The Medicinal Plants of the Philippines, Trinidad Hermenegildo Pardo de Tavera [book club suggestions TXT] 📗

To be given by the tablespoonful in 24 hours.

Botanical Description.—A tree, 6–8 m. high. Branches horizontal and radiating from the trunk. Leaves purplish, bunched, cleft at the base, sometimes transversely ovate, sometimes oval, notched, glabrous. Petiole very short. Flowers axillary, racemose, with a scale at the base of the peduncle, some hermaphrodite and others lacking pistils. Staminate flowers: calyx downy within, with 5 lobes. Corolla wanting. Stamens 10, inserted on the calyx. Hermaphrodite flowers: pistil same length as stamens. Drupe, fleshy, inferior, oval with the borders turned upward containing a very hard and fibrous nut; seed long and sharp-pointed.

Habitat.—Common in Luzon. In Manila it is cultivated extensively as an ornamental tree, especially along the Sabana Walk, General Solano Ave. and in Sampaloc and Malacañan.

Terminalia Chebula, Retz. (T. reticulata, Toth.; Bucida cuminata, Blanco.)

Nom. Vulg.—Dig̃las, Diglas, Tag.; Black Myrobalan Tree, Indo-Eng.

Uses.—The ripe fruit, called myrobalans in India, is purgative and six of them pounded up and given in decoction operate with certainty, producing 4 or 5 copious evacuations without nausea or other disagreeable symptoms. Dr. Waring has experimented with them and recommends them highly. The taste may be made more agreeable by adding a little cinnamon to the decoction. Dymock states that three fruits are sufficient, and Dr. Hove gives one as the effective dose. This lack of agreement may be explained by the fact that the fruits are of different sizes, and probably Waring refers to those of medium size. Contrary to what one would imagine, judging from its purgative action, the fruit contains astringent principles, and makes an effective injection for leucorrhœa as a substitute for nut galls. It is also of some merit in the treatment of piles.

The green fruit is highly esteemed by Radja Kalikesen as a carminative, tonic and purgative. Dr. Twining also mentions these same properties, recommends it as a tonic and aperient of great benefit in atony of the digestive organs and expresses surprise that the Europeans make no use of it. According to the same author a dose in the treatment of diarrhœa and dysentery is 4 grams twice a day. He quotes a case of hypertrophy of the spleen which he cured with this fruit.

Some of the leaves bear horn-shaped galls, flattened, narrow and hollow. They are caused by an insect which stings the leaves and deposits its eggs in them. These leaves with galls are astringent and very useful and effective in dysentery and diarrhœa, especially that of children. The dose for a child of more than one year is 0.40 to 0.50 gram a day, administered in fractional doses every two or three hours.

Fridolin has obtained from its fruit an acid, which he calls chebulinic (C28H25O10) and presumes to be a mixture of tannic and gallic acids. As Stenhouse had formerly indicated, no principle has been discovered to which the purgative properties can be attributed, unless it be a green oleo-resin turned red by nitric acid, obtained from the fruit by Apery.

Botanical Description.—A tree of the second order, with leaves 3′ long, alternate, lanceolate, entire and glabrous. Petioles short. Flowers terminal, in spiked panicles. Calyx superior, bell-shaped, colored, downy within, 5-toothed. Corolla wanting. Stamens 10, longer than the calyx. Anthers roundish. Ovary cylindrical. Style curved and longer than the stamens. Stigma simple. Fruit ovoid, 2–4 centimeters long, 5–10 acute angles, wrinkled, with blackish, hard, compact mesocarp; contains 1 seed.

Habitat.—Batangas, San Mateo. Blooms in May.

Quisqualis Indica, L. (Q. villosa, Roxb.; Q. spinosa, Nares.)

Nom. Vulg.—Tagaraw, Niogniogan, Tag.; Tangolon, Vis.; Babebabe, Pam.; Tartaraw, Iloc.

Uses.—The fruit contains a kernel that tastes much like cacao, for which reason the Tagalogs call it “niogniogan” (like cacao). This kernel is a powerful anthelmintic, used also in India, the dose for a child of 4 years being 2–4, pulverized and mixed with a little molasses or sugar. A large dose produces hiccough, a fact well known to the natives. Dr. Bouton states that they may cause convulsions and other similar nervous disorders.

They yield a light green, fixed oil, probably the active principle of the plant.

Botanical Description.—A climbing shrub, 6–9° high, whose stem is thickly set with long, opposite thorns. Leaves in stars of 3, oblong, acute, entire, glabrous. Petioles very short. Flowers white, veined with red, in axillary spikes. Calyx very long, nearly cylindrical, 5-toothed. Corolla, 5 petals, inserted between the teeth of the calyx. Stamens 10, inserted on the calyx-tube, shorter than the corolla, arranged in 2 series, 5 higher than the rest. Style the same length as the stamens, united throughout nearly its entire length with the wall of the calyx-tube from which it separates near the stigma. Stigma rather bulky. Fruit 1′ long, ovoid, 5 sharp ridges in the woody, fragile, mahogany-colored pericarp, which contains a pointed kernel at one end.

Habitat.—San Mateo, and along the shores of Luzon. Blooms in May.