a. Pythagoras held _Malvoe folium
sanctissimum_; and we read of Epimenides in _Plato_, "at his
Mallows and Asphodels." The Romans esteemed the plant _in deliciis_
among their dainties, and placed it of old as the first dish at
their tables. The laxative properties of the Mallow, both as regards
its emollient leaves, and its _radix altheoe efficacior_, were told of
by Cicero and Horace.

The _Marsh Mallow_ grows wild abundantly in many parts of England,
especially in marshes near the sea coast. It gets its generic
name _althoea_, from the Greek _althos_, "a remedy," because
exercising so many curative virtues. Its old appellations were
_Vismalva_, _Bismalva_, _Malvaviscus_, being twice as medicinally
efficacious as the ordinary Mallow (_Sylvestris_).

Virgil in one of his eclogues teaches how to coax goats with the
Marsh Mallow:--

"Haedorumque gregem viridi compellere hibisco."

The root is sweet and very mucilaginous when chewed, containing
more than half its weight of saccharine viscous mucilage. It is,
therefore, emollient, demulcent, pain-soothing, and lubricating;
serving to subdue heat and irritation, whilst, if applied externally,
diminishing the painful soreness of inflamed parts. It is, for these
reasons, much employed in domestic poultices, and in decoction as
a medicine for pulmonary catarrhs, hoarseness, and irritative
diarrhoea or dysentery. Also the decoction acts well as a bland
soothing collyrium for [324] bathing inflamed eyes. Gerard says:
"The leaves be with good effect mixed with fomentations and
poultices against pains of the sides, of the stone, and of the bladder;
also in a bath they serve to take away any manner of pain."

The mucilaginous matter with which the Marsh Mallow abounds is
the medicinal part of the plant; the roots of the Common Mallow
being useless to yield it for such purposes, whilst those of the Marsh
Mallow are of singular efficacy. A decoction of Marsh Mallow is
made by adding five pints of water to a quarter-of-a-pound of the
dried root, then boiling down to three pints, and straining through
calico. Also Marsh Mallow ointment is a popular remedy, especially
for mollifying heat, and hence it was thought invaluable by those
who had to undergo the ordeal of holding red hot iron in their hands,
to rapidly test their moral integrity. The sap of the Marsh Mallow
was combined together with seeds of Fleabane, and the white of an
hen's egg, to make a paste which was so adhes