910 
INDIAN MEDICINAL PLANTS. 
the same point. Flower pale, purple, tinged with yellow or green, 
fin. diam., single or drooping, usually, axillary stalks. Calyx 
lobed nearly to the base. Segments leaf-like. Corolla bell- 
shaped ; lobes 5, short, broad, spreading. Base of filaments 
hairy, dilated, covering the ovary. Ovary 2-celled. Style longer 
than the Corolla; stigma green. Berry globose, fin. diam , 
purple black, surrounded at base by the enlarged spreading 
Calyx-leaves, a little more acuminate in the Himalayan plant 
than in the European. 
Use : — Officinal in both Pharmacopeias. 
The following report has been received from the Economic Botanist to the 
Botanical Survey of India, to whom sun-dried roots of Atropa Belladonna, 
grown at the Kutchery garden, Naini Tal, were submitted : — 
“ . . . The roots consisted of two kinds, viz., from one-year-old plants 
and from two-year-old plants, and were registered respectively No. 34375 and 
No. 34376. The alkaloid was estimated in each sample of root and it was 
found to occur to the extent of 0'4 per cent, in that from the one-year old 
plants and 0 45 per cent, in that from the two-year-old plants. Belladonna 
roots obtained from Europe and used in British medicinal preparation con- 
tains from - 2 to - 6 per cent, of total alkaloids. The roots grown in Naini Tal 
are therefore of good average quality and are suitable for use in the Medical 
Store Departments of India.” 
Considering the fact that the soil in which these plants were grown 
cannot by any means be regarded as good, the report that the roots are of 
good average quality is most encouraging, and fully justifies the experiments 
being made on a more extensive scale. 
In better soil, which is easily obtainable in the Ramgark neighbourhood, 
I believe that far heavier yields and a considerably higher percentage of 
alkaloid will be obtained. 
The Naini Tal results worked out as follows 
Belladonna roots— 1 year old ... 3,570 lbs. per acre (alkaloid 0'4 per cent). 
Do. do. 2 year old ... 3,545 ,, „ (alkaloid 0'45 per cent). 
Prom the above it will be noticed that although the percentage of alkaloid 
was far greater in the two-year old roots the quantity harvested was actually 
less. The reason for this I am unable at present to explain beyond the fact 
that it was probably due to the plants having been grown in poor soil. 
A point that should not be lost sight of is the ease with which this drug 
can be grown and the imperviousuess of the crop to insect pests and animal 
life. A good stock of acclimatized seed has been saved from both Naini Tal 
and Douglas Dale grown plants. The roots of the Douglas Dale grown plants 
rot during the rains, but seed, which is of a lighter colour than that produced 
in Naini Tal, has been saved. 
Belladonna root is at present obtained from England by the Medical Stores 
