Page:Indian Medicinal Plants (Text Part 2).djvu/24

774 Habitat : — Deccan Peninsula ; " one of the commonest shrubs of Coromandel, growing in all situations." (Roxburgh.)

A sraggling thorny shrub. Branches green herbaceous. Bark light brown, rough, wood white, soft, consisting of concentred layers in which the pores, surrounded by white loose tissue, are alternately scanty and many — (Gamble) young shoots pubescent, glabrous afterwards ; spines in each axil 1-2 in. number, ½-lin. long. Leaves stiff, shining, sharply mucronate or spinescent ½-2in. long 5-¾in. broad, elliptic, acute. Flowers greenish white, sessile, axillary, clustered, scarcely ½ in. diam. Female flowers solitary or in 2-fid clustered. Male flowers in dense globose fascicles, the supporting leaves of the upper fascicles reduced to bracts or obsolete, so that the flower-branches end in naked interrupted spikes on which the flowers are whorled. Calyx 1/10 in.; petals linear-lanceolate, acute, spreading, ⅓ in. Ovary 2-celled. Cells 2-ovulate, or more often- lovulate. Berry ½ in. diam. white ; usually 1 seeded.

Uses : — The leaves, root, and milky juice are bitter and are used medicinally by the Hindus. Dr. P. S. Mootooswamy, (Ind. Med. Gazette, October 1889), states that the leaves are considered stimulant, and are given to puerperal women immediately after confinement. They are administered in the following manner by the villagers : — The leaves with an equal quantity of Neem leaves, and a little powdered brick, are finely ground and given twice a day for the first two days, no food being allowed. For the next six days the woman gets a little boiled rice and pepper water once a day, and is allowed to drink a little warm water after the meal ; she is not allowed to sleep after her food during the day, and if thirsty must quench her thirst by eating betel leaves and areca nut. From the seventh day she gets her ordinary food. It is also the practice among the rural classes to give 2 or 4 ounces of Neem oil soon after delivery ; with a little roasted assafœtida, and the woman is made to take daily for a month from the morning of the third or fourth day a bolus of a stimulating confection, called Nadaycayam in Tamil, which is supposed to keep off cold from the system. (This practice is general amongst the country people in most part of India).