52 THE ]\rEMCINAL PLANTS OF THE PHILIPPINES 



used in Java as an injection for gonorrhoea. In western 

 India and in the Philippines it is an article of diet. The 

 seeds yield an oil that is used for illumination and- as a co- 

 mestible. 



Botanical Description. — A large tree of the first order 

 with digitate leaves of 6-8 leaflets, broad, oval, very acute, 

 tough, glabrous, growing on a long common petiole.* No pet- 

 iole proper. Flowers of a foetid or feculent odor, herma- 

 phrodite, in compound racemes. Calyx fleshy, soft pubescent 

 internally, bell-shaped, in 5 parts. Corolla none. Nectary 5- 

 toothed, on the end of a small column. Stamens 15, inserted 

 on the border of the nectary by threes, forming a triangle. 

 Filament almost entirely wanting. In the midst of the sta- 

 mens is visible a small, hairy body' of 5 lobules which are the 

 rudiments of the ovaries. The style protrudes and twists 

 downwards. Stigma thick, compressed, of 5 lobules. Fruit, 

 five woody pods, semicircular, joined to a common center, 

 each enclosing many oval seeds inserted in the superior 

 suture. 



Habitat. — Luzon, Mindanao, Cebii, Iloilo. Blooms in 

 March. 



Sterculia urens, Eoxb. {S. cordifoUa, Blanco ; Cavallium 

 urens, Schott. & Endl.) 



NoM. VuLG. — Banilad, Tag. 



Uses. — The root bark is pounded up and applied locally in 

 orchitis and in severe contusions with supposed fracture of the 

 bones ; native charlatans pretend to cure the latter condition by 

 this treatment. 



The trunk exudes a sort of gum, which with water forms a 

 sort of colorless, odorless gelatin which dissolves at the boiling 

 point. I do not know to what use this gum is applied in ther- 

 apeutics, but it is often found mixed with the Senegambian 

 gum acacia. 



