The term, English Mercury, has been given because of its excellent remedial qualities against indigestion, and bears out the proverb: "Be thou sick or whole, put [229] Mercury in thy koole." Poultices made from the herb are applied to cleanse and heal chronic sores, which, as Gerard teaches, "they do scour and mundify." Certain writers associate it with our _good_ King Henry the Sixth. There is made in America, from an allied plant, the oak-leaved Goosefoot (_Chenopodium glaucum_), or from the aphis which infests it, a medicinal tincture used for expelling round worms. The Stinking Goosefoot, called therefore, _Vulvaria_, and _Garosmus_, grows often on roadsides in England, and is known as Dog's Orach. It is of a dull, glaucous, or greyish-green aspect, and invested with a greasy mealiness which when touched exhales a very odious and enduring smell like that of stale salt fish, this being particularly attractive to dogs, though swine refuse the plant. It has been found very useful in hysteria, the leaves being made into a conserve with sugar; or Dr. Fuller's famous _Electuarium hystericum_ may be compounded by adding forty-eight drops of oil of amber (_Oleum succini_) to four ounces of the conserve. Then a piece of the size of a chestnut should be taken when needed, and repeated more or less often as required. It further promotes the monthly flow of women. But the herb is possessed _odoris virosi intolerabilis_, of a stink which remains long on the hands after touching it. The whole plant is sprinkled over with the white, pellucid meal, and contains much "trimethylamine," together with osmazome, and nitrate of potash; also it gives off free ammonia. The title, Orach, given to the Stinking Goosefoot, a simple of a "most ancient, fish-like smell," and to others of the same tribe, is a corruption of _aurum_, gold, because their seeds were supposed to cure the ailment known popularly as the "yellow jaundice." These plants afford no nutriment, [230] and, therefore, each bears the name, _atriplex_, not, _trephein_, to nourish:-- "Atriplicem tritum cum nitro, melle, et aceto Dicunt appositum calidum sedare podagram _Ictericis_ dicitque Galenus tollere morbum Illius semen cum vino saepius haustum." "With vinegar, honey, and salt, the Orach Made hot, and applied, cures a gouty attack; Whilst its seeds for the jaundice, if mingled with wine, --As Galen has said--are a remedy fine." "Orach is cooling," writes Evelyn, "and allays the pituit humors." "Being set over the fire, neither this nor the lettuce needs any other water than their own moisture to boil them in." The Orach hails from Tartary, and is much esteemed in France. It was introduced about 1548. GOOSEGRASS.