436 INDIAN MEDICINAL PLANTS. 



A twining herb. Stems wide-climbing, slender, with a 

 few adpressed hairs. Stipules minute ; lanceolate, deciduous ; 

 petiole J-Hin. Leaflets 3, membranous or subcoriaceous, small 

 acute or subobtuse, green, with a few adpressed hairs above, 

 grey and more hairy below, the end one ovate or oblong, 

 l-2in. long. Racemes l-4in. lax, usually long, usually pe- 

 duncled, elongated, the pedicel fascicled. Calyx -§-- |-in.; teeth 

 lanceolate, as long as the tube. Corolla reddish. Pod linear, 

 glabrous, recurved, l|-2in. long, 8-10 seeded. 



Use. — It is used in Hindu Medicine. Its properties are des- 

 scribed in the Nighantu as follows : — 



The Mashparni is bitter, cooling, sweet, astringent, and dry. 

 It produces semen, strength, and blood. It cures consumption 

 and fever and disorders of wind, bile and blood. 



382. Mucuna monosperma, D.C., h.f.b.l, 

 ii. 185. 



Syn. — Carpopogon monospermum, Roxb. 553. 



M. anguina, Wall. 



Vern. — Sougarvi, mothi-kahili (Bomb.) ; Pedda, enooga, 

 doola-gunda (Tel.). 



Habitat. — East Himalayas, tropical zone, Khasia, Assam, 

 Chittagong and the hills of the West Peninsula. 



A large, woody climber, the yonng branches clothed with 

 rufous, deciduous tormentum. Leaves large, rachis 2-|-4jin., 

 with red, deciduous pubescence. Stipules deciduous. Leaflets 

 on short swollen stalks, 2-4, rotundate or broadly oval, shortly 

 acuminate, smooth above, more or less closely pubescent 

 beneath, lateral ones unequal-sided. Flowers large, lfin., 

 bright violet, keel green, on divaricate pedicels, Jin. long, 

 6-10in., a lax pubescent receme (or panicle), shorter than 

 leaves. Calyx sparingly clothed with red bristles ; upper seg- 

 ments wanting ; standard often with a few bristles on back. Pod 

 2in. ; broadty ovate-ovoid, shortly-stalked, somewhat curved, 

 with a short decurved beak, with a broad double horizontal 

 wing along both sutures and several (about 6) broad, erect, 

 distinct wings extending from them at right angles nearly half 



