274 ODOROGRAPHIA. 
readily dries on paper without penetrating it and without render- 
ing it transparent. 
In Bombay the balsam is known as Balsdn-Ka-tel. It is 
imported from Arabia under the Arabic designation Duhnul- 
balasén. When freshly imported it is a greenish-yellow turbid 
oleo-resin of the consistency of honey, of powerful pleasant odour, 
somewhat like rosemary. The balsam is in high esteem among 
the Eastern nations as a medicine, as an odoriferous unguent, and 
as a cosmetic. 
In the dialects of Persia and Bombay the wood of this tree is 
called Ude-i-balasdn, the word ude being pronounced broadly as 
aood, which approaches the English word “wood” when pro- 
nounced slowly. This wood, known to the druggists as Xylobal- 
samum, consists of small branches about 16 centimétres in length 
and as thick asa pen, marked with small alternate excrescences 
which are the remnants of the secondary branches which bore the 
flowers. The bark is of a reddish brown, marked with regular 
longitudinal streaks; the wood is white, hard, of very feeble 
perfume, and devoid of taste by reason of age. Guibourt men- 
tions having also met with, at the native druggists, small tips of 
branches 11 to 14 millimétres in length and of not more than 2 
millimétres in thickness, covered with a rough reddish bark 
transversely striated; this substance was of an aromatic, rather 
bitter taste, and of a sweet agreeable odour when perceived in 
bulk. On being pinched by the hand it developed a strong odour 
sunilar to that of rosemary. 
The fruit or berries of the tree, called in Persian Tukhme-i- 
Balasdén, and in the Bombay and Arabic dialects Habul-Balasdn, 
are also imported into India and kept by the native druggists. 
They are known as Carpobalsamum. They are of a greyish-red 
colour, about the size of a pea, pomted at the ends. The kernel 
is oily and of agreeable aromatic taste. Dr. Dymock reports * 
having compared these berries with the figures and descriptions 
given in Bentley and Trimen’s ‘ Medicinal Plants’ (t. 59) and 
considers there can be no doubt of their identity. If soaked in 
water they soften, so that they can be easily dissected, and the 
remarkable form of the pulpy layer within the epicarp is seen. 
Sections of the epicarp show very large ramifying balsam cells, 
which appear to communicate one with another. 
* Pharm, Journ. [3] viii. p. 104, 
