290 
INDIAN MEDIOINAL PLANTS. 
Parts used : — The seeds, bark, leaves and fruit. 
Use : — “ The seeds are given in coughs. The bark, unripe 
fruit, and leaves are pungent, bitter and purgative, and are 
considered to have anthelmintic properties. The African Arabs 
use the pulp of the fruit as a detergent and the bark to poison 
fish.” (Dymock.) 
According to Surgeon Parker of Poona, the seeds are useful 
in colic (Watt' Dictionary, Vol. I.) 
The soft parts of the fruit contain 7 per cent, of the Saponin C 18 H la O 10 . 
J. Ch. S. 1901 A I 848. 
A sample of oil prepared by the natives of Marogoro (German Bast 
Africa) from the seeds was of a light yellow colour and had a pleasant nutty 
taste and smell. It had the following characteristics Sp. gr. 0-9173 (15'C) ; 
Sapon. Value 195-6 ; Reichert-Meissl Value, 0 55 ; Polenske Value 0'4 ; iodine 
Value, 77 2 ; Acid Value 8 5; unsaponifiable, 0'07 percent; Stearic acid content, 
2'4 per cent. The oil became cloudy at 88°C. J. Ch. I. 15th Ma 1912 p : 442 
251 . — Gomphia cingustifolia, Vahl. h. f. b. i., 
i . 525 . 
Vern. : — Valermani (Mai); Bokera (Sinhalese). 
Habitat ; — Southern provinces of the Western Peninsula. 
Ceylon, common in low country, upper zone, rare in the 
dry region. Also on the Malabar coast, Singapore and the 
Phillippines. 
A small much-branched tree, young parts glabrous. 
T.eaves 2j-5in., distichous, nearly sessile, lanceolate, acute at 
both ends, finely serrate, glabrous, shining, veins very close 
and numerous, pellucid, with 2 marginal ones near the edge. 
Stipules deciduous. Flowers numerous, yellow, about |in., 
on slender pedicels, in large pyramidal terminal and axillary 
panicles. Sepals red, oval, acute, glabrous ; petals twice as 
long as sepals, clawed, obtuse. Stamens 10, filaments very 
short, anthers large, oblong. Ovary carpels ovoid, smooth. 
Style stout, very much exceeding Stamens. Ripe carpels 5 (or 
fewer), attached near their base to sides of the very large 
gynophore, surrounded by the persistent sepals, £-fin., ovoid, 
reniform, purple black, shining. Seed erect, embryo green. 
