Author: William Thomas Fernie (UK) - Year 1897
ONION
The homely Onion may be taken first as the best illustration of the
family. This is named technically Allium cepa, from cep, a
head (of bunched florets which it bears). Lucilius called it Flebile
coepe, because the pungency of its odour will provoke a flow of
tears from the eyes. As Shakespeare says, in Taming of the
Shrew:--
"Mine eyes smell onions;
I shall weep anon."
The Egyptians were devoted to Onions, which they ate more than
two thousand years before the time of Christ. They were given to
swear by the Onion and Garlic in their gardens. Herodotus
tells us that during the building of the pyramids nine tons of gold
were spent in buying onions for the workmen. But it is to be noted
that in Egypt the Onion is sweet and soft; whereas, in other
countries it grows hard, and nauseous, and strong.
By the Greeks this bulb was called Krommuon, "apo tau Meuein
tas koras," because of shutting the eyes when eating it. In Latin its
name unio, signified a single root without offsets.
Raw Onions contain an acrid volatile oil, sulphur, phosphorus,
alkaline earthy salts, phosphoric and acetic acids, with phosphate
and citrate of lime, starch, free uncrystallized sugar, and lignine.
The fresh juice is colourless, but by exposure to the air becomes red.
A syrup made from the juice with honey is an excellent medicine
for old phlegmatic persons in cold weather, when their lungs are
stuffed, and the breathing is hindered.
Raw Onions increase the flow of urine, and promote perspiration,
insomuch, that a diet of them, with bread, has many a time cured
dropsy coming on through a chill at first, or from exposure to cold.
They contain the volatile principle, "sulphide of allyl," which is
acrid and stimulating. If taken in small quantities, Onions quicken
the circulation, and assist digestion; but when eaten more prodigally
they disagree.
In making curative Simples, the Onion (and Garlic) should not be
boiled, else the volatile essential oil, on which its virtues chiefly
depend, will escape during the process.
The principal internal effects of the Onion, the Leek, and Garlic, are
stimulation and warmth, so that they are of more salutary use when
the subject is of a cold temperament, and when the vital
powers are feeble, than when the body is feverish, and the
constitution ardently excitable. "They be naught," says Gerard, "for
those that be cholericke; but good for such as are replete with raw
and phlegmatick humors." Vous tous qui etes gros, et gras, et
lymphatiques, avec l'estomac paresseux, mangez l'oignon cru; c'est
pour vous que le bon Dieu l'a fait.
Onions, when eaten at night by those who are not feverish, will
promote sleep, and induce perspiration. The late Frank Buckland
confirmed this statement. He said, "I am sure the essential oil of
Onions has soporific powers. In my own case it never fails. If I am
much pressed with work, and feel that I am not disposed to sleep, I
eat two or three small Onions, and the effect is magical." The Onion
has a very sensitive organism, and absorbs all morbid matter that
comes in its way. During our last epidemic of cholera it puzzled the
sanitary inspectors of a northern town why the tenants of one
cottage in an infected row were not touched by the plague. At last
some one noticed a net of onions hanging in the fortunate house,
and on examination all these proved to have become diseased. But
whilst welcoming this protective quality, the danger must be
remembered of eating an onion which shows signs of decay, for it
cannot be told what may have caused this distemper.
When sliced, and applied externally, the raw Onion serves by its
pungent and essential oil to quicken the circulation, and to redden
the skin of the particular surface treated in this way; very usefully
so in the case of an unbroken chilblain, or to counteract neuralgic
pain; but in its crude state the bulb is not emollient or demulcent. If
employed as a poultice for ear-ache, or broken chilblains, the Onion
should be roasted, so as to modify its acrid oil. When there is
a constant arid painful discharge of fetid matter from the ear, or
where an abscess is threatened, with pain, heat, and swelling, a hot
poultice of roasted Onions will be found very useful, and will
mitigate the pain. The juice of a sliced raw Onion is alkaline, and
will quickly relieve the acid venom of a sting from a wasp, or bee, if
applied immediately to the part.
