Medicine

An Account of the Foxglove

by William Withering

In 1775 William Withering, a physician in Birmingham, was asked what he thought of a family recipe for the dropsy, kept secret by an old woman in Shropshire, and worked out that of its many herbs the foxglove was the one that did the good. Ten years later he published this careful account of the patients he had given it to, with the doses and the failures. Digitalis, from the foxglove, is still given for the heart.

The librarian

Read it in the Library After Dark Or read it as plain text

Reading time

About 3 hr 5 min

Where to find it

The Medicine Room

Edition

Project Gutenberg, eBook #24886. In the public domain in the United States.