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INDIAN MEDICINAL PLANTS.


(Tam) ; Biyamu (Tel) ; Akki ; Bhatta ; nellu nellu (Kan) ; Ari (Mal).

Habitat: — Indigenous in marshes of Rajputana, Sikkim, Bengal the Khasia hills, Central India and the Circars.

Annual. Stems numerous, varying in height from 2-10 ft, lower portion floating or creeping, erect above, cylindrical, jointed, smooth, striate. Leaves with long close sheaths, the lower ones without blades ; ligule prominent, often an inch in length, lanceolate, acute ; blade linear, tapering, acute, 1-2 ft. long, and upwards of an inch in width, pale green, rough, edges serrulate and armed with minute forward prickles ; midrib prominent. Panicles narrow, 8 in. to 1 ft. or more in length, at first erect, becoming more or less drooping as the grain ripens; rachis flexuose, angular, hispid, with tufts of soft hair at the base of the branches. ' Spikelets laxly disposed, stalked, 1-flowered, articulated with the swollen summit of the pedicel Glumes small, the outer a little the longer, lanceolate acuminate, 1-nerved ; pales 2, equal, longer than the glumes, boat-shaped, clothed with short bristly hairs especially at the upper part, coriaceous, persistent, pale green, becoming white, yellow, reddish-yellow or nearly black as the grain ripens ; lower pale 3-nerved, blunt, acute or ending in a stiff smooth awn which often exceeds the spikelet. Lodicules 2, broad, fleshy, semi-transparent. Stamens 6, hypogynous ; anthers linear, protruding from the pales when in flower. Ovary smooth, tapering ; styles 2, about as long as the ovary ; stigmas red, composed of rough spreading hairs. Fruit (the grain) enclosed in, but not adhering to, the persistent pales, oblong-ovoid, smooth, somewhat compressed. (Duthie).

Uses :— In his "Materia Medica of the Hindus," Dr. U. C. Dutt writes : —

" The three principal classes of rice are Sali or that reaped in the cold season, Vrihi or that ripening in the rainy season, and Shashtika or that grown in the hot weather in low lands. This last is reaped within sixty days of its sowing. The varieties of each of these three classes of rice are numerous and

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