Ladies' Bedstraw.

Botanical name: 

Plate 03. Gallium luteum.

A PRETTY wild plant, frequent about hedges in June and the succeeding months. The stalk is weak and two feet high; the leaves are of a blackish green, and small; and the flowers are yellow. The stalk is angular and whitish, very brittle, and seldom straight; the leaves stand a great many at each joint, and are small, narrow, and disposed about the stalk like the rowels of a spur: the flowers grow in great tufts on the tops of the stalks, so that they make a very conspicuous appearance, though singly they are very small.

This herb is little regarded, but it has very great virtue; it should be gathered, when the flowers are not quite blown, and dried in the shade. An infusion of it will cure the most violent bleedings at the nose, and almost all other evacuations of blood.


The Family Herbal, 1812, was written by John Hill.