24 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTOEY SOCIETV, Vol. XIV. 



Dictionary also D. ferox is mentioned as a China plant, bearing white 

 flowers. In Hooker's Index Keweusis the following synonyms are 

 given for D. ferox : — 



1. D. Bertolinii, Pari, &c. 



2. D. Isevis, Birtol. Fl.'.Ital &c. 



To sum up, although Clarke in Hooker's Fl. Br. India describes 

 D. fastuosa and D. Metel as separate species as originally named by 

 Linnaeus, Dr. Trimen says that the two species are scarcely separable 

 (Flor. Ceylon, p. 238-239, Pt. Ill, 1895). Fliickiger and Hanbury 

 hold the same view. They say that D. alba, Nees, appears to be 

 scarcely distinct from D. fastuosa, Linn, D. alba and D. stramonium 

 according to these writers are different, as they say '' the seeds of 

 D. alba are very different-in appearance from those of D. stramonium 

 being of a light yellowish-brown, rather larger size, irregular in shape 

 and somewhat shrivelled " (Pharmacographia, p. 462, 2nd Ed., 1879). 



The Datura plant is mentioned in Amarkosh, one of the oldest 

 Sanskrit Dictionaries extant. Its author's name is Amarsinha. 

 Horace H. Wilson, a celebrated Sanskrit scholar, in the preface to the 

 first edition of his Sanskrit-English Dictionary (1819), has it that 

 Amarsinha flourished in the fifth century A. D. ; the same view is 

 held by another eminent Sanskrit scholar, Professor Monier Williams 

 of Oxford. He says that the Amarkosha of Buddha Amarsinha 

 belongs to a period not later than A. D. 500. (See " Indian Wisdom," 

 Monier Williams, p. 171, Lend., 1875). Thus it will be seer? that 

 the Datura plant has been known in India for several centuries. There 

 are many synonyms in Amarkosh for Datura. We are chiefly 

 concerned with two of them. They are as follows : — 



1. ^^H^=''{Uninatta). This Sanskrit word is changed by European 

 writers into Hummatu through the Tamil word Umattai. The same 

 Sanskrit word is adopted b}' some European writers as Nil-hummatu 

 through the Telugu word Ndlld-ummitte, or Nalla-imetta. 



2. "({["^^ =={Mdtula). This Sanskrit word is changed by some 

 European writers into Metel. I may here mention that the terra 

 Meteloides, which is used by some European writers, seems to be derived 

 from the Sanskrit word ^]^^=={Mdtuhmga). It must be noted 

 here that the three Sanskrit words mentioned above indicate the white- 

 flowered plant. For in Raja Nighant and in Bhav-Prakash there is 



