494 LILIACE^. 



of the three humors), thirst, heart disease, itch, leprosy, fever, 

 rheumatism, and glandular enlargements. Rheede gives the 

 following: account of its medicinel uses in Malabar: — *' Folia 

 trita et in formam boli redacta, adversus optbalmiam et 

 oculorum suffusionem assumuntur : cum radice addito Allio ac 

 Auripigmento in oleo Sergelm decocta, gonorrliseam sanant, si 

 nerape caput cum oleo illo illinatur. Bulbus cum Sandalo citrino 

 et butyro bubulino tritus linimentum exbibet^ in nervorum con- 

 tractionibus et ardoribus adhibendum. Tota denique planta 

 oleo butyroque incocta omnium acculorum vitia emendat. 



Ainslie {Mat. IncL, ii,, 192) remarks : — ^' This fleshy creeping 

 root is, in a slight degree, warm to tbe taste, and of a not 

 unpleasant odour ; and is prescribed, by tbe native practitioners, 

 in the form of an electuary, in consumptive complaints and 

 coughs of long standing, to the quantity of a small teaspoonful 

 twice daily. The juice of the tender shoots of the plants they 

 administer to children to clear their tbroats of viscid phlegm. 

 The plant is cultivated in great abundance at Cumbum, and 

 on the Yursenand Mountains in tbe Dindigul District/^ 



Description. — Root perennial, stoloniferous. Stolones as 



j> 



sheathing scales. 



groujid 



four 



the exterior ones shortest, spreading most, and considerably 

 broader, the interior ones nearly erect, from! — 4 feet long, semi- 

 cyHndric, grooved on the upper side, each ending in a round, 

 tapering, sharp point ; they are all coloured with deeper and 

 lighter green, and somewhat striated, but otherwise are smooth. 

 Scapes issuing from the centre of the leaves, from 1^ — 2 feet 

 long, including the raceme, or flower-bearing part, erect, 

 round, smooth, about as tbick as a small ratan, between the 

 raceme and the base these are at regrular distances, four or five 

 pointed, alternate sheaths. Racemes erect, about as long as, or 

 longer than, the scape below the flowers, striated, smooth. 

 Flowers middle-sized, greenish-white, erect, collected in fasci- 

 cles of from 4 to 6, on little, regularly distant tuberosities of the 

 rachis. Bracts small, membranaceous. Pedicels clubbed, short, 

 ascending, one-flowered. Calyx none. Coralla one -petalled, 



