Ion describes it as compresso-obovate or obcordate, hence gibbous. This is a more accurate description, I think. Style simple, solitary, filiform, eccentric, becoming convolute, as if to bring the stigma into contact with the large anther of the long filament (Roxb). Stigma minute, often tinged crimson. Ovule solitary, long, conical ; inserted at the summit of a suberect, ascending panicle. Chalaza superior ; micropyle introse, inferior, near funicle. Fruit an ash-coloured nut, kidney-shaped, dry, shining, indchiscent. lin. long, ¼in. broad at hilum ; some- what compressed. Mesocarp soft, corky, lacunose, oleo-resinous. The epicarp and pericarp coriaceous, not woody, as Baillon says. The most noteworthy part of the plant is the succulent, fleshy, enlarged peduncle, soft and juicy, obovoid, slightly sweet, at times very acrid and irritating to the throat and tongue ; popularly sold as the Kaju fruit in the bazaar, and of which much liquor is manufactured in Goa. Seed kidney-shaped which is the real fruit, corresponding to the pericarp. Testa crisp, membranous, and easily removable, mottled reddish-brown outside, deep crimson inside, of an astringent aromatic taste, separable from the kernel or milkwhite cotyledons by a resinous fracture ; albumen absent.
Parts used : — The fruit, seeds and spirit.
Uses : — The bark is said to have alterative properties. The tar, which contains about 90 p. c. of anacardic acid and 10 p. c. of cardol, has recently been recommended as an external application in leprosy, ringworm, corns and obstinate ulcers ; it is powerfully rubefacient and vesicant, and requires to be used with caution. In Native practice, it is sometimes used as a counter-irritant. In Europe, a tincture of the pericarp (1 to 10 of rectified spirit) has been used in doses of 2 to 10 minims as a vermifuge. According to Basiner, the subcutaneous injection of small doses of cardol produces on cold-blooded animals paresis, increasing to paralysis of the extremities, stupor, paralysis of respiration and tetanic spasms. In warm-blooded animals large doses are not lethal, but stupor, paralysis of the extremities and diarrhœa occur, and, after death, congestion of
