Important: Safety Warning
This page prescribes plants as medicine according to pre-modern medical theory. Several of the plants named are toxic, correct identification is difficult, and the doses given have no scientific basis. Do not ingest or apply any preparation described here.
In addition, this page presents medical treatment from an era before modern medicine. The remedies described are ineffective against the conditions named, and some of the ingredients or doses are harmful. Do not use them to treat any illness; consult a qualified medical professional.
This information has been left in for historical purposes but should not be acted upon.
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Wine of Wild Cherry Bark
Professor Parrish gives the following formula in his "Elements of Pharmacy." Alcoholic extract (from 24 ounces) of wild cherry bark, 5½ ounces; sweet almonds, 3 ounces; water, 1 pint; and cherry wine, 2 pints. Beat the almonds with the water to a paste, rub down the extract with 1/2 pint of the wine, and mix the two liquids in a bottle of the capacity of 3 pints, stop it closely, and permit it to stand for 3 days, with occasional agitation; then add the remainder of the wine, allow it to stand a week, and filter. By this mode of proceeding, opportunity is afforded for the development of the hydrocyanic acid before the menstruum is made so alcoholic as to retard the reaction which favors its formation. Thus made, wine of wild cherry bark is a transparent, wine-red liquid, having an astringent bitter-almond taste and odor. The dose of this preparation as a tonic and sedative is a tea-spoonful.