I called on the old gentleman the other day, and persuaded him to give me a short lecture.  The following is the gist of what he said:  “First of all you must know that the elder is good for anything in the world, but especially for swellings.  If you put some of the leaves on your face, they will cure toothache in five minutes.  Then for the nerves there’s nothing like the berries of ivy.  Yarrow makes a splendid ointment; and be sure and remember Solomon’s seal for bruises, and comfrey for ‘hurts’ and broken bones.  Camomile cures indigestion, and ash-tree buds make a stout man thin.  Soak some ash leaves in hot water, and you will have a drink that is better than any tea, and destroys the ‘gravel.’  Walnut-tree bark is a splendid emetic; and mountain flax, which grows everywhere on the Cotswolds, is uncommon good for the ‘innards.’  ’Ettles [nettles] is good for stings.  Damp them and rub them on to a ‘wapse’ sting, and they will take away the pain directly.”  On my suggesting that stinging nettles were rather a desperate remedy, he assured me that “they acted as a blister, and counteracted the ‘wapse.’  Now, I’ll tell you an uncommon good thing to preserve the teeth,” he went on, “and that is to brush them once or twice a week.  You buys a brush at the chymists, you know; they makes them specially for it.  Oh, ’tis a capital good thing to cleanse the teeth occasionally!”

He wound up by telling me a story of a celebrated doctor who left a sealed book not to be opened till after his death, when it was to be sold at auction.  It fetched six hundred pounds.  The man who paid this sum was horrified on opening it to find it only contained the following excellent piece of advice:  “Always remember to keep the feet warm and the head cool.”

As I said good-bye, and thanked him for his lecture, he said:  “Those doctors’ chemicals destroy the ‘innards.’  And be sure and put down rue for the heart; and burdock, ’tis splendid for the liver.”

Nor must mention be omitted of old Isaac Sly, a half-witted labouring fellow with a squint in one eye and blind of the other, who at first sight might appear a bad man to meet on a dark night, but is harmless enough when you know him; he haunts the lanes at certain seasons of the year, carrying an enormous flag, and invariably greets you with the intelligence that he will bring the flag up next Christmas the same as usual, according to time-honoured custom.  He is the last vestige of the old wandering minstrels of bygone days, playing his inharmonious concertina in the hall of the manor house regularly at Christmas and at other festivals.