Page:Indian Medicinal Plants (Text Part 1).djvu/98

18 The alkaloid Atisine of Broughton, from experiments made on rabbits, appears to be non-poisonous. (Dymock). Dr. Dymock says that Atis is an ingredient in Bâl-Goli, a pill given to infants to keep them quiet, which contains thirty-one drugs, of which three are narcotics, viz., Bhang, opium and Datura, and the remainder bitters, aromatics. (Ph. Indica, p. 15, Vol. I.)

Part used:—The root.

Use:—The root is officinal in the Indian Pharmacopœia. Tonic and antiperiodic properties are attributed to it.

Vernacular name—unknown.

Habitat:—Alpine region of the mountain ranges of Gilgit and Turkestan.

Roots:—Biennial, paired; tuberous: daughter-tuber conic, slender, 2-2·5 cm. long 0·7 cm. thick, with very few root-fibres, brown externally, fracture horny, brown, taste faintly sweetish bitter, followed by a very slight tingling sensation, cambium continuous, forming a scarcely sinuous ring in cross-section; mother-tuber similar, more or less shrunk. Innovation-bud conic, about 5 mm. long; scales scarious, soon decaying or sprouting. Stem erect, simple, moderately robust, quite glabrous, rarely slightly pubescent in the upper part, up to 7 dm. high. Leaves scattered, lowest usually decayed at the time of flowering, intermediate remote, upper more approximate, glabrous; petioles more or less widened at the base; lower up to 12 cm. long, upper 1-2 cm. long; blades more or less cordate-orbicular or reniform in outline, with a wide or narrow sinus, 2-3 cm. deep; 5-9 cm. from the sinus to the tip, 8-12 cm. across, 5-partite to the very base or in the outer incisions almost to the base; inner 3 divisions similar, rhomboid in outline from a narrow cuneate