From the The Universal Household Assistant or What Every One Should Know (1884):

Worms — treatment of. — Some members of the profession still cling with bull-dog tenacity to the opinion that worms do not affect the health of children, and that they are natural to them. The latter may or may not be true, but when they accumulate in the intestines, they produce the same disturbance that any foreign, indigestible substance would do. We find the picking of the nose, swollen lower eye-lids, restlessness in sleep, groaning, gritting teeth, starting, and lastly, spasms.    Worms kill more children than teething*; and when you find the above symptoms with a strawberry tongue and a fever, which will attack several times daily, going off as frequently in cold sweats, you can swear that you have a case of worms, and had as well prepare and attack them.    Now as to the best means of getting rid of them. I use the fluid extract of senna and spigelia in teaspoon doses for patients of eight or ten years of age, and less in proportion, night and morning, for three nights and days, following this up each morning with a good dose of castor oil, provided the senna and spigelia does not act. Then wait three days, and again institute the same proceedings, and for the same length of time.    This treatment is for the lumbricoid. For the oxyuris, or "thread worm," I see any bitter infusion by enema, sulph, quinine, followed by an enema of common salt and milk-warm water half an hour afterward, which will destroy and expel them.    The symptoms of the presence of the worm are the same as the scratching of the anus. If every practitioner will use these he will be gratified by the restoration to immediate health of many a little sufferer, who would otherwise linger in sickness for many months and perhaps eventually die.    Worms in Horses — to cure. — A remedy for worms in a horse which has never failed of a cure is to take half a cup of pure, hard wood ashes, finely sifted and mixed dry with the mash or food. If one dose should not prove sufficient, repeat it after a day or two.    Worm Lozenges. — Powdered lump sugar, ten ounces; starch, five ounces; mix with mucilage; and to every ounce add twelve grains of calomel; divide into twenty grain lozenges. Dose, two to six.    Worm Medicines. — 1. Two tablespoonfuls of pumpkin seeds peeled and pulverized, or given to a child who will chew fine. The seed does not kill, but stupefies the worm. The next day give castor oil or any other cathartic, and if the worms are present in the system they will pass off.    2. Make an infusion in the proportion of one pint of boiling water to one ounce of dried hyssop flowers; let it stand ten minutes; pour it off into a wine bottle, and take a wine-glass, or rather less, according to age, two or three times a day.

* Teething was thought to be a common cause infant mortality in the 19^th century, however most "teething deaths" were actually caused by opium poising from the opium and morphine teething infants were treated with.

I took Isobel to the vet. She's having problems closing her beak and has sores around her mouth and while they look like injuries, I was also worried it might be trichomoniasis. iamacliche was kind enough to get up significantly earlier than he is used to in order to provide me with a ride. I was very happy with the gentle manner in which the vet handled Isobel. It turns out that her beak is having problems closing because of the scabbing around her mouth from an apparent attack by Squeaky, and there is no sign of a parasitic infection like trichomoniasis. She gave me some ointment that is more appropriate to the location of the injuries than the neosporin we had been using. She is also only to have moist food and millet for the next two weeks. She will probably never be kept in the same cage as Squeaky again, which is sad, because they had been so in love.

There was a interesting creature in my dream last night. It was about a foot and a half long, round and flat, had a hard exoskeleton and resembled a crab without pincers in the front. It ran after me and the other people in my dream, trying to eat our skin and lay eggs in our brains. Most of the dream was spent running from this creature that could somehow get past doors and climb up and down elevator shafts. At one point I was on a curve in a dirt road out in the middle of nowhere. The was a large muddy puddle in the road. The strange creature had followed me there. In the muddy puddle I started communicating with the creature. We had a long discussion about how it was scared and didn't know what to do. We figured out that it could eat other foods, but it didn't want to stay. Soon it had stuck itself to a nearby ceiling (which was inexplicably next to the dirt road as if the dirt road were in the room with it even though the dirt road was in no room at all, that is the way of dreams). It was convinced no one would want a flesh eating, brain-egg laying parasite creature living around them. But, I gave it a peck to convince it that I was completely okay with it, and it decided to stay. I then woke up.

Sometimes one comes across disturbing things while surfing Wikipedia

I posted these two icons quite a while ago to creepy_icons and darkicons. I didn't post them here because I thought they might be too disturbing some of the readers of my journal. However, I have decided to go ahead and post.

