The plant is a native of the United States, found from Maine to Florida, and in Canada. The entire plant is destitute of verdure. The Herbalist, J. E. Meyers, says the entire plant is used for medical purposes. Its scarcity and high price have prevented its general use. Medicinal Part: The root. Solvent: Water. Bodily Influence: Diaphoretic, Sedative, Febrifuge. Uses: Crawley is recognized as the most powerful, prompt and certain diaphoretic in the“ Materia Medica”; its chief value is as a diaphoretic in fevers, especially in typhus and inflammatory low stages of diseases, and may be relied upon in all cases to bring on free perspiration without increasing the heat of the system, or accelerated action of the heart. It has proven effective in acute erysipelas, cramps, flatulence, pleurisy, and night sweats, it relieves hectic fever without debilitating the patient. Combined with Leptandra virginica( Black root) or Podophyllum peltatum( Mandrake) when it is found necessary to act upon the bowels or liver, and mixed with Dioscorea( Wild yam root) it will be found almost a specific in flatulent and bilious colic. Combined with Caulophyllum( Blue cohosh) it forms an excellent agent in amenorrhoea and dysmenorrhoea or scanty or painful menstruation and is unsurpassed in after-pains, suppression of Lochia, and the febrile symptoms which sometimes occur at the parturient period.
From 20 – 30 grains of the powdered root given in water as warm as the patient can drink( when in bad) and repeated every 1½ – 2 hr., according to circumstances.
Steep 1 teaspoonful of the root in 1 cup of boiling water for ½ hr. When cold( if ambulent) drink 1 or 2 cupfuls a day a good mouthful at a time. Crawley is recognized as the fever powder by some practitioners; should be kept well closed, away from light.
CROWFOOT Ranunculus bulbosus, L.( N. O.: Ranunculaceae)
Common Names: Buttercup, Crowfoot. Features: Do not classify the virtues of this plant with the Geranium maculatum( Cranesbill), which is also called Crowfoot, and belonging to the genus Ranunculus, family Ranunculaceae.
The 250 species are native in cold temperate regions throughout the United States and Europe, growing in fields and pastures; the root of this herb is a perennial, solid, roundish, and depressed, sending out radicals from its undersides, with annually erect hairy stems, 6 – 8 in. in height.
The leaves are on long petioles, each stem supports several solitary golden yellow flowers; five petals; stamens are numerous and hairy; flowering in May, June and July. When any part of these plants are chewed, the pain and much heat in the stomach will also be expressed by inflammation and excoriation of the mouth. Do not take internally. Solvent: Water. Bodily Influence: External rubefacient, Epispastic. Uses: This plant is too acrid to be used internally, especially when fresh. When applied externally it is powerfully rubefacient and epispastic. It is employed in its recent state in rheumatic neuralgia and other diseases where vestication and counter-irritation are indicated. Its action, however, is generally so violent that it is seldom used. The beggars used to use it to produce and keep open sores to excite sympathy. Homoeopathic Clinical: Tincture of the whole plant— Alcoholism, Breast( pain below), Chest( pains in), Chilblains, Corns, Delirium tremens, Diarrhoea, Dropsy, Dyspnoea, Eczema, Epilepsy, Feet( pains in), Gastralgia, Hay-fever, Herpes zoster, Hiccough, Hydrocele, Jaundice, Liver( pain in),