CHARCOAL AND ITS USES.

Marlborough Daily Times, Volume II, Issue 168, 29 October 1880, Page 3

CHARCOAL AND ITS USES.

Charcoal, laid flat while cold on a burn, causes the pain to abate immediately ; by leaving it on for an hour the burn seems almost healed when the burn is superficial. And charcoal is valuable for many other purposes. Tainted meat, surrounded with it, is sweetened ; strewn over heaps of decomposed pelts, or over dead animals, it percents any unpleasant odor. Foul water is purified by it. It is a great disinfectant, and sweetens offensive air if placed in shallow trays around apartments. It is so very porous in its “ minute interior,” it absorbs and condenses eases most rapidly. One cubic inch of fresh charcoal will absorb nearly one hundred inches of gaseous ammonia. Charcoal forms an unrivalled poultice for malignant wounds and sores, often corroding away dead flesh reducing it to one quarter in six hours. In cases of what we call proud flesh it is invaluable. It gives no disagreeable odour corrodes no metal, hurts no texture, injures no color, and is a simple sweetener and disinfectant. A teaspoonful of charcoal, in half a glass of water, often relieves a sick headache ; it absorbs the gases and relieves the distended stomach pressing against the nerves, which extend from the stomach to the head. It often relieves constipation, pain, or heartburn.