Page:Indian Medicinal Plants (Text Part 1).djvu/367

Rh Habitat: — Sub-tropical Himalaya, from Jammu to Nepal. Garwhal and Bhutan.

A tall, scrambling tree, with stout, often spotted, branches. Bark very bitter ; light brown, rather smooth, shining, thin. Wood bright yellow, moderately hard ; sapwood white. Annual rings well-marked by a line of pores in the autumn wood. Pores moderately sized, unevenly scattered, except on the line of the annular rings. Medullary rays fine to moderately broad, short, distant, forming on a radial section a pretty silver-grain (Gamble). Leaves pubescent, a foot or more long, of 9-15 leaflets, the lowest pair much smaller and stipuliform ; leaflets 6-4 pair, obovate, acuminate, serrate, opposite, nearly sessile. Flower polygamous, in pubescent panicles ; small greenish, generally pentamerous. Calyx-segments small, imbricate. Petals ovate or obovate, persistent in female and hermaphrodite flowers. Much enlarged and coriaceous in fruit ; filaments strap-shaped, equalling the petals, villous, about the size of a pea, ¼in diam., black, each containing one erect seed.

Parts used : —The bark, root and leaves.

Use : — Dr. Royle draws attention to the bark, wood and root of this plant as quite as bitter as the quassia of the West Indies, for which it would doubtless prove an excellent substitute. The Pharmacopoeia Indica regards this bark as worthy of further attention.

The leaves, according to Stewart, are applied to itch.

This large tree is common in the Ataran Forest Division, Tenasserim where it is called by the Karens "Napaw-ow." The bark is exceedingly bitter and is used by the Karens as a febrifuge instead of quinine. The bark contains a bitter principle allied to quassin, and has an advantage in containing no tannin. There is no alkaloidal principle such as quinine in the bark.

Vern. : — Ampadoo-Barrowing (Mal).

Habitat :— Assam ; Eastern Peninsula ; Tenasserim ; and the Andaman Islands.