Page:Indian Medicinal Plants (Text Part 1).djvu/425

Rh Arab. Of the small variety of raisins without stones — Sultâna Raisins, Eng. Kishmish, Bédânah, Hind., Duk. and Pers.

Habitat. — Wild in the N. W. Himalaya ; cultivated extensively in N. W. India and rarely in the Peninsula as Poona and Nasik.

A large, woody climber ; tendrils long, bifid. Leaves simple, glabrous above, clothed beneath with grey floccose deciduous tomentum, from a cordate base nearly orbicular, more or less deeply 5-lobed, edge cut into large unequal, acute teeth ; basal nerves 5, the midrib with 4-5 pair of prominent secondary nerves, petioles generally shorter than leaf, longer than half its length. Flowers green, fragrant, petals cohering at the top. Inflorescence usually on the tendrils. Cymes arranged in panicles. Fruit 3-5-seeded.

Use. — The dried fruits, called raisins, are used in medicine. They are described as demulcent, laxative, sweet, cooling, agreeable and useful in thirst, heat of body, cough, hoarseness and consumption (DUTT).

Mahomedan writers consider grapes and raisins to be attenuant, suppurative, pectoral and the most digestible of fruit, purifying the blood and increasing its quantity and quality. The ashes of the wood are recommended as a preventive of stone in the bladder, cold swellings of the testes and piles. The juice of the unripe grapes is used as an astringent. The modern Italians use the juice in affections of the throat (DYMOCK).

The leaves, on account of their astrigency, are sometimes used in diarrhœa.

In modern native practice, the raisins are considered cool and aperient, and given in coughs, catarrh and jaundice (MOOKERJî).

Grapes are refrigerant, diuretic and antipyretic. In large doses, raisins act as a demulcent, expectorant and laxative, and in smaller ones as an astringent.

The sherbet or syrup of grapes is a very pleasant and cooling drink, and proves very useful in relieving thirst and other pyrexial symptoms in many forms of fever. I have also used