Page:Indian Medicinal Plants (Text Part 1).djvu/825

Rh tened. Pedicels ⅛-¼in., densely umbelled, glabrous or minutely puberulous ; buds 1/6in. long. Flowers small, Calyx teeth, 1/16in., elliptic oblong ; petals 1/9in. ; style ¼in., much longer than the Corolla. Berry 1/5in., globose, smooth, deep-red to black.

Use:— Said to be the dan of Ceylon, the bark of which is used as a febrifuge in fever and in diarrhœa, and also applied externally to ulcers (Watt's Dictionary, I. 290).



Vern. :— Chikku (the fruit) (Bomb.) ; Sapotá (H. and B.) ; Shimai-eluppai (Tam.) ; Sima-ippa (Tel.) ; Kumpole (Kan.) ; Chakchakoti-kajhár (Duk.).

Habitat : — Cultivated in many parts of India.

A native of Tropical America, much cultivated in Indian gardens, most excellent luscious fruit, which should be eaten when slightly overripe, as says Gamble, in which I quite agree with him (K. R. K.). C. B. Clarke says that fruiting branchlets, communicated by Mr. Cantley from Perak, of a tree 80-100 ft. high, yielded gutta plentifully. The wood is reddish brown, hard, with radial groups of pores in oblique patches, fine medullary rays and irregular narrow, wavy, transverse lines (Gamble). Leaves crowded near the ends of thick branchlets, shining, elliptic-lanceolate ; blade 3-6in. Petiole slender, ½-1in. long. Flowers 6-merous, whitish ; stamens 6, alternately with lanceolate staminodes, resembling the corolla-lobes. Ovary 12-celled. Fruit as large as an orange, rind rough, brown, thin. Seeds 5 or more, some undeveloped ones sharp as needles. The fruit must, therefore, be carefully eaten, to avoid the sharp needle-like abortive seeds, at times about 1/6in. long, hurting the mouth or getting into the throat. Seeds black, shining, about ½in. long when mature.

Uses : — In the West Indies, the seeds are known to be aperient and diuretic, and the bark is reputed to be tonic and febrifuge. In the Concan, the fruit soaked in melted butter all 