The Description.

            1. Bugula spreadeth and creepeth alongst the ground like Moneywort; the leaves be long, fat, & oleous, and of a brown colour for the most part. The flowers grow about the stalks in roundels, compassing the stalk, leaving between every roundel bare or naked spaces; and are of a fair blue colour, and often white. I found many plants of it in a moist ground upon Blackheath near London, fast by a village called Charlton, but the leaves were green, and not brown at all like the other.

            2. Bugle with the white flower differeth not from the precedent, in roots, leaves, and stalks; the only difference is, that this plant bringeth forth fair milk white flowers, and the other those that are blue. It is also found with a flesh coloured flower, and the leaves are less snipped than those of the former. Bauhin makes mention of one much less than those, with round snipped leaves and a yellow flower, which he saith he had out of England, but I have not as yet seen it, nor found any other mention thereof.

The Place.

            Bugula groweth aImost in every wood and copse, and such like shadowy and moist places, and is much planted in gardens: the other varieties are seldom to be met withal.

The Time.

            Bugula flowereth in April and May.

The Names.

            Bugle is reckoned among the confounds or wound herbs and it is called of some Consolida media, Bugula, and Bugulum: in High Dutch, Guntzel; in Low Dutch Sengroen: of Matthiolus, Herba Laurentina: in English, Brown Bugle: of some, Sicklewort, and Herb Carpenter, but not truly.

The Nature.

            Bugle is of a mean temperature, between heat and dryness.

The Virtues.

            A. It is commended against inward burstings, and members torn, rent, and bruised: and therefore it is put into potions that serve for nodes, in which it is of such virtue, that it can dissolve & wash away congealed and clotted blood. Ruellius writeth that they commonly say in France, how he needeth neither physician nor surgeon that hath Bugle and Sanicle, for it doth not only cure rotten wounds being inwardly taken, but also applied to them outwardly; it is good for the infirmities of the liver; it taketh away the obstructions, and strengtheneth it.

            B. The decoction of Bugle drunken, dissolveth clotted or congealed blood within the body, healeth and maketh sound all wounds of the body, both inward and outward.

            C. The same openeth the stoppings of the liver and gall, and is good against the jaundice and fevers of long continuance.

            D. The same decoction cureth the rotten ulcers and sores of the mouth and gums.

            E. Bugula is excellent in curing wounds and scratches, and the juice cureth the wounds, ulcers and sores of the secret parts, or the herb bruised and laid thereon.