446 SCIENTIFIC AND APPLIED PHARMACOGNOSY 



Description. Stems from 10 to 50 cm. in length, nearly cylindrical, 

 from 1 to 2 mm. in diameter, purplish-brown and pubescent or puber- 

 ulent. Leaves short-petiolate, lanceolate or oblanceolate, entire, 

 with distinctly revolute margins, summit acute, somewhat mucronate- 

 tipped, upper surface dark green and rough pubescent, lower surface 

 light greenish-brown and canescent; petaliferous flowers, when fresh 

 bright yellow, on drying yellowish-brown and consisting of 5 sepals, 

 an equal number of large petals, numerous stamens and a unilocular 

 ovary, the latter becoming in fruit an ovoid capsule, which is about 

 5 mm. in length and contains numerous, small blackish-brown seeds, 

 which are somewhat triangular in section and covered with small, 

 rounded, reddish-brown papillae; apetalous flowers in axillary clusters 

 nearly sessile, petals about 5 mm. in length, stamens 4 in number, the 

 capsule about 3 mm. in length, enclosing from 6 to 10 small blackish- 

 brown papillose seeds; odor aromatic; taste astringent and bitter. 



INNER STRUCTURE. See Fig. 194. 



Constituents. A small quantity of volatile oil; 10 per cent of 

 tannic acid; a bitter principle which forms white crystals; and 

 probably also a glucoside. The presence of small crystals of ice at 

 the base of the stem in autumn is due to the deposition of globules of 

 water on the stellate hairs which freeze, and hence the popular name 

 frost-weed is given to the plant. 



BIXACE^E, OR ANNATTO FAMILY 



These are shrubs or trees found in the Tropics, and are of interest, 

 chiefly on account of the seeds of Bixa Orellana, which furnish the 

 coloring matter known as ANNATTO (Orlean, Arnotta). The plant is 

 found in tropical America and also in Polynesia and Madagascar. 

 The seeds are covered with a fleshy arillus from which the coloring 

 matter is prepared by means of water. The insoluble matter is col- 

 lected, made into cakes and chiefly used for dyeing and coloring. 

 Annatto contains a red crystalline principle, bixin, a yellow coloring 

 principle, orellin, and an ethereal oil. The root of this plant also 

 contains some coloring matter. 



TARAKTOGENOS KURZII. Chaulmoogra Seeds. The seeds of 

 Taraktogenos kurzii (Fam. Bixaceae), a native of Burma. The seeds 

 on expression yield a fatty oil, commonly known as chaulmoogra oil. 



like leaves. L, a short-stalked glandular hair. M, a transverse section 

 through a stoma, partly covered with a stellate hair. N, a small mestome 

 strand from the leaf showing a strand of leptome (L), surrounded by a sheath 

 (P) of thin-walled parenchyma, After Holm, Merck's Report, 1912, p. 38. 



