Uses : — The fruit pounded and well mixed with warm cocoanut oil, forms a valuable application to sores under the ears and nostrils (Ainslie.)
The fruit is reckoned poisonous and, I am told, it is mixed with rice and employed to destroy crows (Roxburgh).
The root is used as a cattle medicine in inflammation of the lungs (Wight).
In Bombay, the fruit is smoked as a remedy for Asthma. The root, with an equal portion of Colocynth root, is rubbed into a paste and applied to carbuncles ; combined with equal portions of the three myrobalans and turmeric, it affords an infusion which is flavored with honey and given in gonorrhœa (Dymock).
The juice of the fruit or the root-barks, boiled with gingelly oil, is used with good effect as a bath oil, for the relief of long- standing or recurrent attacks of headache (Surgeon-Major Thompson in Watt's Dictionary).
525. T. cordata, Roxb, h.f.b.i., ii. 608 : Roxb, 695.
Vern. : — Bhoœ-koomra ; Bhûmi-kumara ; Bha-khûmba ; Patol (B.).
Habitat : — From the base of the Eastern Himalaya in Sikkim and Assam to Pegu. Frequent in the Khasia Terai and Cachar.
An extensive climber, with large tuberous roots and stout branching stems ; tendrills usually very stout, 3-fid. Leaves 6-8 in., entire or obscurely angular, broadly ovate-cordate, acute or shortly acuminate, dentate-serrate, dark-green above, and with short scattered hairs on both surfaces ; petiole 2-4in., stout. Male racemes few-flowered ; bracts large, elongate, sheathing at the base, obovate, entire, pubescent. Calyx-tube 1½in., lobes acuminate, denticulate. Fruit as in T. palmata. (Duthie).
Parts used : — The root and flowers.
Use :— The large tuberous roots are used as a valuable tonic and as a substitute for Calumba (Roxburug). In Patna, the
