American Materia Medica, Therapeutics and Pharmacognosy

In delirium tremens it produces a sedative influence, which results in
quiet, rest, and frequently in deep sleep.
In these cases it is best in hot infusion combined with warm beef-tea or
other hot nutritious liquid food. If its use be continued it will replace the
alcohol, and in its satisfaction of the unnatural demands of the stomach,
will enable the patient, with proper adjuvants, to permanently overcome
the taste for liquor. It must be given in conjunction with persistent and
concentrated nutrition, and may be combined with hydrastine or
strychnine or other nerve stimulants and tonics.
It is also of much service in the treatment of the opium and morphine
habits, and also that of cocaine. It must be pushed to the extreme limit
and any local irritant influence avoided.
In languid and enfeebled states of the stomach, with inactivity of the
peptic and other glands, whatever the cause, it is an immediate and
direct stimulant. In atonic dyspepsia and flatulent colic, in atonic
inactivity of the liver and other glandular organs which have a part in the
stomach and intestinal digestion, its influence is immediate and most
important.
It is a common ingredient of pills and laxative granules, and it certainly
improves the capillary circulation and nerve tone of the entire intestinal
tract.
In the stage of collapse of prostrating diarrheas and of exhausting fevers
and in cholera, no agent is more efficient. It is useful in yellow fever, in
typhus and in some cases of typhoid where there are great relaxation and
muscular weakness, where there are sluggishness of the nervous system,
torpor and insensibility, low muttering delirium and tendency to coma.
In relaxed and enfeebled conditions of the pharynx and post-nasal
membranes, in engorged sore throats not always accompanied with active
inflammatory symptoms, it will sometimes cure when other agents have
signally failed. This is especially true if there be a granular condition,
with dark colored membranes, or if there be a purple or discolored hue to
the mucous membranes, common in some long continued sore throats. It
is a valuable adjuvant in the treatment of diphtheria and in phlegmonous
tonsilitis, with sluggish circulation, and also in the sore throat of scarlet
fever. In these cases it may be used as a gargle and taken internally also.
A most serviceable general gargle is made by combining in strong
Ellingwood’s American Materia Medica, Therapeutics and Pharmacognosy - Page 95