124 PENGHAWAR DJAMBI. 



isse. so remarkable a production as a vegetable lamb, and then ex- 

 Guillanme claims with P ious credulity : 



de Bartas. " merveilleux effect de la dextre divine, 



La plante a chair et sang, 1'animal a racine, 



La plante comme en rond, de soy mesmes se meust, 



L'animal a des pieds, et si marcher ne peut, 



La plante est sans rameaux, sans fruict et sans feuillage, 



La plante a belles dents, paist son ventre affame 



Du fourrage voysin, 1'animal est seme"." 1 



The fable is revived in the following more elegant lines from 

 the pen of a modern author, but they are not very happy as 

 applied to a Sumatran plant : 



" Cradled in snow and fann'd by arctic air, 

 Shines, gentle Barometz ! thy golden hair ; 

 Eooted in earth each cloven hoof descends, 

 And round and round her flexile neck she bends ; 

 Crops the grey coral moss and hoary thyme, 

 Or laps with rosy tongue the melting rime. 

 Eyes with mute tenderness her distant dam, 

 Or seems to bleat, a Vegetable Lamb." 2 



Uses, surgical Before dismissing Penghawar Djambi, we must, however, 

 consider its reputed medicinal and surgical uses. As a styptic, 

 the hair of the stipes may be employed in the same manner as 

 cotton wool, tow, or the nap of a beaver hat. According to Dr. 

 J. M. Van Bemmelen, who has elaborately investigated the chem- 

 istry of the drug, 3 the styptic action of these hairs is solely 

 mechanical. Practitioners, however, have tried the effect of 

 an aqueous decoction of the hairs or of the stem, as a remedy 

 for internal hemorrhage, 4 and some have reported favourably 



1 See the French translation of Clusius's Latin version of Monardes, by 

 Anthoine Colin, Maistre Apoticaire, jure" de la ville de Lyon ; Ed. 2. Lyon, 

 1619, 8vo., where are preserved some other of these effusions "a la louange 

 de quelques drogues." 2 The Botanic Garden, ed. 3, pt. II., p. 30. 



* Chemische Lfntersuchung des Penghawar Vjambi in Vierteljahresschrift 

 fiirprakt. Pharmacie, V. bd., 3 heft (1856). 



4 Since the above was in type, I have heard from my friend, Dr. J. E. De 

 Vry, of Rotterdam, that the late Dr. Molkenboer, a talented Dutch physician, 

 was firmly of the opinion that a decoction of Penghawar Djambi was bene- 

 ficial in internal hemorrhage. 



