774 INDIAN MEDICINAL PLANTS. 



Habitat : — Deccan Peninsula ; " one of the commonest shrubs 

 of Coromandel, growing in all situations." (Roxburgh.) 



A sraggling thorny shrub. Branches green herbaceous. 

 Bark light brown, rough, wood white, soft, consisting of con- 

 centred layers in which the pores, surrounded by white loose 

 tissue, are alternately scanty and many — (Gamble) young shoots 

 pubescent, glabrous afterwards ; spines in each axil 1-2 in. 

 number, £-lin. long. Leaves stiff, shining, sharply mucronate 

 or spinescent i-2in. long 5-fin. broad, elliptic, acute. Flowers 

 greenish white, sessile, axillary, clustered, scarcely J in. diam. 

 Female flowers solitary or in 2-fid clustered. Male flowers in 

 dense globose fascicles, the supporting leaves of the upper fasci- 

 cles reduced to bracts or obsolete, so that the flower-branches 

 end in naked interrupted spikes on which the flowers are 

 whorled. Calyx T J in.; petals linear-lanceolate, acute, spread- 

 ing, -§■ in. Ovary 2-celled. Cells 2-ovulate, or more often- lovu- 

 late. Berry i in. diam. white ; usually 1 seeded. 



Uses : — The leaves, root, and milky juice are bitter and are 

 used medicinally by the Hindus. Dr. P. S. Mootooswamy, (Ind. 

 Med. Gazette, October 1889), states that the leaves are considered 

 stimulant, and are given to puerperal women immediately after 

 confinement. They are administered in the following manner 

 by the villagers : — The leaves with an equal quantity of Neem 

 leaves, and a little powdered brick, are finely ground and given 

 twice a day for the first two days, no food being allowed. For 

 the next six days the woman gets a little boiled rice and pepper 

 water once a day, and is allowed to drink a little warm water 

 after the meal ; she is not allowed to sleep after her food dur- 

 ing the day, and if thirsty must quench her thirst by eating 

 betel leaves and areca nut. From the seventh day she gets her 

 ordinary food. It is also the practice among the rural classes 

 to give 2 or 4 ounces of Neem oil soon after delivery ; with a 

 little roasted assafoetida, and the woman is made to take daily 

 for a month from the morning of the third or fourth day a bolus 

 of a stimulating confection, called Nadayeayam in Tamil, which 

 is supposed to keep off cold from the system. (This practice 

 is general amongst the country people in most part of India). 



