Part 58

Botanical Description.--A tree, 20° or more in height, with abundant milky sap. Leaves alternate, oval, acute at both ends, slightly wavy and revolute borders, tough, glabrous and dark green upper surface; light green, slightly rough under surface. Petioles short. Flowers greenish, monoecious, growing on root, trunk and branches. Calyx very small, monophyllous, of about 7 deciduous lobules. Staminate: On a club-shaped receptacle, 3' or 4' long, bristling with the stamens; filaments very short, anthers 2-celled. Pistillate: On a common, oblong receptacle which ripens to the great fruit; style 1, short; rarely 2 divergent styles; stigmas acute. Fruit about size and shape of a small watermelon, beset with many sharp eminences, containing many seeds enveloped in thick arils.

Habitat.--It grows in all parts of the Archipelago and is commonly known.

Laportea gaudichaudiana, Wedd. (Urtica umbellata, U. ferox, Blanco.)

Nom. Vulg.--Lingaton, Lipa, Apariagua (?), Tag., Vis.; Lipangdoton, Pam.

Uses.--The Padre Mercado writes as follows concerning the properties of this plant: "The leaves, applied with salt in the form of a plaster, purify dog bites, foul, putrid, malignant and cankerous ulcers; they cure boils, contusions and all abscesses; mixed with wax they may be applied for obstruction of the spleen; mashed with the juice and inserted in the nose they arrest nose-bleed; cooked with snails they soften the stomach, excite the secretion of urine and dissipate flatus; the juice given as a gargle aborts inflammation of the epiglottis. The seeds mixed with wine are a sexual excitant and "clear out" the womb; taken with syrup they relieve dyspnoea, pain in the side and inflammation of the lungs and force up the humors from the chest; it may be mixed with medicines that corrupt the flesh (sic). The grated root drunk with wine relieves painful flatulence. I myself (continues the Padre Mercado) have experimented with a woman who suffered with painful flatulence and this remedy relieved her."

We repeat that all the foregoing is copied from the writings of Padre Mercado and we offer it as a therapeutic curiosity.

P. Blanco states that merely to touch the leaves causes an intolerable itching.

Botanical Description.--A small tree, 12-15° high, trunk richly branched. Leaves opposite, bunched at the ends of the branches, notched at the base, long, ovate, serrate, hairy on both surfaces. Flowers yellowish-white, dioecious. Staminate: In compound racemes; calyx 4 parts; corolla none; stamens 4, inserted on the base of the calyx. Pistillate: Flowers in 2-forked umbel, flat, very large; calyx, none; stamens none; stigma 1; seed heart-shaped.

Habitat.--Very common in all the fields and in the mountains. Blooms in June.

CASUARINEÆ.

Beefwood Family.

Casuarina Sumatrana, Jung. (C. equisetifolia, Blanco.)

Nom. Vulg.--Agoho, Tag.; Malabohok, Agoho, Vis.; Aro, Karo, Agoó, Iloc.

Uses.--The bark is astringent by virtue of the large quantity of tannin it contains. Its principal use is in decoction in the treatment of diarrhoea, dysentery and hæmoptysis; it is also given in amenorrhoea, though it is apt to increase the pain. Externally it is used as a wash for contusions and ulcers.

Another species, C. equisetifolia, Forst., confounded with the former species by the natives, has the same therapeutic applications.

Botanical Description.--A tree with stellately arranged straight branches. Leaves stellate, long, narrow, linear, 4-grooved. They have been compared to the tail of a horse and the tail of a certain bird--the casobar. Staminate and pistillate flowers greenish, on different parts of the same stalk. Staminate, in small aments. Pistillate on small globose aments; calyx proper of the floweret, a coarse scale; corolla none; ovary conical; styles 2, flattened, divergent; stigmas acute. Fruit: Each floweret produces a woody seed-vessel, bivalved, ovate, glabrous, with a small seed ending in an oval wing; all these seed vessels joined form a small cone about 1' long.

Habitat.--Very common in Ilocos, Tarlak, Binangonang of Lampong and N. Ecija.

MONOCOTYLEDONS.

MUSACEÆ.

Banana Family.

Musa paradisiaca, L.

M. sapientum, L.

Nom. Vulg. Plátano, Sp.; Saging, Tag., etc.; Banana, Eng.

Uses.--The fruit produced by the various varieties of the banana plant constitutes one of the most wholesome and delicious of foods, appreciated by natives and Europeans alike. According to Boussingaul its nutritive value is greater than that of the potato and it may be used constantly without ill effects. Bananas contain a large percentage of sugar and mucilage. In India they dry them in the sun, as figs and grapes are treated in other countries and thus preserve them for long voyages by sea or land; eaten in conjunction with animal food they are a strong preventive of scurvy. If eaten when thoroughly ripe they have a laxative effect.

The young and tender leaves are used in the Philippines as a protective dressing for ulcers, dermatitis, burns and cantharidal or other artificial blisters. Before applying to the affected surface the leaf is heated to make it more flexible and coated with a thin layer of cocoanut oil or other fatty substance.

In the dispensaries of India they also use the leaves in this way, thus protecting and at the same time maintaining the moisture of the part. Dr. Waring recommends the practice and Dr. Van Someren follows it in the application of water dressings, having substituted banana leaves for gutta-percha.

In Mauritius the fruit is used for dysentery, and the flowers, together with an equal quantity of those of Spilanthes Acmella, are made into a decoction and prescribed for dropsy.

Botanical Description.--The banana plant with its huge waving leaves and succulent stem is universally familiar. The flower stalk rises through the center developing a drooping spike, the flowers in short rows in the axils of its large purplish bracts. According to Blanco there are 57 varieties of this plant in the Philippines, the following being the most common edible varieties: bungulang, lakatan, letondang, obispo, higo, morado, butuan, bentikohol, sabá, tampuhing.