The root of the hop is not without its uses, containing starchy substances which can be made into glucose and alcohol. It also contains a certain amount of tannin, which, it has been suggested, might be used with advantage in tanneries.
Until recently trumpeted forth in the advertisements of a certain patent medicine, it was not generally known outside the medical profession that hops possessed medicinal qualities of considerable value. Old medical writers, however, must have changed their views on the subject within a hundred years after the time of Andrew Boorde, from whose works we have already quoted a few lines. Wm. Coles, Herbalist, in his _History of Plants_, published in 1657, states that certain preparations of hops are cures for about half the ills that flesh is heir to. Another old writer declares the young shoots of the hop, eaten like asparagus, to be very wholesome and effectual to loosen the body (the poorer classes in some parts of Europe still eat the young hops as a vegetable); the head and tendrils good to purify the blood in the scurvy and most other cutaneous diseases (which scurvy is not), and the decoctions of the flower and syrup thereof useful against pestilential fevers. Juleps and apozems are also prepared with hops for hypochondriacal and hysterical affections; and a pillow stuffed with hops is used to induce sleep. This last method, by the way, was taken advantage of by the medical advisers of George III. That unfortunate king, when in a demented condition, always slept on a pillow so prepared. Another writer tells us that the Spaniards were in the habit of boiling a pound of hop roots in a gallon of water, reducing it to six pints, and drinking half a pint when in bed of a morning, under the belief that it possessed the same qualities as sarsaparilla. Dr. Brooks, in his _Dispensatory_, published in 1753, concurs with the older writers on the subject.
_Observations and Experiments on the Humulus Lupulus of Linnæus, with an account of its use in Gout and other Diseases_, is the title of a pamphlet by a Mr. Freake, of Tottenham Court Road, published in 1806. The author states that a patient of his, who was in want of a bitter tincture, found all the usual remedies disagree with him, and after numerous unsatisfactory experiments, fell back upon a preparation of hops, which appeared to answer its purpose. This led Mr. Freake to try further experiments with the hop, when he came to the conclusion that it was an excellent remedy for relieving the pains of gout, acting sometimes when opium failed. { 86}