Hydrophobia happens when you are bitten by a mad dog, and you become unable to drink or get any liquid close to you. If you have hydrophobia, you must cast yourself cross the bed upon your belly, hanging his head over the other side of the bed. In this posture of a dog, you may feel some comfort than staying in the erect posture of a man. However, it does not cure your disease. Fortunately, Sir Rob. Gourdon has communicated to the Royal Society as to the cure for such disease.
Ingredients: (for dogs and beasts with the disease)
Grimony Roots ………….. a handful
Primrose Roots……………a handful
Dragon Roots……………..a handful
Single Peony Roots………a handful
The Leaves of Box ……….a handful
The Starr of the Earth….. two handfuls
The Black of Crabs Claws prepared…… One Ounce
Venice Treacle…………… Once Ounce
1. All these are to be beaten and bruised together, and boiled in a gallon of milk till the half be boiled away.
2. Put it into a bottle, unstrained, and give 3-4 spoonful of it to the dog or beast with the symptoms of hydrophobia (madness).
3. Wait for three mornings.
For people who have been bitten:
4. Take the same ingredients and do the same, and let it them be infused warm in two quarters of strong White Wine for at least 12 hours.
5. Take a quarter of a pint, evening and morning, for three days.
* It may be sweetened either with sugar or some cordial syrup.
Another approved remedy (so that you can detect whether or not the dog that bit you was mad)
Pluck the feathers from the breech of an old cock, and apply it bare to the Bite, and do this upon each of the wounds. If the dog were mad, the cock will swell and die, and the person bitten will do well; but if the cock does not die, the dog was not mad.
*If the wounds be very small, it is requisite to open them with a Lancett.
Another process
1. Let the party be plunged in the sea nine times, while he is fasting, as soon as may be after the bite.
2. Let the bitten part be washed with a lie of the ashes of oke-wood and urine, and apply a cataplasme of London treacle, Alliaria or Hedge Garlick, Rue and Salt.
3. Take dried Rue and Scordium each 2 Dr, Virginia Snake-Root 1 1/2 Dr, Floors of St. John’s wort 3 Dr, Fine fillings of Tinn and Garlick cut small, each 4 Dr, London Treacle 1 Ounce. Let them all beaten and exactly mixed together, adding Syrup of Lemmon Pils as much as suffices to make it into an Electuary.
4. Divide this into nine equal parts to be taken every day one, drinking after it a small draught of good strong Ale.
5. Let him walk upon it and not dine till 4 hours after.
Philosophical Transactions Vol. 16, 1686-1692
