172 RUBIACEA. ‘ 
isin constituted the greater portion of the 10°4 per cent, 
of ash obtained on combustion, 
UNCARIA GAMBIER, fz. 
Fig.— Hunter in Trans. Linn. Soc. iz., 218, t. 22; Kor 
Verh. Nat. Gesch. Bot., t. 84; Bentl. and Trim., 139. 
extract, Gambier, Pale catechu (Hng.), Gambir cubique (Fr rac 
Hab.—Malacca, Penang, Bia gh pate. The extract’ of the : 
leaves, and young shoots. : 
Vernacular.—Chini+Katha or Kath, &c. (Ind.) In the In- 
dian languages it bears the same name as Acacia Catechu, with 
- the addition of the adjective Chinese. 
History, Uses, &c.—We meet with no account of thi 
substance in Hindu or Mahometan works on Materia M 
Anslie mentions the drug, but he appears to have been Vi 
imperfectly acquainted with it, as in his first volume he 
_cribes the different kinds of catechu found in Southern In 
without noticing Gambier. (Materia Indica, I1., p. \ 
Flickiger and Hanbury in their Pharmacographia remé 
that:—“If we may credit Rumphius, it would seem that 
important manufacture of Gambier had no existence at 
commencement of the last century, As to ‘Gutta Gambi 
his statements are scarcely in accord with those of more recent — 
writers. We may, however, remark that that name is very 4 
the Tamil Katta Kambu, signifying catechu, which drug ! 
sometimes made into little round cakes, and was certainl: 
large export from India to Malacca and China as early as t 
Stevens, a merchant of Bombay, in his Compleat Guide to the 
Eastern India Trade, published in 1766, quotes the prices 
of goods at Malacca, but makes no allusion to Gambier. 1} 
is there any reference to it in Savary’s Dictionnaire de 
merce (Edn. of 1750), in which Malacca is mentioned as 
_ great entrepét of the trade of India with that of China a 
