Introduction
Gratiola officinalis, L. Hedge hyssop. Nat. Ord., Scrophulariaceae.
Provings
I. TRINKS. (No information.) Great ill-humour and desire for solitude (1st day); fretful mood (do); no desire to talk or more; earnest reflective mood; irresolution, no persistency in work; dizzy in head, he stands long looking at one spot, without thinking about it (soon); reeling gait; drawing pain on left frontal protuberance (1st day); pain as after a blow on left temporal bone, when touched (3 hours); pressure in eyeballs (2nd days); creeping in ears (speedily); tensive feeling in face as if swollen (3rd days); drawing pain over left eye (1/4 hour); tearing in right half of face; creeping and burning in right zygoma, and 1/4 hour late in left; heat of face and hand (1st hour); burning and creeping, with feeling of swelling in cheeks (1 1/2 hours); jerking, painful drawing in front of throat (12th, 13th days); drawing in upper incisors (1 hour); creeping on gums; accumulation of saliva in mouth; creeping sensation in fauces; urging to eructate, which changes to qualmishness (5 morning); eructations several times during 1st hours; hunger, but want of appetite (1st day); qualmishness, a. m., which is relieved by eructations (1st day); food causes slight pressure in gastric region, and fulness lasting several day; after a late supper, in early morning while in bed, some gastralgia; digging in region of stomach; sudden urging to vomit, with shivering on scalp (soon); pressure in scrob. cordis (soon) also after eating (2nd, 3rd day); pressure in pit of stomach as from a stone moving here and there with cramp-like drawings extending into chest, accompanied by frequent qualmishness and eructation lasting several day, and always worse after eating (4th days) tensive stitches in epigastrium, with nausea and occasional eructation, evening (1st day); while walking, dull stitches in epigastrium, especially during inspiration (4th days); cutting at epigastrium (1/2 hours); an hour after an ordinary meal, gnawing in scrob. cordis as from hunger, which goes off after eating again, but soon returns; pain under short ribs on left side, after dinner; dull stitches under short ribs during dinner, intermitting (4th days); same, right side, evening (3rd days); same on left side (2nd and 3rd days); griping about navel, after food (2nd days); griping in abdomen, evening for several day; after food griping in belly, and soon thereafter urging to stool without evacuation; griping after food, especially morning and evening, for several day (from 2nd lays); cutting pain in belly, while sitting (6 hours); borborygmi after dinner (1st day); hard stool, some hour later every day, often preceded by urging (2nd to 12th day); after long urging to stool a hard evacuation, for several day; after frequent urging to stool and rumbling, as if diarrhoea would ensue, a hard evacuation requiring pressure; in early morning, after great straining a scanty firm-formed stool (2nd day); evacuations for first weeks hard and tardy, then softer and (as usual) twice daily; a thin, pappy, yellow stool; urine is scanty and radish, cloudy on standing; drawing pain in glans penis; violent stitches from the spermatic cord through abdomen to chest. Oppression of chest and increased action of heart (1 hour); stronger and quicker action of heart (1st day); dull digging pain in right ischium, evening (1st day); crampy drawing in under part of left upper arm, also at several spots in hands (1st day); tearing drawing pain in arms, especially left elbow and wrist (2nd and 3rd days); tearing throbbing pain in left elbow (3rd days), also in left wrist (6th day); paralytic feeling in left arm, evening (1st day); bruised pain in loins; after a slight walk, bruised pain in thighs (2nd day); tetanic condition with clear consciousness while lying p. m., after deep sleep, in which an emission had occurred, – on waking, bruised pain in whole body, especially back and left arm (1st day); great relaxation of body and mind (1st day); early in bed feels as if beaten, better after getting up, but confused in head (4th days); heaviness in arms and thighs, when moving; yawning and relaxation of body, with desire to lie down (1st day); profound stupefied sleep, on waking dazed in head; chill with cold hands, which returns several times during day (3 hours); chill and shivering especially along back, with quite cold hands, a. m. (1st day); shivering over head, evening (1st day); increased warmth in hands (soon after ingestion.) (HARTLAUB and TRINKS, Arzneimittellehre, ii.)
2. NENNING.[*See Acidum hydrocyanicum, i, 26(vol.i, p.30)*] Fretful or hilarious mood; speedy but transient vertigo; feeling as if brain was contracted and head would become smaller, with general sick feeling, going off in open air (1 hour) sudden sensation in whole head, while sitting, as if someone let go a steel spring which had been made very tense, and which vibrated and hummed for some time, so that hearing and sight vanished, though consciousness was not lost, – attack lasted 2 morning (2nd days); feeling in middle of forehead as if a hair hung down, which he constantly wanted to wipe away (2 hours); frequent sudden burning in left frontal eminence, as if one suddenly approached with a red-hot iron; boring and tearing in temples, p. m., and at night, only a little next morning, the most violent pain lasts only 1/2 hour, aggravation from cold to warmth, and temples become very sensitive from the pain; long-lasting accumulation of saliva in mouth (1/4 hour; stitches in left false ribs, now stronger, now weaker, often completely intermitting, – in morning on rising, after stool and after dinner (2nd days); pinchings and drawings on both sides of hypogastrium up to chest, then stitches over navel and in there, very painful (3 hours); first usual stool, then violent fluid evacuation with pains in belly, then urging, – soon after stool pains in belly again, and another fluid evacuation (6 p. m.); catamenia 8 days too early, and last 2 days longer than usual. Heat in chest over scrob. cordis, then in head, with redness of face and hands but with only ordinary warmth of surface; itching of skin at various points. (Ibid.)
