part ii

. 87. 88.

[2125] Frezier, _Voyage to the South Seas_, Lond. 1717. p. 13.—Turner in his Herbal (1568) gives the plant an opposite character, for the bruised leaves, says he, “swage the brestes or pappes swellinge wyth to muche plenty of milke.”

KAMALA.

_Kamela_, _Glandulæ Rottleræ_.

=Botanical Origin=—_Mallotus philippinensis_[2126] Müller Arg. (_Croton philippensis_ Lam., _Rottlera tinctoria_ Roxb., _Echinus philippinensis_ Baillon), a large shrub, or small tree, attaining 20 or 45 feet in height, of very wide distribution. It grows in Abyssinia and Southern Arabia, throughout the Indian peninsulas, ascending the mountains to 5000 feet above the sea-level, in Ceylon, the Malay Archipelago, the Philippines, the Loochoo islands, Formosa, Eastern China and in North Australia, Queensland and New South Wales.

The tricoccous fruits of many of the _Euphorbiaceæ_ are clothed with prickles, stellate hairs, or easily removed glands. This is especially the case in the several species of _Mallotus_, most of which have the capsules covered with stellate hairs, together with small glands. In that under notice, the capsule is closely beset with ruby-like glands which, when removed by brushing and rubbing, constitute the powder known by the Bengali name of _Kamala_. These glands are not confined to the capsule, but are scattered over other parts of the plant, especially among the dense tomentum with which the under side of the leaf is covered.

=History=—In India the glands of Mallotus have been long known, for they have several ancient Sanskrit names: one of these is _Kapila_, which as well as the Telugu _Kapila-podi_, is sometimes used by Europeans, though not so frequently as the word _Kamala_ or _Kamela_, which belongs to the Hindustani, Bengali and Guzratti languages. The Sanskrit word _Kapila_ signifies tawny or dusky red, the Tamil _Podi_ means the pollen of a flower or dust in general.

It does not appear that as a drug the glandular powder of _Mallotus_, or as it is more conveniently called, _Kamala_, attracted any

## particular notice in Europe until a very recent period, though it is

named by Ainslie, Roxburgh, Royle and Buchanan, the last of whom gives an interesting account of its collection and uses.[2127] In 1852, specimens of it as found in the bazaar of Aden, under the old Arabic name of _Wars_, were sent to one of us by Port-Surgeon Vaughan, with information as to its properties as a dye for a silk and as a remedy in cutaneous diseases.[2128] But the real introduction of the drug as a useful medicine is due to Mackinnon, surgeon in the Bengal Medical Establishment, who administered it successively in numerous cases of tapeworm. Anderson of Calcutta, C. A. Gordon, and Corbyn in India, and Leared in London, confirmed the observations of Mackinnon, and fully established the fact that kamala is an efficient taenifuge.[2129] It was introduced into the _British Pharmacopœia_ in 1864.

[2126] Fig. in Bentley and Trimen’s _Med. Plants_,