Amaranthus

Amaranthus blitum. It is also called flower gentle, flower velure, floramor and velvet flower.

It is a garden flower, well known. It grows from one to two feet high, streaked, and red towards the root, but very smooth, divided towards the top with small branches, among which stand long broad leaves of a reddish green colour, slippery; the flowers are not properly flowers, but tufts, very beautiful, but of no smell, of a reddish colour; if bruised they yield juice of the same colour; being gathered they keep their beauty a long time; the seed is of a shining black colour. They flower from august till the frost nips them.

There are several kinds of the amaranthus; but that used in medicine is the large one with the drooping purple spike. The flowers dried and powdered are used as a styptic, arresting the profusion of menses, diarrhoea, bleeding at the nose. Etcetera. One species bears a white flower, which stops the whites and cleanses and strengthens the kidneys.