3. Dr. HERRMANN, aet. 39, sanguine temp., good health, save for drawing pains in occiput from time to time, which did not occur during proving. From 1-3 dr. of tinct. experienced no effect. From 5-24 dr. noticed following symptoms: – Vertigo, to staggering, in morning after rising, for some hour; pressure in temples, of short duration; pressure and itching in corners of eyes, with inflammation of conjunctiva; lids gummed together with dry pus, most in angles; inflammation of gum near a hollow tooth; hawking of much mucus in morning; tongue thickly coated, yet natural taste of food, and augmented appetite during whole time of proving; borborygmi and pinchings in abdomen after each dose;
stomach-ache with transient nausea,; fulness of abdomen and emission of malodorous flatus; itching at anus; great urgency to stool, as if diarrhoea would come on, – stools nevertheless very hard; pappy stool, twice in day, followed next day by constipation; burning in urethra while urinating; pressure in left side of chest, when breathing while stooping. From 20dr. paralytic drawing in thighs, as far as knees; frequent yawning and desire to sleep during any; great chilliness. (Archiv, xvii, 2, 165).
4. B-, man of 31, choleric-sanguine temp., in strong health. From 1-12 dr., –dazedness, pressure on right. forehead; continued itching in eyelashes; much borborygmus in abdomen; itching in anus and many urging to stool, which is sometimes hard, sometimes liquid; drawing and tearing in neck, right side; rheumatic drawing in shoulders; drawing in arms and tearing in all joints; weakness in legs; much yawning and great fatigue; skin of whole body moist (Ibid.)
5. Dr. KRATZENSTEIN. From 2-4 dr. of tinct. observing nothing save isolated symptoms, took it later in doses of 20 dr. twice daily. From these: – Violent rush of blood to head, with beating in forehead, which increased to vertigo with obscuration of vision, which movement-especially that of a carriage-carried even to loss of consciousness, and which did not cease till after a sleep of some hour. Indisposition to any mental exertion. Tearing in eyes, with formation of mucus on lids, especially at internal angles; in reading or looking at illuminated objects, momentary loss of sight, which disappeared after closing eyes, but returned incessantly; on reopening eyes all objects appeared white, even verdure of trees and grass. Itching as of insects crawling or cobwebs trailing along face, especially violent on lower joined compelling scratching, after which small pustules form, ending not in crusts but in desquamation. Much accumulation of saliva he ejects mouthfuls of clear water. Indescribable feeling of malaise in throat, which obliges continual swallowing, and this is difficult as if throat were constricted; food and drink, nevertheless, are swallowed freely; eructations ease the feeling, especially when he can bring up some bitter fluid, but it returns after some hour In stomach, especially some hour after food, twisting and digging, with distension of epigastric region, so as to need loosing of clothes, and exciting eructations and seen retching which brings up nothing but bitter mucus. Violent shoots in hypochondria, with fulness and sense of distension, eased by escape of flatus or by stool; bellyache, as in diarrhoea from chill, with twisting and digging, relieved by bending forward and resting. Frequent stools, with burning and pressing, and protrusion of large excrescences which-on their return within anus and even per se-cause darting pain; a fetid mucus escapes, brown and acrid, without caecal matter; irritation in anus continues, and after repeated efforts there follows a mass of semifluid faces, dark brown, mixed with mucus, very fetid; a final effort expels white mucus like white of egg, and appeases the rectal irritation and the pain in right hypochondrium and abdomen. Mucus in urine, floating cloud on standing; after micturition, burning and along urethra. Violent beating of heart, felt all through body, but only lasting a few seconds, – especially strong after stool. Small pulse, intermitting several times after the palpitation. Ill-humour; all contradiction excites him; passion; disgust for life, with uneasiness about his health. (Ibid.).
Hughes was a great writer and a scholar. He actively cooperated with Dr. T.F. Allen to compile his 'Encyclopedia' and rendered immeasurable aid to Dr. Dudgeon in translating Hahnemann's 'Materia Medica Pura' into English. In 1889 he was appointed an Editor of the 'British Homoeopathic Journal' and continued in that capacity until his demise. In 1876, Dr. Hughes was appointed as the Permanent Secretary of the Organization of the International Congress of Homoeopathy Physicians in Philadelphia. He also presided over the International Congress in London.