N. O. ROSACjE. 527 



Use : —The dried petals are slightly tonic and astringent, 

 and useful in debility. They are officinal in the Indian and 

 British Pharmacopoeias. 



476. R. alba Linn. H.F.B.I., n. 364. 



Vern.: — Swet or Sevanti gulab (H. and B.) ; Gul-seati (Pb.) 



Syn.: — R. glandulifera, Roxb. 407. 



Habitat : — Cultivated in India. 



Caucasus, Afghanistan ? (J. D. Hooker). 



Leaflets 5-7, large, grey, rugose, downy and pale beneath. 

 Flowers large white pale, or bluish, double. Sepals often 

 pinnatifid. 



Use : — The flowers are used as a cooling medicine in fevers, 

 also in palpitation of the heart (Baden Powell.) The petals 

 made into gulkand in Poona (a preserve with cane-sugar). 



477. Cydonia vulgaris Pers, h.f.b.i., ii. 369. 



Syn : — Pyrus cydonia, Linn. Roxb, 406. 



Vern : ■— Bihi (H.) ; Bamtsunt, bamsutu (Kashmir) ; Shimai- 

 madala virai (Tarn.). 



Eng :-— The Quince. 



Habitat : —Cultivated in N.-W. India. 



A large shrub ; branchlets, underside of leaves, peduncles 

 and calyx white-tomentose. Wood light brown, soft, even-grain- 

 ed. Leaves ovate from an obtuse base, entire ; petioles short, 

 stipules oblong, obtuse, glandular-serrate. Flowers white, 2in. 

 across. Calyx-lobes leafy, glandular-serrate, longer than tube. 

 Fruit large, clothed with grey, woolly tomentum ; 5-celled ; 

 endocarp cartilaginous. Seeds many, testa mucilaginous. 

 Flowers in March and April. 



Parts used :— -The seeds. 



Use : — The sweet and sub-acicl quinces are commonly eaten 

 as a fruit by the Arabs and Persians, and are considered 

 cephalic, cardiacal and tonic. The leaves, buds and bark of 

 the tree are domestic remedies among the Arabs on account 

 of their astringent properties. In India, the seeds are consi- 

 dered cold, moist, and slightly astringent, and are one of the 

 most popular remedies in native practice, the mucilage being 



