74 THE MEDICINAL PLANTS OF THE PHILIPPINES 





reason for this confusion of terms, but presume it to be due to 

 imperfect knowledge of Spanish on the part of those who thus 

 quote Blanco. 



Pili-pitch, or elemi, as they call it in Manila, is a substance 

 existing in soft masses, slightly yellowish or gray, resembling 

 old honey in appearauce. Its odor is strong and agreeable, 

 somewhat like that of lemon and turpentine. Its taste is acrid 

 and bitter. 



The French pharmacist Meaujean demonstrated in 1820 that 

 elemi contains two resins, one soluble in the cold, and the other 

 in hot spirits of wine. Other chemists, among them Baup, 

 Fliickiger and Hanbury, have found elemi to be composed of a 

 resinous substance and a colorless essential oil ; the proportion 

 of the latter Fliickiger gives as 10 fo and further states that it 

 is dextrogyrous. Sainte-Claire Deville found the essential oil 

 levogyrous, a fact that emphasizes the probability of there be- 

 ing different products in the market bearing the name of elemi. 



Baup obtained several principles from it : (1) A resin, brein, 

 fusible at 187°, soluble in cold alcohol, crystallizable in oblique 

 rhombic prisms ; (2) another crystalline substance, bryoidin, 

 soluble in 360 parts water at 10°, and melting at 13°; (3) a 

 small amount of breidin, a body soluble in 260 parts water and 

 melting at 100°+ ; (4) another resin soluble in boiling alcohol, 

 called amyrin. 



White pitch is used in the Philippines to make plasters 

 which they apply to the back and breast of patients suffering 

 from bronchial or pulmonary complaints ; it is also applied to 

 indolent ulcers. We believe that elemi possesses the same 

 properties as copaiba, and that its indications for internal use 

 are the same. 



Botanical Description. — A tree 30-40 meters high, with 

 leaves alternate, odd-pinnate ; leaflets opposite, coriaceous. Flow- 

 ers yellowish-white in axillary, compound panicles, hermaphro- 

 dite. Calyx 3-toothed. Corolla, 3 oblong, concave petals. Sta- 



