CASSIA FISTULA.— LAXATIVE CASSIA. 
Class X. DECANDRIA.— Order I. MONOGYNIA. 
Natural Order, LEGUMINOSiE. — THE PEA TRIBE. 
Fig. (a) represents the pod or legume ; '(b) a longitudinal section of the same, showing the position of the seeds; (c) two views of a seed. 
This species of Cassia is a native of Egypt and the warmer parts of the East Indies, and is naturalized in 
the West Indies, and South America. It is the Cassia solutiva of the Arab and Greek physicians of the 
middle ages, as appears from the writings of Avicenna and Myrepsus, and is supposed to have received the 
same generic appellation as that which from time immemorial has distinguished the oriental aromatic spice, 
from the circumstance of its agreeable odour ; for we are told by Alpinus, when he was in Egypt, in the 
latter part of the 16th century, that the natives took great delight in walking early in the morning, in the 
spring season, near plantations of this kind of Cassia, regaling themselves with the fragrance of the flowers. 
The Cassia fistula was cultivated in England by Philip Miller, in 1731. Dr. Hasselquist, who observed it 
on the banks of the Nile, growing among the date trees, near. Alexandria, says it flowers in May; and the 
Arabs call it Hearsciambar. Bruce asserts, that it is a native of Abyssinia. 
It rises, when full grown, to the height of thirty or forty feet, and is branched towards the top. The 
bark, especially upon the trunk, is brownish, or ash-coloured, very much furrowed and cracked. The wood 
is white and soft. The leaves are alternate, pinnated, composed of five or six pairs of ovate-oblong, pointed, 
undulated leaflets, of a pale green colour, finely nerved with a prominent midrib underneath, and supported 
on short footstalks. The flowers are large, odorous, yellow- veined, and produced in long pendant axillary 
racemes. The calyx consists of five oblong, blunt, greenish, crenated leaves. The corolla is composed of 
five petals, which are concave, roundish, unequal, spreading, and waved. The germen is slender, cylindrical, 
and curved into a semicircle. The fruit is a long woody dark brown pod, about an inch in diameter, and 
nearly two feet in length, cylindrical, with two longitudinal furrows on one side, and one on the other, 
divided by thin plates or partitions into transverse cells, each containing one smooth, oval, compressed seed, 
of a dusky yellow colour, imbedded in a soft black pulp. 
The pods are said to undergo a kind of fermentation, to prepare them for keeping. In Egypt, ac- 
cording to Hasselquist, they are collected before they are quite ripe, and carried into a very close room, in 
which has been prepared a bed of palm leaves and straw, six inches deep. On this they lay the pods in a 
heap : the door is then closely shut, and the next day they sprinkle water on the heap, which is repeated 
the day following. In this manner the pods lie heaped for forty days, till they become black. Others, says 
he, dig a hole in the ground to put them in; but this method is greatly inferior to the former. Cassia pods 
are brought to this country principally from the West Indies, packed in casks and cases. The pods of the 
East India Cassia are smaller, smoother, and afford a blacker, sweeter, and more grateful pulp, than those 
which are brought from the West Indies, South America, or Egypt. 
Qualities. — The pulp, which is the part used, is separated from the woody part and seeds, by passing 
it through a sieve. It has a faint, somewhat nauseous odour, and a sweet mucilaginous taste. 
Qualities and Chemical Properties. — The pods of Cassia which are heaviest, and in which the 
seeds do not rattle, are the best, as they contain the greatest quantity of pulp, which is the part used in 
medicine. The best pulp is of a bright, shining black colour, and of sweetish sub-acid taste. According to 
M. Henry, it contains sugar, gum, a substance resembling tannin, gluten, and colouring matter soluble in 
ether. — Journ. Chim. Med. ii. 3/6. 
Medical Properties and Uses. — Both the leaves and flowers are purgative, as well as the pulp. 
The latter is occasionally used as an agreeable laxative for children ; but adults require so large a portion of it 
to produce any effect, that it is never employed for them, excepting when combined with more active remedies. 
Dr. Cullen conceived that it possessed no advantages over the pulp of prunes, in which opinion we readily 
coincide. It enters into the composition of the subjoined officinal preparations, to which it imparts a plea- 
sant flavour. 
Confectio Cassise, L. E. D. 
Confectio Sennse, L. E. D. 
