THE POISONOUS PLANTS OF BOMBAY. 245 



of the pericarp contains anacardic acid and cardol. Besides being 

 soluble in ether as noted by Lapire, it is soluble in alcohol and vege- 

 table oils. Anacardic acid and cardol are readily decomposed by heat. 

 Exposure to them produces irritant effects even from a distance in 

 some constitutionSj particularly in those which are predisposed to 

 irritation by virtue of their tender cutaneous system. It is impossi- 

 ble to know beforehand which constitution might suffer and which 

 escape. When, however, it is once found out that a particular consti- 

 tution does suffer from near or from afar, it were best for such a 

 constitution to keep aloof from the marking-nut, or its operations, 

 when other persons are using the nut. " According to Basiner," says 

 Dr. Lyon, " when subcutaneously injected in large doses, the yellow 

 oily liquid known as cardol causes in warm-blooded animals stupor 

 and paralysis." Medicinally given, the juice, as a whole, acts as a 

 stimulant and narcotic. Surgeon-General Balfour notes that the juice 

 is much administered internally to elephants. " Given in large 

 doses," says he, " it renders these animals furious." 



The volatile nature of the oil of some of the members of the 

 Anacardiacem is very striking. Thus, for instance, referring to Schinus 

 molle (false pepper), Sir Joseph Hooker, in editing Mrs. Hooker's 

 translation of LeMaout and Decaisne's " Descriptive and Analytical 

 Botany," adds a note that " fragments of the leaf of this plant floated 

 on water move about by jerks owing to the discharge of a volatile oil 

 from the tissues." Let me add that this false pepper plant is a small 

 tree of tropical America, with a sugary edible drupe 1 and a mastic 

 with a slight odour of pepper (LeMaout and Decaisne, p. 363, 1873). 

 Balfour says that the torn leaves of this plant send out the resinous 

 matter with so great a force " as to cause a sort of spontaneous 

 motion by the recoil." Another congener of the marking-nut known 

 as Melanorrhcea usitatissima (or usitata as Dr. Gregg calls it), which 

 yields the so-called Martaban varnish, possesses a thick viscid greyish 

 fluid, assuming a black colour on exposure. It constitutes the black 

 varnish of the Burmese, and is extensively used by them. The point I 

 wish to notice about this fluid black varnish is, that it has a distinctly 

 terebinthinate smell. Ordinarily the black oleo-vesinous fluid from 

 the pericarp of the marking-nut is without any smell, " It is known 



