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Recipe and Home Remedy Book

Recipe and Home Remedy book

The materials in the collection are speculated to have been compiled in southern England, based on the newspaper citations for formulas and the addresses to buy bottled remedies. There are handwritten entries for home medicinal cures, food and alcoholic beverage recipes, and household hints. Some have acknowledgements to a certain newspaper or person, and occasionally the date obtained is added, ranging from 1787-1808.

Among the treatments are some for the plague, dropsy, whooping cough, scarlet fever, scurvy, rheumatism, jaundice, and colic. Instructions are given for preparing medicinal items such as tincture of bark, decoction of sarsaparilla, mustard whey, and lead salve. Food recipes include eel, mince pie, tea cakes, and loin of mutton. Variations of wine and mead recipes are given. Household recipes are conveyed for purposes such as cleaning mahogany, making green paint for outdoors, and getting wine stains out of white or yellow regimental leather breeches.