458 
Notes  on  East  Indian  Gums. 
J  Am.  Jour.  Pharm, 
I       Sept.,  1888. 
"  ghati  gum,  gum  collected  on  the  ghats  and  hills  of  the  country  and 
called  "  ghati  in  contradistinction  to  the  variety  imported  from 
foreign  ports. 
The  best  picked  ghati gum  as  now  exported  from  Bombay  is 
entirely  or  almost  entirely  derived  from  Anogeissus  latifolia}  I 
think  Dalzell  is  the  first  author  who  mentions  this  gum.  He  says, 
"the  tree  produces  a  very  white,  hard  and  valuable  gum.'^  The 
Bombay  name  is  "  daura  or  "  dabria.^'  It  is  largely  used  through- 
out India  for  calico  printing,  for  which  it  has  a  high  reputation,  and 
as  has  been  shown  by  Mander  it  may  with  advantage  be  used  in 
pharmacy  in  place  of  the  high  priced  and  scarce  Kordofan  gum.  I 
have  obtained  the  same  reactions  with  this  gum  as  was  observed  by 
Mander  with  a  London  sample  of  ghati  gum,  hence  I  conclude 
that  his  sample  was  free  from  admixture  with  other  gums. 
"  Oomrawuttee  gum  derives  its  name  from  Oomrawuttee,  or  Am- 
ravti,  the  chief  town  of  the  Hyderabad  assigned  districts  known  as 
the  Berars,  the  centre  of  a  prosperous  trade  and  officially  described 
as  "  the  very  home  of  the  cotton  plant  and  the  heart  of  the  cotton 
trade  in  India.^^  It  gives  its  name  to  a  variety  of  cotton  staple, 
^Hhe  Oomrawutties,'^  and  such  phrases  as  "good  oomras,''  "good 
fine  oomras,"  "  oomra  variety,'^  are  to  be  met  with  in  the  Bombay 
cotton  market  reports.  Oomrawutti  gum  is  considered  by  the  native 
gum  dealers  in  Bombay  to  be  of  two  kinds,  the  "  ghati and  the 
"  amrad ; "  the  latter  they  consider  to  be  derived  from  the  babool 
tree  {Acacia  arabica).  Babool  gum  is  distinguished  from  all  other 
gums  that  I  have  examined  by  being  unaffected  by  either  neutral 
or  basic  acetate  of  lead,  and  by  being  more  or  less  darkened, 
but  not  gelatinized,  by  ferric  chloride.  Samples  of  babool  gum 
that  have  hung  long  on  the  tree  and  are  of  a  deep  reddish-brown 
color  give  a  very  dark  coloration,  almost  black,  but  the  pale  samples 
are  less  affected.  The  Oomrawuttee  sample  examined  by  Mander  was 
evidently  babool  gum.  With  regard  to  the  name  "  amrad,'^  I  do  not 
think  it  has  any  reference  to  "  amra,"  the  native  name  for  the  gum 
derived  from  Spondia^  mangifera,  as  this  gum  has  a  character  more 
nearly  resembling  tragacanth  than  arable  gum.  Forty  grains  of  it 
form  a  jelly  with  about  two  ounces  of  water.  I  thought  it  might  be 
a  corruption  of  "  amravti,^'  but  the  gum  dealers  can  give  no  satisfac- 
^  I  consulted  Dr.  Dymock  on  this  point,  and  he  is  also  of  opinion  that  the 
gum  now  exported  as  ghatti  is  derived  as  stated. 