    

A week ago, I found a book in my closet that I had never seen before. Printed in 1884, it is entitled The Universal Household Assistant or What Every One Should Know. It's "a cyclopedia of practical information" and has subjects listed in alphabetical order. Following are some of my favorite entries:

Cancer — cure. — Take the blossoms of red clover and make tea of them, and drink freely. It will cure cancer in the stomach as well as on the surface.    Choking — ways to relieve. — Do not lose an instant. Force the mouth open with the handle of a knife or of a long spoon; push the thumb and fingers deep down into the throat beyond the root of the tongue, and feel for the foreign body. If the obstruction cannot be grasped, a hair pin bent into a hook and guided by the left hand will often bring it out. If this fails, get someone to press against the front of the chest or support it against the edge of a table, and strike several hard, quick blows with open hand on the back between the shoulder blades. Further treatment must be applied by a physician, who should have been immediately sent for    2. To prevent choking, break an egg into a cup and give it to the person choking, to swallow. The white of the egg seems to catch around the obstacle and remove it. If one egg does not answer the purpose, try another. The white is all that is necessary.    3. A smart blow with the flat of the hand on the back just below the neck will often relieve the windpipe. If it does not, send for the doctor at once.    4. Foreign bodies lodged in the throat can be removed by forcibly blowing into the ear. The plan is so easily tried and so harmless that we suggest its use.    Dentists' Nerve Paste. — 1. Arsenic, one part; rose pink, two parts. To destroy the nerve apply this preparation on a pledget of cotton, previously moistened with creosote, to the cavity of the tooth, let it remain four hours, then wash out thoroughly with water.    2. Arsenous acid, thirty grains; acetate of morphia, twenty grains; creosote, quantity sufficient for paste. Mix.    Embalming — new method of. — Mix together five pounds dry sulphate of alumine, one quart of warm water, and one hundred grains arsenious acid. Inject three or four quarts of this mixture into all the vessels of the human body. This applies as well to all animals, birds, fishes, etc. This process supercedes the old and revolting mode, and has been introduced into the great anatomical schools of Paris.    Guano — home-made. — Save all your fowl manure from sun and rain. To prepare it for use, spread a layer of dry swamp muck (the blacker it is the better) on your barn floor, and dump on it the whole of your fowl manure; beat it into a fine powder with the back of your spade; this done, add hard wood ashes and plaster of Paris, so that the compound shall be composed of the following proportions: Dried muck, four bushels; fowl manure, two bushels; ashes, one bushel; plaster, one and one-half bushels. Mix thoroughly, and spare no labor; for, in this matter, the effort expended will be well paid for. A little before planting, moisten the heap with water, or, better still, with urine; cover well over with old mats, and let it lie till wanted for use. Apply it to beans, corn, or potatoes, at the rate of a handful to a hill; and mix with the soil before dropping the seed. This will be found the best substitute for guano ever invented, and may be depended on for bringing great crops of turnips, corn, potatoes, etc.    Hysterics — cure for. — The fit may be prevented by the administration of thirty drops of laudanum, and as many of ether. When it has taken place open the windows, loosen the tight parts of the dress, sprinkle cold water on the face, etc. A glass of wine or cold water when the patient can swallow. Avoid excitement and tight lacing.    Mites in Cheese — to destroy. — 1. These are at all times better avoided than destroyed, for when they have become very numerous they do a great deal of damage in a short time. To avoid mites the best plan seems to be to leave the cheese exposed to the air, and to brush it occasionally; some prefer wrapping the cheese in a buttered paper, but the former plan, we think is the best. When mites have become very numerous, they may be killed by suspending the cheese by a piece of wire or string, and dipping it for a moment into a pail of boiling water. The boiling water will kill all the mites, and do no harm to the cheese unless it is left in too long.    2. Cheese kept in a cool larder or cellar, with a cloth rung out of clean, cold water constantly upon it, will never have mites in it, or if it has, this will soon destroy them, and also greatly improve the cheese, keeping it always moist.    