Browse:Silkroot, Silkweed, Milkweed (Volume 1, entries 1511–1513)
Silkroot, Silkweed, Milkweed
Volume 1, entries 1511–1513. Source context: THE DOCTORS AT WORK: REPORTS FROM LAYMEN → FOLK MEDICINE → CURE AND PROTECTION. Entries listed under this heading in the source volume.
Entries
Entry 1511
[These three names are for the same plant.]
I went up in the country an - with mah mother, an' mah husband stayed at home. But it's mah home dat he stayin'. An' of co'se he wus goin' with another woman an' he had her in mah room. An' so when I come back I went to bed. An' she had put somepin in mah mattress for me. An' so I went to the medical doctor an' he told mah mother that I better see a 'erb doctor. [Evidently she explained to medical doctor that she had been tricked and he advised the mother to find a herb doctor. I found this sort of advice several times - see Index and Introduction.] He [the 'erb doctor] come to me an' he said I wus hurt, an' he told me to take ev'rything off of mah bed an' scal' [scald] mah bed off an' look in the mattress. An' I looked in the mattress. An' he had a piece in it jis' about that long - a little bag with a whole lot of little stuff in it. An' so he made me some teas. An' there was silkweed, an' whiskey, an' High John the Conker an' Low John - an' made me a tea of it. An' I took that three times a day. Then I took a bottle of three S's [SSS]. An' that's whut cured me.
Entry 1512
This happened to my mother-in-law. My mother-in-law she was sick, she was sick for a long time. She'd have spells - looked like she'd have them about twicet a month. She'd fall and we had to pick her up and put her in bed. We had the doctor. He doctor her and doctor her. The doctor couldn't do her any good. So fin'lly I went on aroun' and that darn ole man - one day I was talkin' to him and tellin' him about it. He said, "Well," he said, "I think I kin cure her." I says, "All right, if you kin cure her," I says, "I'll pay you well for it." [Here is an echo from ancient Babylonia - no cure, no pay.] And I says, "Now, whut are you goin' cure her with?" I says, "I don't want you to give her any- thing that's poison." He said, "Well," he says, "I'll go and get the stuff and bring it right to your own home and I'll show you whut I'm goin' do to make the tea." And he goes and gits runnin'-huckleberry and siZkroot and milkweed [same plant as preceding siZkroot] and boil it together until it come to be - look kin'a milkish. Then he put a tablespoonful of cookin' soda in that, into a quart bottle, mix it up well and let it dissolve. [And he said] "An let her take three tablespoonfuls of it three times a day - first thing in the morning, and jis' before she eat her dinner, an' jis' before she go to bed."
Entry 1513
I've been hurt once [in 1912] by a woman. Well, I was poisoned in good fashion, I liked to die. I had Dr. A., a medical doctor, and his medicine went against me, it didn't do me no good. And the 'erbs that I kep home, which I keep some now, you boil them and then taken some and put on the whiskey in the bottle. I jis' plumb blin', jis' broke out all the way. And that's what got me my foot. And I - see, I keep that tea.
(What else do you do?)
Jis' roots and teas. Silkroots, blacksnake root and devil-shoestring root. You see, the first time you take de siZkroot - and you cut it a inch long and you steep dat in overnight water and put a cover over it. Well, it bitter, and it'll swell. You'll throw up ev'rything in you. De stuff come out of - green as you ever seen, as green as grass you ever seen. De devil-shoestring and the black- snake root you steep dem together and you drink that. Den, when I got so I could walk, I goes in the woods, take my hatchet. I gits some cherry bark, white oak bark and dogwood root, and bathed that - made a wash of this water, you know, and use it to wash with. And bathe right down, bathing that for nine mornings. And den, when you git ready to throw it away, you throw it to sunrise.