 |
BASIL OGYMUM BASILICUM This is the herb which all authors are together by the ears about, and rail at one another, like lawyers. Galen and Dioscorides hold it not fitting to be taken inwardly, and Chesippus rails at it with downright Billingsgate rhetoric.. Pliny and the Arabian physicians defend it. This is the Garden or Sweet Basil. It has one upright stalk, branching on all sides with two leaves at every joint, a little snipped about the edges. The flowers are small and whitish. Where to find it: It grows in gardens. Flowering time: Mid to late summer. Astrology: A herb of Mars and under the Scorpion, and therefore called Basilicon. It is no marvel if it carry a kind of virulent quality with it. Medicinal virtues: Applied to the place bitten by venomous beasts, or stung by a wasp or hornet, it speedily draws the poison to it. Every like draws its like. This herb and Rue will never grow together, nor near one another; and we know Rue is as great an enemy to poison as any that grows. It expelleth both birth and afterbirth and as it helps the deficiency of Venus in one kind, so it spoils all her actions in another. 1 dare write no more of it. Modern uses: Basil is a popular culinary herb. It is aromatic, and carminative. It will expel flatulence and help to ease griping pains in the abdomen. The essential oil obtained from the plant contains camphor. As a medicine Basil is taken in the form of an infusion. |