_Semen Guilandinæ_; _Bonduc Seeds_, _Grey Nicker Seeds or Nuts_; F.
_Graines de Bonduc ou du Cniquier_, _Pois Quéniques_, _Pois Guénic_.
=Botanical Origin=—_Cæsalpinia Bonducella_ Roxb. (_Guilandina
Bonducella_ L.), a prickly, pubescent, climbing shrub[814] of wide
distribution, occurring in Tropical Asia, Africa and America,
especially near the sea. The compressed, ovate, spiny legume is 2 to 3
inches long, and contains one or two, occasionally three or four, hard,
grey, globular seeds.
The plant is often confounded with _C. Bonduc_ Roxb., a nearly allied
but much rarer species, distinguished by being nearly glabrous, having
leaflets very unequal at the base, no stipules, erect bracts, and
yellow seeds.
=History=—“_Pūti-Karanja_” stinking Karanja, in Susruta (I.223,
1) is the plant under notice. The word _Bunduk_, occurring in the
writings of the Arabian and Persian physicians, also in Constantinus
Africanus, mostly signifies _hazel-nut_.[815] One of these authors, Ibn
Baytar,[816] who flourished in the 13th century, further distinguished
a drug called _Bunduk Hindi_ (Indian hazel-nut), giving a description
which indicates it plainly as the seed under notice. Both _Bunduk_
and _Bunduk Hindi_ are enumerated in the list of drugs of Noureddeen
Mohammed Abdullah Shirāzy,[817] physician to the Mogul emperor Shah
Jehan, A.D. 1628-1661.
The pods of _C. Bonducella_ were figured by Clusius in 1605, under
the name of _Lobus echinodes_, and the plant both by Rheede[818] and
Rumphius. Piso and Marcgraf (1648) noticed it in Brazil and gave some
account of it with a bad woodcut, under the designation of _Inimbóy_
(now _Inimboja_), or in Portuguese _Silva do Praya_.
[813] Purchas, _His Pilgrimes_, iv. (1625) 1308.
[814] Fig. in Bentley and Trimem, _Med. Plants_, part 24 (1877).
[815] The word also means _a little ball_ or _a round stone_. Bunduk
Hindi is frequently used by Arabic authors to denote also Areca nut.
[816] Sontheimer’s translation, i. 177.
[817] _Ulfaz Udwiyeh_, translated by Gladwin, 1793. No. 543. 551.
[818] _Hort. Malab._ ii. (1679) tab. 22, sub nom. _Caretti_.
In recent times, Bonduc seeds have been employed on account of their
tonic and antiperiodic properties by numerous European practitioners in
the East, and have been included in the _Pharmacopœia of India_, 1868.
=Description=—The seeds are somewhat globular or ovoid, a little
compressed, ⁴/₁₀ to ⁸/₁₀ of an inch in diameter and weighing 20 to 40
grains. They are of a bluish or greenish grey tint, smooth, yet marked
by slightly elevated horizontal lines of a darker hue. The umbilicus
is surrounded by a small, dark brown, semilunar blotch opposite the
micropyle. The hard shell is from ¹/₂₅ to ²/₂₅ of an inch thick, and
contains a white kernel; representing from 40 to 50 per cent. of the
weight of the seed. It separates easily from the shell, and consists of
the two cotyledons and a stout radicle. When a seed is soaked for some
hours in cold water, a very thin layer can be peeled from the surface
of the testa. The kernel is bitter, but with the taste that is common
to most seeds of the family _Leguminosæ_.
=Microscopic Structure=—The outer layer of the testa, the epidermis
above alluded to, is composed of two zones of perpendicular, closely
packed cells, the outer measuring about 130 mkm., the inner 100 mkm. in
length and only 5 to 7 mkm. in diameter. The walls of these cylindrical
cells are thickened by secondary deposits, which in transverse section
show usually four or more channels running down nearly perpendicularly
through the whole cell.
The spongy parenchyme, which is covered by this very distinct outer
layer, is made up of irregular, ovate, subglobular or somewhat
elongated cells with large spaces between them, loaded with brown
masses of tannic matter, assuming a blackish hue when touched with
perchloride of iron. The thick walls of these cells frequently exhibit,
chiefly in the inner layers, undulated outlines. The tissue of the
cotyledons is composed of very large cells, swelling considerably in
water, and containing some mucilage (as may be ascertained when thin
slices are examined in oil), small starch granules, fatty oil, and a
little albuminous matter.
=Chemical Composition=—According to the medical reports alluded to in
the _Pharmacopœia of India_ (1868), Bonduc seeds, and still more the
root of the plant, act as a powerful antiperiodic and tonic.
The active principle has not yet been adequately examined. It may
perhaps occur in larger proportion in the bark of the root, which
is said to be more efficacious than the seeds in the treatment of
intermittent fever.[819]
In order to ascertain the chemical nature of the principle of the
seeds, one ounce of the kernels[820] was powdered and exhausted with
slightly acidulated alcohol. The solution after the evaporation of the
alcohol was made alkaline with caustic potash, which did not produce a
precipitate. Ether now shaken with the liquid, completely removed the
bitter matter, and yielded it in the form of an amorphous white powder,
devoid of alkaline properties. It is sparingly soluble in water, but
readily in alcohol, forming intensely bitter solutions; an aqueous
solution is not precipitated by tannic acid. It produces a yellowish
or brownish solution with concentrated sulphuric acid, which acquires
subsequently a violent hue. Nitric acid is without manifest influence.
From these experiments, we may infer that the active principle of the
Bonduc seed is a bitter substance not possessing basic properties.
[819] Waring, _Bazaar Medicines_, Travancore, 1860. 18.
[820] Kindly furnished us by Dr. Waring.
=Uses=—The powdered kernels either _per se_, or mixed with black pepper
(_Pulvis Bonducellæ compositus_ Ph. Ind.), are employed in India
against intermittent fevers and as a general tonic.
The fatty oil of the seeds is sometimes extracted and used in India; it
was shown at the Madras Exhibitions of 1855 and 1857.