The Medicinal Plants of the Philippines Part 38

Uses.--The milky juice of the trunk and branches is a drastic purgative, too active for safety as a physic. Mixed with water it is used as a wash for atonic ulcers.

The seeds yield 25-30 per cent. of a yellowish oil, more active than castor oil as a purgative but less certain. Ten or twelve of the former equal in effect 30 to 40 drops of the latter. Its density is 0.919, and it differs from castor oil in being only slightly soluble in absolute alcohol. In some parts of the Philippines it is used for purposes of illumination, and it is exported to Europe to adulterate soaps and candles. It contains a little stearin which begins to be deposited at 9 and is entirely solidified at 0.

The fruit is strongly purgative, and this action is not due to the oil but to a peculiar resin so active that 3 fruits produce drastic effects. Whatever purgative action the oil possesses is due to the resin which it contains in solution. It seems, therefore, preferable to treat the seeds with alcohol, thus dissolving the resin, and use the tincture thus obtained in place of the oil.

The natives use the plant to intoxicate the fish in ponds and sluggish streams.

The seeds of the species _J. multifida_, L., also called _tuba_ in Tag., and _mana_, are likewise purgative in their action. Dr. Waring saw a case of poisoning with the fruit; the patient, a young man, suffered violent vomiting, intense pain in the stomach and head, and marked prostration. He recovered under the use of lime juice and stimulants.

Botanical Description.--The _J. Curcas_ is a small tree growing as high as 9. Leaves alternate, cordate, glabrous, 3-5 cut-lobed. Flowers yellowish-green, monoecious, in terminal umbels, staminate and pistillate flowers mingled without order. Staminate: Calyx, 5 unequal sepals; corolla bell-shaped, 5 petals, woolly within, a small notch at the end, bent downward; stamens 10, in 2 whorls of 5. Pistillate: Calyx and corolla as above; several tongue-like staminodes replace the stamens; ovary free, oblong, 3-celled, 1 ovule in each cell; style 3-branched. Seed vessel fleshy, of 3 capsules, each bearing 1 oval, coriaceous seed.

Habitat.--Luzon and Visayas.

_Aleurites Moluccana_, Willd. (_A. triloba_, Forst. and Blanco.)

Nom. Vulg.--_Lumban_, _Kapili_, Tag.; _Belgaum_ or _Indian Walnut_, Indo-Eng.

Uses.--The kernels are rich in oil which is used for illumination and the manufacture of soap. For industrial purposes it is superior to linseed oil, according to the report of the Madras Drug Committee.

Dr. O'Rocke states that in doses of 1-2 ounces it acts as a gentle and sure purgative, producing copious bilious evacuations after 3-6 hours, without causing nausea, colic or other similar effects. The munic.i.p.al physician of Sampaloc, Senor Xerez, states that he has frequently used this oil in Manila, as a purgative, and he agrees perfectly with Dr. O'Rocke as to its effect.

D. Anacleto del Rosario, the distinguished Filipino chemist, tells me that he once witnessed a case of poisoning by the fruit of the _lumban_, the patient being a native boy. Doubtless the milky juice, so active in all the Euphorbiaceae, was the cause of the symptoms. It is true that the kernel causes colic and copious alvine discharges.

Nellino's chemical a.n.a.lysis of the seeds is as follows:

Water 5.25 Fatty matter 62.97 Cellulose 28.99 Mineral matter 2.79

The ashes contain the following matters:

Lime 28.69% Magnesia 6.01% Potash 11.23% Phosphoric acid 20.30%

The oil is yellow, syrupy, transparent, odorless, insipid.

Botanical Description.--A tree with leaves bunched or cl.u.s.tered, 3-5 lobulate with as many nerves. Petioles about as long as the leaves. Flowers white, terminal in panicles, the pistillate mixed with the more numerous staminate flowers. Staminate: Calyx monophyllous, cylindrical, 2-toothed; corolla, 5 linear petals twice as long as the calyx; stamens 20 or more, joined in a column at their bases. Pistillate: Calyx and corolla as above; ovary of 2 or 3 uniovulate locules, encircled by a disk; style 2-or 3-branched. Seed vessel large, ovate, compressed, fleshy, 2 sutures at right angles, 2 compartments, in each a hard nut.

Habitat.--Grows all over Luzon and is well known to the natives.

_Croton Tiglium_, L. (_C. glandulosum_, _C. muricatum_, Blanco.)

Nom. Vulg.--_Tuba kamaisa_, Tag.; _The Purging Croton_, Eng.

Uses.--The fruit is used by the Filipinos to intoxicate the fish in ponds and sluggish streams. The seeds contain an oil that is official in all Pharmacopoeias as one of the most powerful hydragogue cathartics. As it is intensely irritating it should never be administered alone but combined with other substances, such as castor oil, or in pill form. The internal dose is 1 to 2 drops. It is considered a specific for lead colic and is indicated when not only purgation but active irritation of the digestive ca.n.a.l is desired.

Applied to the skin it is a strong irritant causing rapid and painful vesication. Great care should be exercised not to raise the hands to the eyes after touching the oil, as serious inflammation might result.

Botanical Description.--A small tree, 8-9 high, with rough trunk. Leaves alternate, ovate, acute, minutely serrate, both surfaces beset with sharp hairs. Flowers yellowish-white, monoecious. Staminate: Fewer than the pistillate, growing above them; calyx 5-toothed; corolla, 5 woolly petals; stamens 16, joined in the center. Pistillate: Calyx 5-toothed; corolla much less developed than in the staminate; ovary free, 3 uniovulate locules; styles 3, bifid. Seed vessel dry, with thin envelope bristling with stiff hairs; 3 carpels each containing a seed.

