N. o. PolygonacbtE. 
1073 
Use The roots are bruised, and, boiled in combination with 
Catechu (Katb), used as a gargle for sore-gums. (Murray.) 

1055 . Polygonum, aviculare Linn., h.f.b.i., v. 26 . 
Fern. : — Indranee, bigbund, hunraj (Hind.); Kesru, banduke 
(Pb.); Miromati (Sans.) ; Machooti (Pb.) ; Drob (Kasb.). 
Habitat : — Western Himalaya, from Kashmir to Kumaon ; 
Rawal Pindee and the Deccan. 
A glabrous herb. Root mostly annual. Branches procumbent 
or ascending, grooved, leafy. Leaves elliptic or elliptic-oblong 
or lanceolate, obtuse flat, nerveless ; stipules shorter than the 
internodes, hyaline, lacerate, many-nerved. Flowers axillary ; 
pedicel short, pointed at the tip. Perianth obovoid, cleft to 
near the base ; nut ovoid, obtusely 3-gonous, minutely rugosely 
striolate. 
Uses : — In Chumba, the dried root is applied externally as an 
anodyne, and officinal in Kashmir. (Stewart.) The seeds are 
also said to be powerfully emetic and purgative. In Europe, 
the whole plant is considered vulnerary and astringent. In the 
Y ear Book of Pharmacy for 1874, an interesting account is 
given of the reputed value of the decoction of the herb in 
cases of vesical calculus. A case is described in which a dose 
of two tumblerfuls of the decoction is said to have been followed 
by almost immediate relief. 
“ It was used by the ancients to arrest hemorrhage, the seeds were con- 
sidered to be laxative and diuretic and to arrest defluxions. For burning 
pains in the stomach the leaves were applied topically, and were used in tho 
form of a liniment for pains in tho bladder and for erysipelas. The juice was 
administered in fevers, tertian and quartan more particularly, in doses of two 
cyathi, just before the paroxysms. Arabian physicians consider it to be cold 
and dry, and reproduce what the Greeks have said concerning its medicinal 
uses. 
In India, the plant is still used by tho Hakims in the diseases named by 
Diosoorides. 
In our own times Polygonum root has been used as a febrifuge in_ Algeria, 
and has been reported upon as being an excellent remedy for chronic diarrhoea 
and stone in the bladder. Its value has apparently been much ex aggerated. 
(J. R. Jackson, Avier. Journ. Phnrtn., 1878, p. 247.) 
In the Lancet, (1886, p. 658) it is said to be used in Russia, under the name 
of Homeriana, as a popular remedy in lung affections. Dr. Rotschlnin, who has 
experimented with the drug, found it really valuable in several cases of 
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