A tincture is made from large, red, strong Onions for medicinal
purposes. As a warming expectorant in chronic bronchitis, or
asthma, or for a cold which is not of a feverish character, from half
to one teaspoonful of this tincture may be given with benefit three
or four times in the day in a wineglassful of hot water, or hot milk.
Likewise, a jorum (i.e., an earthen bowl) of hot Onion broth taken
at bedtime, serves admirably to soothe the air passages, and to
promote perspiration; after the first feverish stage of catarrh or
influenza has passed by. To make this, peel a large Spanish Onion,
and divide it into four parts; then put them into a saucepan, with half
a saltspoonful of salt, and two ounces of butter, and a pint of cold
water; let them simmer gently until quite tender; next pour all into a
bowl which has been made hot, dredging a little pepper over; and let
the porridge be eaten as hot as it can be taken.
The allyl and sulphur in the bulbs, together with their mucilaginous
parts, relieve the sore mucous membranes, and quicken perspiration,
whilst other medicinal virtues are exercised at the same time on the
animal economy.
By eating a few raw parsley sprigs immediately afterwards, the
strong smell which onions communicates to the breath may be
removed and dispelled. Lord Bacon averred "the rose will be
sweeter if planted in a bed of onions." So nutritious does the
Highlander find this vegetable, that, if having a few raw bulbs in his
pocket, with oat-cake, or a crust of bread, he can travel for two or
three days together without any other food. Dean Swift said:--
"This is every cook's opinion,
No savoury dish without an onion,
But lest your kissing should be spoiled,
Your onions must be fully boiled."
Provings have been made by medical experts of the ordinary red
Onion in order to ascertain what its toxical effects are when pushed
to an excessive degree, and it has been found that Onions, Leeks,
or Garlic, when taken immoderately, induce melancholy and
depression, with severe catarrh. They dispose to sopor, lethargy, and
even insanity. The immediate symptoms are extreme watering of the
eyes after frequent sneezing, confusion of the head, and heavy
defluxion from the nose, with pains in the throat extending to the
ears; in a word, all the accompaniments of a bad cold, sneezings,
lacrymation, pains in the forehead, and a hoarse, hacking cough.
These being the effects of taking Onions in a harmful quantity, it is
easy to understand that when the like morbid symptoms have arisen
spontaneously from other causes, as from a sharp catarrh of the head
and chest, then modified forms of the Onion are calculated to
counteract them on the law of similars, so that a cure is promptly
produced. On which principle the Onion porridge is a scientific
remedy, as food, and as Physic, during the first progress of a
catarrhal attack, and pari passu the medicinal tincture of the red
Onion may be likewise curatively given.
Spanish Onions, which are imported into this country in the
winter, are sweet and mucilaginous. A peasant in Spain will munch
an onion just as an English labourer eats an apple.
At the present day Egyptians take onions, roasted, and each cut into
four pieces, with small bits of baked meat, and slices of an acid
apple, which the Turks call kebobs. With this sweet and savoury dish
they are so delighted, that they trust to enjoy it in paradise. The
Israelites were willing to return to slavery and brick-making for
their love of the Onion; and we read that Hecamedes presented
some of the bulbs to Patrochus, in Homer, as a regala. These are
supplied liberally to the antelopes and giraffes in our Zoological
Gardens, which animals dote on the Onion.
A clever paraprase of the word Onion may be read in the lines:--
"Charge! Stanley, charge! On! Stanley, on!
Were the last words of Marmion.
If I had been in Stanley's place
When Marmion urged him to the chase,
In me you quickly would descry
What draws a tear from many an eye."
For chilblains apply onions with salt pounded together, and for
inflamed or protruding piles, raw Onion pulp, made by bruising the
bulb, if kept bound to the parts by a compress, and renewed as
needed, will afford certain relief.