364 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol. XV. 



JATROPHA GLANDUL1FERA, Roxb., Undirbibi. 

 (With a plate.") 



- Abundant in waste places in Western India. There is a very glandular shrubby 

 species of Jatropha with reddish tinged leaves and red flowers, a naturalised 

 plant from Tropical America known to the people as Vilyati ratanjoh, the 

 Jatropha gossypifolia, Linn. Its special interest lies in the fact that it has been 

 mistaken by Dr. Dymock in his " Pharmacographia Inclica" III., 273, and quoted 

 by Mr. Nairne in " Flowering Plants of Western India," page 295, for the subject 

 figured which is the true appurtenant to the name J. glandulifera, although it 

 is much less glandular than the species referred to above. Roxburgh describes 

 this plant minutely in the Flora Indica, Clarke Ed., page 689, and to it belongs 

 the legend given by Dr. Dymock to the following effect : — A cultivator near 

 Pandarpur was ploughing his field while crowds were passing to meet the 

 palanquins of the gods brought from other temples to Pandarpur, and many 

 passengers asked the cultivator what he was going to sow. Polite for a time, the 

 repeated enquiries became irritating, and to one of the questioners a very rude 

 answer was given ; this one happened to be the god Vithoba in disguise, who 

 rejoined, 'As you sow, so may you reap, ' and ever after as long as the field was 

 held by a Hindu it produced nothing but Undirbibi. As far as is known, this 

 plant is indigenous only near Pandarpur ; the specimen figured was carried to 

 Poona by the writer and photographed while in flower. 



G. MARSHALL WOODROW. 

 Kelvinside, Glasgow, July, 1903. 



No. XIX.— RAT KILLED BY LEAD-POISONING. 



When going into an empty room in my bungalow here three or four days 

 ago, my nose was assailed with that smell which indicates the vicinity of decay- 

 ing animal matter. I found a dead rat and lying close beside it the small 

 cartridge (saloon or miniature rifle) which I send herewith. I conclude the 

 rodent gnawed the bullet and died from lead-poisoning. 



A. C. YATE, Lt.-Col., 



2nd Baluch Battn. 



Karachi, 31s« July, 1903. 



[The bullet shows plainly the marks of a rodent's teeth, and the rat was 

 probably attracted by the grease on the bullet. — Ed.] 



No. XX— THE FOOD AND POISON OF CENTIPEDES. 



Mr. Okeden's notes on the " Centipede eating a Snake " published in the 

 last number of the Society's Journal, has suggested to me that the following 

 notes may be of interest : — 



I was disturbed one night by the noise of a sparrow in distress, and thinking 

 that a snake had probably got hold of it, I pulled down the nest which was in 

 the roof of my verandah, and found a large centipede clinging round the 

 sparrow's body with its head buried in the bird's side. The centipede would not 

 or could not let go its hold, and was cut away with a pair of scissors. 



