THE POISONOUS PLANTS OF BOMBAY, 101 



insects. The gum from the bark which Madame refers to is quite 

 different in kind. It possesses no insecticide properties. It is free 

 from the acridity which strongly characterizes the oleo-resinous product 

 from the mesocarp of the nut. The gum from the bark consists 

 chiefly of bassorine, common gum and gallic acid. It swells to a 

 considerable size, but does not dissolve in water.* Balfour says 

 "it forms a good substitute for gum arable. In South America 

 bookbinders wash books with a solution of the gum in order to 

 keep away the moths and ants." If it be a substitute for o-um 

 arabicj which has no insecticide properties, I cannot understand how it 

 can keep off" moths and ants. On the contrary ordinary gum arable 

 invites some kinds of ants. " The gum," says Balfour,f *' should be 

 collected when the sap is rising ; 5-12 lbs. can be collected annually." 

 Observe that Balfour further notes that the seeds are used to flavour 

 Madeira wine. 



There is a very strange series of remarks in Mr, T. N. Mukarji's 

 *' Hand Book of Indian Products " («z(ig P> 74), which must not be 

 allowed to pass unnoticed here. They are all the more strano-e 

 because he is supposed to know what he is writing about. " The 

 kernel," says he, " when raw is exceedingly acrid " (the italics are 

 mine — K.R.K.) ; "but when boiled it forms a delicious article of 

 food." Nothing of the kind. There is not the slightest acridity about 

 the unboiled " kernel." Boiled or unboiled, it is equally delicious. 

 True, some would consider the boiled or roasted kernel more delicious. 

 Further, Mr. Mukarji says that " the oil of the nut is used as an 

 anaesthetic in leprosy with advantage." Note that Mr. Mukarji is not 

 a medical man of any pretensions. He is a layman. Let him 

 understand that it is not the oil of the nut, but the oleo-resinous product 

 from the mesocarp of the nut^ or the true botanical fruit that is used 

 in leprosy ; and that too, not as an anassthetic, but as an acknowledged 

 remedy against the anaesthetic form of leprosy — ergo^ as a cure for 

 ancesthesia. It is strange that an oriental writer, knowino- the plant 

 well, should fall into such errors. He is merely a compiler. 



As Rai Bahadur Kanny Lai Dey truly observes in his " Indio-enous 

 Drugs of India," the oil extracted from the kernel " by expression is 



« O'Shaughnessy's Bengal Dispensatory, p. 281, 

 t TimlDer Trees of India, p. 19. 



