NOTES ON CHINESE MATERIA MEDICA. 257 



The tubers have a slightly saccharine and aromatic taste, with iseo-62. 

 a somewhat terebinthinous not unpleasant odour. Their aqueous 

 decoction is not rendered blue by iodine. 



OpJiiopogon Japonicus, a low-perennial with a creeping rhi- Ophiopogon 

 zome, produces small tubers as expansions of the radical fibres : apW( 

 that they are really identical with the drug found in the Chinese 

 shops, 1 have been able to convince myself by actual comparison. 

 Kaempfer, who figures the plant well, states that a second species 

 called in Japanese Temondo, and common in the province of Temondo. 

 Satzuma, produces larger tubers, and is therefore preferred. Two 

 varieties of Ophiopogon Japonicus are described by Thunberg ; l 

 one of them may possibly be identical with Ksempfer's Temondo. 

 According to Loureiro, the tubers of his Commelina medica 

 (Aneilema, li. Br.) are called MWi-mun-tung. 



The drug under notice is in frequent use among the Chinese, 

 the candied tubers being eaten as a medicine. 



7C f I -* Te%n-mun-tung ; Tubers of Melanthium Cochin- MelantMum 

 chinense, Lour. ; Tian-myn-dun, Tatarinov, CataL Med. Sinens., J^^~ 

 p. 56 ; Pun-tsaou, Fig. 401. 



These, like the preceding, are fleshy, translucent, yellowish- 

 brown tubers, of the thickness of a writing quill to that of the 

 little finger, and often 3 inches in length. They are usually 

 flattened, and more or less contorted and longitudinally furrowed. 

 They have a mucilaginous, slightly saccharine taste, but do not 

 possess any marked odour. 



Loureiro states that this drug is regarded as diaphoretic and 

 expectorant, and that it is administered in phthisis and also 

 (in the form of decoction ?) to allay feverish thirst and heat. It 

 is also preserved with sugar as a sweetmeat. It appears to be 

 produced in the province of Chekiang. According to Loureiro, 

 the plant is frequent in dry hedges both in Cochin- China and 

 China. 



TvC Muh-heang ; Eoot of Aucklandia Costus, Falc. (Com- Auckland, 

 positce), Linn. Trans., vol. xix., part i. (1842), p. 23 ; Aplotaxis 

 Lappa, Decaisne, in Jacquemont's Voyage dans I'lnde, tome iv. 



1 Flora Japonica, p. 139. 



S 



