APOCYNACER. 387 
with a layer of sand, being used as school-boards on which 
children ‘trace their letters asin the Lancastrian system. The | 
natives of Western India have a superstitious fear of it, and 
say that it assembles all the trees of the forest once a year to 
pay homage. (Graham.) 
Rheede in 1678 and Rumphius in 1741 described and figur~ 
ed the tree and noticed the medicinal use of the bark by the 
natives along with salt and pepper in febrile dyspepsia, and as 
a local application to ulcers and rheumatic joints. ‘Rumphius’s 
experience is, that the bark is useful in catarrhal dyspepsia and 
in the febrile state consequent upon that affection, and also for 
enlarged spleen. He says: “Ofits value in catarrhal dyspepsia 
I can speak from experience; the dose should be 15 grains 
taken at bedtime in powder or decoction.” Nimmo in 1839 
called attention to the bark as a powerful tonic, and suggested 
its use as an antiperiodic, Dr. Gibsou in 1853 contributed a 
short, but interesting, account of the drug to the Pharmaceu- 
tical Journal (xii., p. 422). Alstonia bark is official in the Phar- 
macopeia of India, and is described as an astringent tonic, 
anthelmintic, and antiper iodic. In the Concan the juice of the 
fresh bark with milk is administered in leprosy, and is also 
prescribed for dyspepsia and as an anthelmintic ; and the juice 
of the leaves with that of fresh ginger root or zedoary is 
administered to women after confinement. One of us has 
found the tincture of the bark to act in certain cases as a very 
powerful galactagogue: in one case the use of the drug was 
purposely discontinued at intervals, and on each occasion the 
flow of milk was found to fail. 
In 1874 Gruppe, an apothecary of Manilla, obtained. from 
the bark a substance which he named ditain. In the report on 
the Centennial Exhibition presented to the American Pharma- 
ceutical Association (Transactions 1877), the following account 
of this substance and of the use of the drug in Manilla is 
given :— Echites scholaris (Alstonia scholaris, Brown,) grows 
wild abundantly in the central provinces of the island of i 
where it has long been known and esteemed by the natives 
unde; the name of ‘ oa as a most efficient tanie. and : 
