Hi Listers, Here are some ailments and cures in Victorian times. Many of these were probably used before then. We can imagine that substitutes for some of the ingredients had to be found when in the West Indies. Hard Breasts.-Apply turnips roasted till soft, then mashed and mixed with a little oil of roses; change this twice a day, keeping the breast very warm with flannel. Soft, Breasts and Swelled.-Boil a handful of chamomile and as much mallows in milk and water; foment with it between two flannels as hot as can be borne, every twelve hours. It also dissolves any knot or swelling in any part. A Bruise.-Immediately apply treacle spread on brown paper; or electrify the part, which is the quickest cure of all. A Burn or Scald.-Immediately plunge the part into cold water. keep it in an hour, if not well before ; perhaps four or five hours. Or, electrify it; if this can be done presently, it totally cares the most desperate burn. Or, apply a bruised onion. In a deep Burn or Scald, mix lime-water and sweet oil, to the thickness of cream; apply it with a feather several times a day; this is a very effectual application. A Cancer in the Breast, of thirteen years' standing, has been cured by frequently applying red poppy-water, plantain and rose-water, mixed with honey of roses ; afterwards, the waters alone perfect the cure. Or, take horse-spun, (a kind of warts that grow on the inside of horses' fore legs,) and dry them by the fire, till they will beat to powder. Sift and infuse two drachms in two quarts of ale; drink half a pint every six hours, new-milk warm. It has cured many. A Cancer in any other Part.-Apply red onions bruised. For a Cancer in the Mouth.-Boil a few leaves of succory, plantain, and rue, with a spoonful of honey, for a quarter of an hour. Gargle with this often in an hour; or, with vinegar and honey, wherein half an ounce of roche-alum is boiled. To cure Chilblains.-Apply a poultice of roasted onions hot; keep it on two or three days, if not cured sooner. Hard Breasts.-Apply turnips roasted till soft, then mashed and mixed with a little oil of roses; change this twice a day, keeping the breast very warm with flannel. Chin-cough, or Hooping-cough.-Use the cold-bath daily; or rub the back, at lying down, with old rum-it seldom fails. In desperate cases, change of air alone has cured. Cholera Morbus, or Flux and Vomiting.-Drink two or three quarts of cold water, if strong ; or warm water, if weak. Or, decoction of rice, or barley, or toasted oaten bread. To cure chopt Hands.-Wash with soft soap, mixed with red sand; or wash them in sugar and water, or in venegar. For a Cold.-Drink a pint of cold water lying down in bed; or a spoonful of' treacle in half a pint of water. In a Fit of the Cholic.-Drink a pint of cold water, of a quart of warm water Or, apply outwardly a bag of hot oats; or steep the legs in hot water a quarter of an hour.-Or, take a spoon-full of sweet oil. For a Consumption.-Cold bathing has cured many deep consumptions. Take no food but new butter-milk churned in a bottle, and white bread. Or, boil two handfulls of sorrel in a pint of whey; strain it, and drink a glass thrice a day. Or, turn a pint of skimmed milk with half a pint of small beer; boil in this whey about twenty ivy leaves, and two or three sprigs of hysop; drink half overnight, and the rest in the morning; do this, if needful for two months daily-it has cured in desperate cases. Convulsion in Children.-Scrape piony roots, fresh digged; apply what you have scraped off to the soles of the feet ; it helps immediately. This should give us a better idea of the kinds of cures that the Doctors in the BWI may have indulged in between 1800-1850 and before and after. Cheers! Rich