Habitat.--Common in Luzon.

_Acalypha Indica_, L. (_A. Caroliniana_, Blanco.)

Nom. Vulg.--Not known.

Uses.--This plant is not used medicinally in the Philippines, but is very common in India. Dr. G. Bidie, of Madras, states that the expressed juice of the leaves is in great repute, wherever the plant grows, as an emetic for children and is safe, certain and speedy in its action. Like ipecacuanha it seems to have little tendency to act on the bowels or depress the vital powers, and it decidedly increases the secretion of the pulmonary organs. Probably an infusion of the dried leaves or an extract prepared from the green plant would retain all its active properties. The dose of the expressed juice for an infant is a teaspoonful.

Dr. A. E. Ross speaks highly of its use as an expectorant, ranking it in this respect with senega; he found it especially useful in the bronchitis of children. He also makes favorable report of a cataplasm of the leaves as a local application to syphilitic ulcers and as a means of relieving the pain attendant on the bites of venomous insects.

The alleged purgative action of the root noticed by Ainslie is confirmed by Dr. H. E. Busteed, who reports having used the expressed juice of the root and leaves as a laxative for children.

Langley, a military surgeon, states that in Canara the natives employ the leaf juice in congestive headache, soaking pledgets of cotton with it and introducing them into the nasal fossae; the resultant nose bleed relieves the headache. The powder of the dry leaves is dusted on ulcers and putrid sores. In asthma and bronchitis, both of children and adults, Langley has used this plant with good results, and he recommends 1.25-3.50 grams of the tincture (100 grams of the fresh plant to 500 of alcohol, 90) repeated several times a day; the effect is expectorant, nauseant and, in large doses, emetic.

It must be noted that only the young, growing plants are active.

The flowers of another species, _A. hispida_, Burm., called _bugos_ in Tag. and Vis., is used in India for the dysentery.

Botanical Description.--A little plant, about 3 high. Leaves alternate, broad, lanceolate, 5-nerved, serrate from middle to apex. Petioles much longer than the leaves, 2 stipules at their bases. Flowers greenish, monoecious in axillary spikes, pedunculate, as long as the leaves, crowned by a prolongation of the axis in the form of a cross. Staminate: Numerous, in upper part of spike; calyx 4 parts; no corolla; stamens 8-16, small, free. Pistillate: Less in number, at the base of the spike; perianth of 3 imbricated leaflets; ovary, 3 uniovulate locules; style, 3 branches which also subdivide. Capsule 3-celled, each cell containing a globose seed with cicatrix.

Habitat.--Luzon, Panay and Mindanao. Blooms in October.

_Echinus Philippensis_, H. Baillon. (_Croton Philippense_, Lamk.; _Rottlera tinctoria_, Roxb.; _Mallotus Philippensis_, Mull.)

Nom. Vulg.--_Banato_, Tag.; _Buas_, _Vuas_, Iloc.; _Monkey-face Tree_, _Kamala_ or _Kamala Dye_, Indo-Eng.

Uses.--The capsular fruit of this plant is thickly beset with reddish glands and hairs, which, when brushed off and gathered in powder form, const.i.tute the _kamala dye_ of the Hindoos. It was mentioned by the Arabian physicians of the tenth century under the names of _Kanbil_ and _Wars_. In India the powder is highly valued as a yellow dye-stuff for silk. Medicinally it is used as an anthelmintic, the English physician Mackinnon, of the Bengal Hospital, having been the first to scientifically prove this property; he reported that it was successful in expelling the tape-worm. It is now official in the Pharmacopoeia of India and also in the U. S. P. as an anthelmintic and purgative; in Switzerland it is commonly given to expel the bothriocephalus which abounds there, the lake fish acting as hosts.

The dose recommended by the Pharmacopoeia of India is 8-12 grams, divided in 3 or 4 doses. This amount sometimes causes nausea and colic; in the third or fourth stool the taenia is commonly expelled in a lifeless condition. Dujardin-Beaumetz advises a dose of 30 grams of castor oil in case the taenia has not been expelled 2 hours after the last dose of kamala. The powder is efficacious but the tincture seems to be surer; the dose is 6 grams for children and 20 for adults, given in divided doses in aromatic water every hour for 6 hours. This tincture is prepared by macerating 200 grams of kamala in 500 cc. alcohol for 7 days; then filtering with expression and adding enough alcohol to complete the 500 cc.

The powder is also used in India as a local application in herpes circinata. It is insoluble in water; in ether and alcohol it yields 80% of a red resin. Anderson noted that a concentrated ethereal solution of kamala after a few days formed a solid crystalline ma.s.s, yellow, very soluble in ether; this substance he named _rottlerin_, C_11_H_10_O_3_.

Botanical Description.--A tree, 6-8 meters high, covered with stellate groups of short yellow hairs. Leaves alternate, petiolate, rhomboid-oval or lanceolate, ac.u.minate, 3-nerved, entire or slightly dentate, upper surface glabrous, lower surface covered with woolly hairs and powdery red glands. Flowers yellowish-green, small, dioecious, apetalous, in spikes. Staminate: By 3's in the axil of each bract; perianth, 3 or 5 deeply cut, lanceolate lobules; stamens 15-25, free, inserted in the center of the flower. Pistillate: In the axil of each bract; ovary, 3 locules each with 1 ovule, covered like the leaves with hairs and yellow, granular glands. Seed vessel globose, 3-celled, like ovary covered with hairs and glands.

Habitat.--Mountains of Morong, San Mateo, Tarlak, Bosoboso, Ilocos Norte, Albay and Batangas.

_Ricinus communis_, L. (Variety _microcarpus_, Mull.)