492 
INDIAN MEDICINAL PLANTS. 
pair ; leaflets 3-4 pair, l-2in. long, glabrous, shining, oblong 
or obovate, obtuse or acute, rigidly coriaceous. Flowers -rVlin. 
long, pale yellow, crowded in long slender spikes from the 
axils of the upper leaves, or arranged in terminal panicle. 
Spikes peduncled, |ft. long or more, usually panicled from 
the nodes of old leafless branches. Pedicels short, or absent. 
Calyx shortly 5-toothed ; petals 5, stamens free, 10, exserted, 
anthers tipped with glabrous, deciduous glands. Pods woody, 
2- 4ft. , or more by 4-5in., curved, constricted between the 
seeds, consisting of 10-30, one-seeded, flat, square or nearly 
orbicular joints, the valves thick, separating from the thick 
rim. Seeds 2in. broad, flat, nearly orbicular, brown, shining, 
testa hard. The seeds.are eaten after being roasted. 
Uses : — The kernel of the seeds is employed by the Hill people 
as a febrifuge. In Java, employed as emetic (Drury). 
An infusion of the spongy fibres of the trunk is used with 
advantage for various affections of the skin in the Philippines. 
(Dalzell and Gibson). The seeds are used in pains of the loins 
and debility (Watt.) 
The properties of the seeds do not appear to have been tested 
in European practice (Dymock). 
Powdered kernel, mixed with some few spices, is commonly 
taken by native women for some days immediately after delivery, 
for allaying the bodily pains and warding off cold (Watt), 
i Crude saponin was extracted from the seeds after removal of the fat by 
means of 90 per cent alcohol, and precipitated by ether from the cold alcoholic 
extract. By precipitation with barium hydroxide solution, a saponin, named 
“‘Saponin A. ” was removed from the aqueous solution of this crude saponin. 
The solution thus freed from “Saponin A ” was evaporated to dryness, after 
removing the excess of barium hydroxide, the dry residue extracted with hot 
90 per cent, alcohol, and the alcoholic solution fractionally precipitated with 
chloroform and ether. The aqueous solution of the ether precipitate was 
dialysed, and the residue evaporated to dryness in vacua over sulphuric acid. 
“Saponin B” C 1S 0 10 was thus obtained as a whitish hygroscopic 
powder, which became brownish on heating to.110 "C. It was precipitated 
from strong aqueous solutions by basic, but riot by normal load acetate. 
It gave a dark reddish-violet color, with strong sulphuric acid, eventually 
turning brown. On hydrolysis, a sugar identical with galactose, a sapogenin 
soluble in ether and in alcohol, and another body insoluble in those solvents 
and in ammonia, were formed.— J. S. Ch. I. 16-5-1904, p. 502. 
