542 LEGUMINOSAE. 
sured, white, yellow or reddish, which derives its name from 
the port of Massowa. Both of these are good soluble gums, 
and if carefully sorted not much inferior to Kordofan gum, 
Both are exported to Europe, and form the East Indian gum 
of commerce. About 15,000 cwts. of these gums were annually 
imported into Bombay, but since the war in the Soudan the 
imports have much decreased. 
Akakia, according to the best Arabic and Persian autho- 
rities, is an extract prepared from the juice of the Karaz. This 
is the fruit of the Acacia nilotica of Delile (Fl. Aigypt., t. 963), 
the Acacia vera of Vesling (Eigypt., p. 9, Icon.), aud is called 
by the Egyptians ‘‘ Sant.” 
Tt is the axavOos of Theophrastus (iii, 4; iv., 3; vi., 1) and 
the Acanthus of Virgil, who speaks of “ baccas semper fron- 
dentis acanthi” in allusion to the globular inflorescence 
(Georg. ii., 119). 
Pliny (24, 67) says that ‘‘the juice is left to thicken in the 
pods, which are steeped in rain water for the purpose, and 
/then pounded in a. mortar; after which the juice is extracted 
by means of presses, It is then dried in the sun, and when 
dry divided into tablets,” It is considered to be cold and dry, 
astringent, styptic, and tonic, and is used internally and locally 
in relaxed conditions of the mucous membranes, also as a 
collyrium in purulent conjunctivitis and chronic congestion of 
the vessels of the conjunctiva. Applied as a lotion it is said 
to improve the complexion. With white of egg it is a good 
application to burns and scalds, powdered it arrests hemor- 
rhage ; in short, it is used in all cases in which an astringent 
is indicated, 
Description.—It is heavy, hard, and has an agreeable 
odour, small fragments held between the eye and the light 
should be of a bottle-green ‘colour, but some samples have @ 
reddish tinge like the glass of which hock-bottles are made; 
_ when seen in bulk it appears black. The taste is sweet, 
astringent and mucilaginous. Placed in cold water it soon 
Te es, forming a mucilage in which floats a quantity — 
