178 STRYCHNOS NUX -VOMICA 



ovules in each cell in several rows on the axile placentas. Style 

 filiform, a little longer than the corolla, stigma capitate, faintly 

 bifid. Fruit a smooth, shining, globular berry, as large as an 

 apple, varying from 1 J to over 2 inches in diameter, rind tough or 

 somewhat hard, thin, bright orange-yellow, when ripe completely 

 filled by a soft white gelatinous pulp in which the seeds are 

 irregularly immersed, and which is traversed by the fibrous 

 remains of the dissepiment. Seeds several, usually 1 5, circular, 

 nearly flat, about 1 inch in diameter and nearly | inch thick, 

 slightly hollowed in the central part of the dorsal surface, some- 

 what convex on the ventral, margin rounded and narrowly keeled ; 

 testa blackish-, yellowish-, or whitish-grey, very densely covered 

 with fine short, adpressed, whitish silky hairs, radiating from the 

 centre, hilum, central prominent, raphe slightly raised, passing to 

 a slight prominence in the margin ; embryo f inch long, lying at 

 the edge of the seed in a broad chink of the horny endosperm 

 which readily splits into two halves, radicle thick, club-shaped, 

 cotyledons cordate-ovate, acute. 



Habitat. This tree is common in many parts of Southern 

 India, as the Malabar and Coromandel coasts ; it also grows in 

 Ceylon and in Burmah, Cochin- China, Timor, and Java, and even 

 extends to N. Australia, if 8. lucida, R. Br., be properly referred to 

 the same species. It flowers in the cold season. 



Plants are still cultivated in our botanic gardens, the tree 

 having been first brought here in 1778 by Dr. P. Kussell. 



DC. Prod., ix, p. 15; Roxb., M. Ind., i, p. 575; Benth., PI. 

 Austral., iv, p. 369; Lindl., PL Med., p. 528. 



Official Parts and Names. 1. Nux VOMICA; the seeds: 2. 

 STEYCHNIA ; an alkaloid prepared from Nux Vomica (B. P.). 

 The seed (Nux Vomica) (I. P.). Nux VOMICA ; the seed 

 (U.S. P.). 



1. Nux VOMICA. Commerce. Nux vomica is imported into 

 Great Britain and other parts of the world, from the East Indies. 

 There are no recent returns of the quantity imported into this 

 country, but judging from those of a few years since, the amount 