Nitrous Oxide, or Laughing Gas. — Take two or three ounces of nitrate of ammonia in crystals and put it into a retort, taking care that the heat does not exceed five hundred degrees; when the crystals begin to melt, the gas will be produced in considerable quantities. The gas may be also produced, though not so pure, by pouring nitric acid, diluted with five or six times it [sic] weight of water, on copper fillings or small pieced of tin. The gas is given out till the acid begins to turn brown; the process must then be stopped.    Opium and its Uses. — Opium is a stimulant, narcotic, and anodyne. Used externally, it acts almost as well as when taken into the stomach, and without affecting the head of causing nausea. Applied to irritable ulcers in the form of tincture, it promotes their cure and allays pain. Clothes dipped in a strong solution, and applied over painful bruises, tumors, or inflamed joints, allays pain. A small piece of solid opium stuffed into a hollow tooth relieves toothache. Two drops of the wine of opium dropped into the eye acts as an excellent stimulant in bloodshot eye, or after long-continued inflammation, it is useful in strengthening the eye. Applied as a liniment, in combination with ammonia or oil, or with camphorated spirit, it relieves muscular pain. When combined with oil of turpentine, it is useful as a liniment in spasmodic colic. Used internally, it acts as a very powerful stimulant, then as a sedative, and finally as an anodyne and narcotic, allaying pain in the most extraordinary manner, by acting directly upon the nervous system.    In acute rheumatism it is a most excellent medicine, when combined with calomel and tartarate of antimony; but its exhibition requires the judicious care of a medical man.    Doses of the various preparations. — Confection of opium, from five grains to half a dram; extract of opium, from one to five grains (this is a valuable form, as it does not produce so much after-derangement of the nervous system as solid opium); pills of soap and opium, from five to ten grains; compound ipecacuanha powder (Dover's powders), from five to twenty grains, compound kino powder, from five to twenty grains; wine of opium, from ten minim to one dram.    Caution. — Opium is a powerful poison when taken in too large a quantity, and therefore should be used with extreme caution.    Sealing-wax (Red). — Shellac (very pale), four ounces; cautiously melt in a bright copper pan over a clear charcoal fire; when fused, add Venice turpentine, one and one-fourth ounces. Mix, and further add vermilion, three ounces; remove the pan from the fire, and pour into a mold. For a black color, use ivory black, or lampblack, instead of the vermilion; for a blue color, use Prussian blue, instead of vermilion, same quantity. Each color must be well mixed with the composition; of the lampblack, use only sufficient to color.    Small-pox — cure for. — A physician writes: I am willing to risk my reputation as a public man, if the worst case of small-pox cannot be cured in three days simply by cream of tartar. This is a never-failing remedy: One ounce of cream of tartar, dissolved in one pint of boiling water, to be taken when cold. Dose, two tablespoonfuls every two hours. It is also a preventive; dose, as before, three times a day. It has cured thousands, never leaves a mark, never causes blindness, and avoids tedious lingering.    Soup for Invalids. — Raw beef, on account of its ready digestibility, is often prescribed for invalids. Of late, European physicians have found the use of what we may call raw soup of great utility when given to patients much reduced by fevers. This soup, first proposed by Liebig, is made from finely chopped beef or fowl, recently killed. Half a pound of this meet [sic] is added to a pint and a half of distilled water (pure rain water, filtered, will answer), four drops of pure muriatic acid are added, and a teaspoonful of salt, or enough to suit the taste. After standing an hour, the whole is thrown upon a hair sieve (a flannel bag will do as well) to separate the liquid. If the first liquid which passes through is muddy, it is poured back into the strainer until what runs off is quite clear. When the liquid ceases to run, half a pint of water is added, in small quantities at a time, to the flesh in the strainer. The yield will be about a pint of a reddish colored liquid, tasting like soup, which is to be given cold, a cupful at a time, or in such quantities as the patient desires. It is claimed that this soup contains the nutritive principles of the meat not changed by heat, as they are in cooking, and that they are part ready digested by the muriatic acid, and that it is suited to the weakest digestive organs. If the red color and somewhat fleshy odor are objected to, the one may be disguised by caramel (burnt sugar) and the other by a little wine. The soup spoils readily, and in warm weather must be kept on ice.    Tape Worm. — To expel this parasite, take equal parts of tincture assafoetida and tincture absinthii, in teaspoonful doses, night and morning. No fasting is necessary.