N. 0. VERBENAOEjE. 
991 
many, on short pedicels and arranged in large terminal much- 
branched tomentose cymose panicles 1-3 ft. long ; bracts at 
the forks lanceolate, those beneath the calyx narrower. Calyx 
(in flower) j in. long, broadly campanulate, stellately tomentose ; 
lobes go in. long, subequal, spreading ; the whole calyx ulti- 
mately enlarging to 1 in. or more and forming a membranous 
bladder-like covering to the firuit. Corolla white, glabrous, 
limb £ in across ; lobes subequal, seading. Fruit subglobose, 
^ in. in diain., somewhat 4-lobed ; pericarp soft, densely clothed 
with felted stellate hairs. 
Uses : — A plaster of the powdered wood is recommended in 
hot headaches and for the dispersion of inflammatory swellings; 
when taken internally it is said to be beneficial in dyspepsia, 
with burning of stomach. It also acts as a vermifuge. The 
ashes of the wood are applied to swollen eyelids and are said to 
strengthen the sight. The bark is an ast ringent, and the oil of 
the nuts promotes the growth of hair and removes itchiness of 
the skin. The flowers, according to Endlicher, are diuretic, and 
Gibson states that the seeds possess similar properties (Dymock). 
The wood rubbed down with water into a paste allays the 
pain and inflammation caused by handling the Burmese black 
varnish Tliitsi (Melanorrhoea usitatissima). It also deserves 
to be tried as a local application to inflammations arising from 
the action of the Marking Nut (Ph. Ind.). . The oil is extracted 
from the wood in Burma, and is used medicinally as a substitute 
for linseed oil and as varnish (Mukerji.) The tar is used 
in the Konkan as an application to prevent maggots breeding 
in sores on draught cattle (Dymock). 
At a meeting of the Nilgri Natural History Society in 1887, Mr. Lawson 
showed a specimen of a whitish mineral substance found in a teak tree growing 
in the Government Plantation at Nilambur. This peculiar secretion is not 
altogether unknown to officers in the Forest Department, and its composition 
has on more than one occasion been investigated by chemists. 
The late It. Romanis (Jn. Chom. Soc., 8-11-87) found that alcohol extracts 
a soft resin from teak wood, but no oil or varnish. On distilling the resin he 
oblaind a crystalline substnneo which he also found to be present in consi- 
derable quantity in tho tar resulting from the destructive distillation of 
teak. The analyses which he has made of the crystals point to the empirical 
formula C, H 10 O ; on oxidation with nitric acid they yield what appears to 
bo a quinono of the formula c, b h is o 2 . 
