Page:Indian Medicinal Plants (Text Part 1).djvu/379

Rh A large or small shrub more or less pubescent with short hairs. Leaves thin, pubescent, ovate, acute or shortly acuminate, acute or obtuse at base, entire ; in flower usually about 1½in., in fruit about 2-4 by 2½-1¼in. Petioles ¼in. long, pubescent. Flowers sweet-scented, white, axillary 1-1½in. long, in few — flowered clusters or short racemes ; peduncles short, pedicles ¾in. long, hairy, tomentose. Calyx short, cup-shaped, pubescent outside, teeth acute. Petals yellow, linear, longer than the Staminal — tube, free, glabrous. Staminal-tube glabrous, slender, ¾-1in. long, dilated at top, teeth subulate, short. Anthers ½ as long. Ovary 5-celled. Style long, exserted, Stigma capitate, urn-shaped. Capsule sub-globose, glabrate, ½in. diam. (Talbot). Seeds not winged (W.P. Hiern).

Western Peninsula, on the Ghats, from the Concan southward ; Mahableshwar, North Canara. Gujrat at Dolra (Dholara).

Use : — " The root is used as an application to fistulas, and is administered internally in black leprosy" (Dymock).

Vern. : — Kâpur-bhendi, pit-wel, tinpâna (Mar.) ; Trifolio (Goa) ; Kanu-dida (Kan.) ; Nela naregam (Malay.).

Habitat :— Western Peninsula or the Western Ghats, from the Concan southwards.

Parts used : — The roots and stems.

A small, glabrous and shining undershrub. Branches erect or decumbent, from a few inches to 2ft. long. Leaves trifoliate, 1-4in. long. Leaflet sessile, cuneate obovate, quite entire, or obtusely lobed, terminal leaflet rather longer than the lateral ones, and about the length of the common petiole. Common petioles winged. Flowers 1-1¼in. long, quite white, longer than the peduncles. Petals 5. Calyx 5 cleft, small campanulate. Staminal-tube elongated, inflated above, 10 crenate at the mouth. Anthers 10, terminal, shortly oblong, inserted at the crenatures of the mouth, exserted, setaceous-apiculate. Disk annular. Ovary 3-celled, loculicidally 3-valved. Style yellow. Seeds 2 in each cell ; albumen fleshy, embryo foliaceous.