TIIK PURGING CROTON 



CUCUMIS 



MELO 



Sweet Melon 



It will thus be observed that while both the exports and the imports 

 inere;i-"l very considerably within the past twenty-seven years, a 

 serutinyof the details reveals the fact that the most important improve- 

 ment lias taken place within the last six or seven years and is due mainly 

 the expanding supply of Indian Aloe Fibre (see Agave, 44-5). 



CROTON TIGLIUM, Linn. ; Fl Br. Ind., v., 393 ; Pharmacog. D.E.P., 

 ml, iii., 281-6 ; Gamble, Man. Ind. Timbs., 1902, 614 ; EUPHORBIACE^B. ii., 617-20. 

 IK- Purging Croton, jaya-pdla, jaypdl, kanakaphdla, jamdl-gota, nepdl, Croton. 



am, kanako, bori, dand, etc. A small tree met with under cultivation 

 hroughout the greater part of India ; said to be naturalised in Eastern 

 en-jal, Assam, and elsewhere. 



Gamble states definitely that it is not indigenous. It was apparently first 

 described by Acosta in 1578, and subsequently by Rheede in 1679, then by 

 Rumphius in 1743. The purging croton grows on the poorest soils, such as waste Cultivation, 

 lands, from the sea-level up to about 3,000 feet. Under cultivation no special care 

 necessary, and it will fruit in the second year. It has been spoken of as a 

 ade-tree for coffee. A little of the powdered oilcake forked into the soil has been 

 mmended as a protection for tea and other plants from grub and white ants, 

 he nuts yield a large amount of medicinal OIL which may be administered Medicine. 

 a violent purgative, or applied externally as a powerful vesicant. An inquiry 

 iade by Prof. W. R. Dunstan and Miss L. E. Boole into the nature of the vesicating Vesicant, 

 constituent resulted in their obtaining " a small quantity of a yellow oil which, 

 after a time, became a transparent resinous mass, intensely active and burning 

 without ash. It was found that crotonoleic acid owed its vesicant properties to 

 small proportion of this resin, to which the name of ' croton resin ' has been 

 irovisionally given " (Imp. Inst. Journ., 1896, ii., 264). It is said that croton 

 iii is used by fraudulent manufacturers as an adulterant of tincture of iodine. 

 Of. Brit, and Col. Drugg., 1901, xl., 176.] The seeds have similar properties to 

 the oil and are fairly largely used by the Natives of India. Kino-like exudation 

 has been discussed by Hooper (Rept. Labor. Ind. Mus., 1905-6, 34). Messrs. 

 Hearson, Squire & Francis say that if the London price be taken as 25s. to 35s. Trade. 

 <t cwt., the freightage, insurance and brokers' commission would have to be 

 orne by the shipper. It is better to express the oil before transit since much 

 lost on the voyage. For kino see Pterocarpus Marsupium (p. 908). 



CUCUMIS, Linn. ; Fl. Br. Ind., ii., 619-20 ; DC., Orig. Cult. Plants, D.E.P., 

 258-62 ; Cogniaux, DC., Monog. Phaner., iii., 479-507 ; Cooke, Fl Pres. ii., 626-38. 

 Bomb., i., 534-6 ; Duthie, Fl Upper. Gang. Plain, L, 371-4 ; Prain, Beng. 

 Plants, i., 522-3 ; CUCURBITACE^:. A genus of climbing herbaceous plants 

 rhich embraces twenty-eight species, of which more than half are 

 jcognised as African and only three or four Indian. It is noteworthy, 

 lowever, that of the Indian forms, two are the Melon and Cucumber 

 (economically very far the most important of all) and the third is C. 

 rttfj*, Roxb. a truly wild plant, never cultivated nor its fruits eaten. 



C. Melo, Linn. ; Duthie and Fuller, Field and Garden Crops, pt. ii., Sweet 

 51, pi. 1; Sweet Melon, kharbuja, karbuz, kharmuj, tarbuj, dungra, chibuda, 

 gidhro, zaghun, sarda, vcllari-verai, mulam-pandu, remo, etc. 



Most of the early travellers speak of the best melons of India being grown History, 

 from imported seed. The Emperor Baber makes, in fact, no mention of Indian 

 melons, but extols those of Samarkand. So also in Akbar's time none of the 



437 



or Karbuz. 



