Page:Indian Medicinal Plants (Text Part 2).djvu/362

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INDIAN MEDICINAL PLANTS.


are sometimes found irregular masses of harder, much darker-coloured-wood, with a honey-like scent, which constitute the Aloe or Eagle-wood of commerce. Leaves 2-3½in., thinly coriaceous, shining, caudate, acuminate; secondary nerves slender, with numerous, parallel, intermediate nerves ; petiole 1/10in. Flowers white, in many-fid ; sessile or shortly peduncled, silky umbels ; pedicels slender, ¼in. long. Perianth persistent in fruit, ¼in. long, silky without, densely villous within. Fruit thinly velvety, l½-2in. long, obovoid, thinly coriaceous.

Uses : — The fragrant resinous substance is considered cordial. It has been prescribed in gout and rheumatism. (Ainslie.) It is a delightful perfume, serviceable in vertigo and palsy, and the powder is useful as a restrainer of the fluxes and vomiting. In decoction, it is useful to allay thirst in fever. (Lourerio.) An essential oil prepared from the wood is also used medicinally. The wood is a preventive against fleas and lice, and in the form of a powder is rubbed into the skin and the clothes. In medicine, aloes wood is considered a stimulant and cordial in gout, rheumatism and paralysis, also as a stimulant astringent in diarrhœa and vomiting. It is taken internally as a tonic in doses of ten to sixty grains. Under the name of agalocki, Celsus ranks it among medicines which invigorate the nerves. The wood has long had a place in the Materia Medica of the Pharmacopœias of Europe, but it does not appear to possess any properties that call for its admission to modern local practice. (Pharmacog. Ind.)


N. 0. ELÆAGNACEÆ.

1101. Elœagnus hortensis, M. Bieb., h.f.b.i., v. 201.

Vern.:— Sanjit (Afg.) ; Sirshing (Tibet); Shiûlik (U.P.); Botvir, Gangu (Kashmir).

Habitat: — Western Himalaya.

A small, deciduous tree or large shrub, 12-30ft. high, often spinous, young, silvery. Bark light grey, thick, fibrous, smooth,