pain and noise of them. Applied also with figs beaten together, helps to ripen and break imposthumes, and other sores.
Leeks are as like them in quality, as the pome-water is like an apple; they are a remedy against a surfeit of mushrooms, being baked under the embers and taken; and being boiled and applied very warm, helps the piles. In other things they have the same property as the onions, though not so effectual. A syrup made of the juice of onions and honey, is an excellent medicine in asthmatic complaints. All the parts of this plant have a strong, and to many a very disagreeable smell, and a sharp biting taste. They are excellent to be taken by those who abound in cold watery humours, but very injurious to those of a bilious habit, affecting the head, eyes, and stomach. Onions, when plentifully eaten, procure sleep, help digestion, cure acid belchings, remove obstructions of the viscera, increase the urinary secretions, and promote insensible perspiration. Steeped all night in spring water, and the infusion given children to drink in the morning fasting, kill worms. Onions bruised, with the addition of a little salt, and laid on fresh burns, draw out the fire, and prevent the part from blistering. Their use is fittest for cold weather, and for aged, phlegmatic people, whose lungs are stuffed, and their breath short.