600 
INDIAN MEDICINAL PLANTS. 
yield to solvents about 17 per cent, of yellowish-red oil having an indine 
value of 129 3, and 92‘2 per cent, of fatty acids melting at 29°. Grimaldi and 
Prussia, in 1909, found the oil of colocynth seeds to have the specific gravity 
of 0 9289, solidifying point 14°, and iodine value 120'27. Power and Moore 
(1910) separated from the oil a phytosterol, melting between 158° and 160° C. 
The oil has a bitter taste if made from tbe undecorticated seeds (Hooper). 
545 . C. vulgaris, Schrad., h.f.b.i., ii., 621 . 
Syn. — Cucurbita citrullus, Linn. Roxb. 700. 
Vern. — Tarbfiz (H.) ; Tarmuj (B.) ; Tarbuj, Kalingad or 
Kalingan (Bomb.) ; Pitcha-pullam (Tam.). 
Habitat. — Cultivated throughout India. 
A climbing or trailing, hispid annual. Stems branching, 
angular ; tendrils 2-fid, firm ; pubescent. Petioles about 2in., 
nearly round, villous ; blade of leaf 3-5in. long by 2-3in. broad, 
triangular-ovate, cordate, deeply trifid ; segments pinnatifid, 
terminal one larger; lobes undulate orlobulate, pale-green above, 
ashy beneath. Flowers monsecious, axillary, solitary, rather large. 
Male flowers: — peduncle falling short of the petiole; Calyx 
campanulate, lobes narrowly lanceolate, equalling the tube ; 
Corolla about an inch in diam., greenish outside, and villous ; 
segments ovate, oblong, obtuse, 5-nerved. Stamens 3, anthers 
free. Female flowers : — Calyx-tube, fused with the ovary, con- 
tracted above, lobes and Corolla as in the male ; ovary ovoid ; 
densely villous ; style short, stigmas 3. Fruit large, ovoid, pale 
or dark-green or mottled, sometimes covered with a glaucous 
waxy bloom ; flesh white, yellowish or red, at times deeply pink. 
Seeds compressed, and usually margined, varying much in 
shape and colour. Some of the varieties grown in Alibag in the 
Kolaba District, have a glafieous green globose fruit. (K. R. K.) 
The wild plant may be either bitter or sweet without any 
observable structural differences. The bitter form comes very 
close to C. colocynthis, when that species is cultivated 
(Watt). 
Uses. — The seeds are used as a cooling medicine. In 
Bombay, they are considered cooling, diuretic and strengthening. 
The juice is used with cumin and sugar as a cooling drink 
(Dymock). The Vytians prescribe the juice of the fruit to 
quench thirst, and also an antiseptic in typhus fever (Ainslie). 
