Page:Indian Medicinal Plants (Text Part 2).djvu/89

Rh in palsy, relaxation of the muscles and tendons, debility and chronic rheumatism. It may be applied externally and given internally, in doses of from 1 to 2 dangs (Dymock). The Pharmacopœia Indica describes the seed as a valuable nervine tonic and stimulant, and, in overdoses, a virulent poison, and recommends its use in paralytic and neuralgic affections in atonic diarrhœa and chronic dysentery, also in habitual constipation, prolapsus of the rectum, spermatorrhœa, &c. It has also been employed in intermittent fevers, epilepsy, diabetes, anæmia, chlorosis and other affections. The bitter taste and highly poisonous action of this substance are chiefly clue to the presence of strychnine and brucine, the proportion of the former varying from ¼ to ½ per cent.

In the Concan, small doses of the seeds are given with aromatics in colic, and the juice of the fresh wood (obtained by applying heat to the middle of a straight stick, to both ends of which a small pot has been tied) is given in doses of a few drops in cholera and acute dysentery. In some districts small quantities of the seeds are taken, apparently as a stimulant, or in lieu of opium. (Dymock).

" The leaves when applied as poultice, promote healthy action in sloughing wounds or ulcers, more especially in those cases when maggots have formed. It arrests any further formation of them, and those in the deeper parts perish immediately when the poultice is applied. The root -bark is ground up into a fine paste with lime-juice, and made into pills which are said to be effectual in cholera" (Dr. Thompson, in Watt's Dictionary).

An oil from the seeds is employed medicinally.

" I have found strychnine, very useful in malarious fevers of a low type " (Dr. Hazlitt, in Watt's Dictionary).

" Strychnine is a valuable drug in the bronchitis of the debilitated. Its action as an expectorant appears to be considerable " (Surgeon S. H. Browne, in Watt's Dictionary).

In modern medicine nux-vomica is prescribed with advantage in the catarrhal dyspepsia, accompanied by flatulence and want of contractile power in the intestines which is so common in India. In such cases it appears