Dress and care of the feet: $b showing their natural shape and construction; their usual distorted condition; how corns, bunions, flat feet, and other deformities are caused, with instructions for their prevention or cure. Also, directions for dressing the feet with comfort and elegance, and many useful hints to those who wear, as well as those who make foot-coverings.Peck, John Lord
Science
Dress and care of the feet: $b showing their natural shape and construction; their usual distorted condition; how corns, bunions, flat feet, and other deformities are caused, with instructions for their prevention or cure. Also, directions for dressing the feet with comfort and elegance, and many useful hints to those who wear, as well as those who make foot-coverings.
Peck, John Lord
Boots; Foot; Foot -- Care and hygiene; Footwear; Shoes
“When business or other circumstances prevent the patient from
adopting this plan, and oblige him to stand or walk a good deal,
still it is possible to remove all pressure from the corn. For
this purpose from eight to twelve pieces of linen, smeared with an
emollient ointment, and having an aperture cut in the middle exactly
adapted to the corn, are to be laid over each other, and so applied
to the foot that the corn is to lie in the opening in such a manner
that it can not be touched by the shoe or stocking. When the plaster
has been applied some weeks the corn commonly disappears without
other means. Should the corn be on the sole of the foot, it is only
necessary to put in the shoe a _felt_ sole wherein a whole has
been cut, corresponding to the situation, size, and figure of the
induration.
“A corn may also be certainly, permanently, and speedily eradicated
by the following method, especially when the plaster and felt with a
hole in it are employed at the same time. The corn is to be rubbed
twice a day with an emollient ointment, such as that of marshmallows,
or with the volatile liniment, which is still better; and in the
interim it is to be covered with a softening plaster. Every morning
and evening the foot is to be put, for half an hour, in warm water,
and while there the corn is to be well rubbed with soap. Afterwards
all the soft, white, pulpy matter outside of the corn is to be
scraped off with a blunt knife; but the scraping must be left off
the moment the patient begins to complain of pain from it. The same
treatment is to be persisted in without interruption until the corn
is totally extirpated, which is generally effected in eight or twelve
days. If left off sooner the corn grows again.”
The “Hydropathic Encyclopædia” recommends a more summary mode of
dealing.
“These well-known toe-tormenters are produced by tight shoes or
boots. The first principle of cure is to give the feet a respectable
‘area of freedom;’ and the second is, to soak them in warm water and
shave off the horny substance, and then touch them with the nitric or
nitro-muriatic acid. When the corn is inflamed or highly irritable,
the tepid foot-bath should be employed to remove this condition
before the acid is applied. The _aqua-regia_—nitro-muriatic acid—is
the ordinary secret remedy of the ‘corn-curers.’ When the corn is
fully formed, or ripe, a membrane separates it from the true skin,
so that it can be taken off without injuring that surface; and this
circumstance enables professional chiropodists to ‘elevate the grain’
on the point of a penknife, after an application of the acid.”
Another mode, similar in character, is taken from a late work by Dr.
Ira Warren.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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