204 INDIAN MEDICINAL PLANTS. 



karanj (Mundari,) Tele {Ho) ; Burkiinda (Mundarij (Bomb.) ; 

 Kavalee talbsu (Tel.) ; Vellay putali (Tarn.) ; Kalru (Ajmir). 



Habitat : — N. W. India, Assam, Behar, Eastern and Wes- 

 tern Peninsulas, Ceylon dry country. 



A large deciduous tree. " Bark J in. thick, very smooth, 

 white or greenish grey, exfoliating in large thin irregular papery 

 flakes. Wood very soft, reddish brown, with an unpleasant 

 smell, with light coloured sap wood, always feels wet or oily. 

 Pores large, often oval and sub-divided, very scanty, frequently 

 filled with gum. Medullary rays moderately broad, on a radial 

 section prominent as long, dark undulating bands, giving the 

 wood a mottled silver-grain ; the distance between the rays is 

 larger than the transverse diameter of the pores. Alternate dark 

 and light concentric bands across the rays " (Gambled The 

 bark gives good fibre. The colloid gum is called Katira. 

 Leaves crowded at the ends of branches, tomentose beneath, 

 nearly glabrous above, ; simple, cordate, shallowly-palmately- 

 5-lobed ; lobes entire, acuminate, blade 8-12in., petiole 6-10in. 

 long. Flowers yellow, small, in crowded, erect, more or less 

 pyramidal dense panicles, clothed with a dense sticky tomen- 

 tum of glandular stellate hairs ; a few flowers bisexual, mixed 

 with a large number of male flowers. Staminal-column short ; 

 anthers about 20. The gynophore short, thick. Calyx J in. 

 diam., campanulate, 5-parted, lobes acute, spreading. Fruit 

 -±-5 follicles, yellow-pubsecent, sessile, radiating, ovoid, thickly 

 coriaceous. Carpels, 3 in. long, red when ripe, covered outside 

 with stiff stinging bristles. Seeds 3-6 in each carpel, oblong, 

 dark brown. This tree is often associated with Boswellia 

 throughout the Peninsula (Brandis). 



Uses : —The leaves and tender branches steeped in water 

 yield a mucilaginous extract, useful in pleuro-pneumonia in 

 cattle (Watt.) 



The gum, known as karai-gond, is used as a substitute for 

 tragacanth in Bombay (Dymock). 



The Santals consider the gum a useful medicine in throat 

 affections. (Revd. A. Campbell.) 



