ACACIA 



KATH AND KKKI^AL CATECHU 



Pale Catechu 



months of December to March inclusive are those of most energetic opera- 

 f ions. The produce of each cauldron is approximately 36 to 44 Ib. a day, 

 but the total yield during the season cannot be accurately determined 

 since much depends on the quality of the trees, their proximity to the 

 boiling place and, above all, the working days of the season. The proceeds 

 of one cauldron may be 2,000 Ib., or it may exceed 6,000 Ib. As to the 

 yiclil of cutch per given weight of heartwood, it is believed that a ton of Yield, 

 wood might be taken as yielding 250 to 300 Ib. of cutch. 



In the western and northern tracts of India, such as Kanara, Dharwar, other Forms of 

 Khandesh, Surat and Baroda, and to some extent Chota Nagpur in Bengal, 

 Dehra Dun and Gonda in Oudh, dark-coloured cutch is also prepared by a 

 process that only differs in minor details from that briefly described in con- 

 nection with Pegu. The industry in these regions is on a much smaller 

 scale and the appliances are correspondingly less perfect, but the principle 

 involved is the same. In Gujarat, as a rule, the trees are not felled, but the 

 larger branches are simply lopped off, and these are cut and boiled down into 

 cutch. The article from these localities as met with in the market differs, 

 however, materially in external appearance and shape from Pegu cutch. 

 It occurs in small cubes, flat cakes or rounded balls, and is of a redder 

 colour and more opaque fracture. The influence of the method of manu- 

 facture, more especially the use of iron cauldrons, will be discussed in a 

 further paragraph. 



2. Pale Catechu or the crystalline substance known as Kath. This Method of 

 is the restricted name, given in Northern India to a grey crystalline Prepan 

 substance prepared from a concentrated decoction of A. Catechu wood 

 by placing in it a few twigs and allowing the decoction to cool. The twigs 

 are removed and the crystalline substance found adhering to them is 

 collected and pressed into large irregular cubes. Whether the liquid is 

 rejected or is afterwards boiled down to produce a poor quality of dark 

 catechu or cutch has curiously enough not been recorded. The cubes 

 of grey crystalline substance are the kath, which is eaten by the Natives 

 in their pan and which imparts with lime the red colour to the lips. It is, 

 apparently, hardly ever exported to Europe, and the name kath, while Kumaon Kath. 

 chiefly applied to it, is in some parts of India unfortunately also given to 

 cutch. Kath and cutch have by Europeans been mistaken for the same 

 substance, but the former is much purer chemically than the latter, and 

 it may be owing to the fact of cutch being the form exported to Europe 

 that catechu has lost the former position it held as an astringent MEDICINE. Medicinal Form. 

 It seems probable that the preparation of kath may be a secondary process secondary 

 from the cutch, since its direct preparation from the original decoction Manufa 

 has only been observed at Kumaon, although the substance is universally 

 used in pan all over India. This subject deserves to be thoroughly in- 

 vestigated, and the merits of kath and its process of preparation made 

 better known. In a further paragraph will be found an abstract of recent 

 investigations that have a bearing on the issue here raised. [C/. Madden, 

 Journ. As^ Soc. Beng., 1848, 565.] 



3. Keersal or Khersal. From the wood of Acacia Catechu is 

 occasionally obtained a pale crystalline substance known as khersal. The 

 woodmen, when cutting up the timber for fuel, sometimes come across this 

 substance and carefully collect it, since it is much valued as a medicine 

 by the Hindus, and fetches a high price. [Cf. Dymook, Mat. Med. Western 

 Ind., 232 ; Bomb. Gaz., vi., 13.] 



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