Adansonia.
Adansonia. Adansonia digitata, L. Baobab.—A tree of enormous magnitude, belonging to Bombacaceae. It is a native of Africa, extending quite through that continent from Senegal to Abyssinia, and has been introduced into the West Indies. The leaves and bark of this tree abound in mucilage, and have little odor or taste. By the Africans the leaves are used as a diaphoretic, and the subacid pulp of the fruit in dysentery. Under the name of cream-of-tartar tree various trees have been described. Their fruits contain, or have been supposed to contain, potassium bitartrate. The most important of these is the Adansonia Gregorii F. Muell, of North Australia. Another cream-of-tartar fruit is yielded by a tree of South Africa, which, according to E. M. Holmes, is probably the Adansonia madagascariensis Baillon. This fruit has been examined by E. J. Millard (P. J., April, 1890), who found that it contains no cream of tartar at all. It is probably identical with a cream-of-tartar fruit examined by F. L. Slocum. (A. J. P., 1880). Heckel and Schlagdenhauffen (Nouv. Rem., xxi, 487) have found in the fruit of the Adansonia digitata as much as 2 per cent. of free tartaric acid and 12 per cent. of potassium bitartrate. Duchassaing, of Guadeloupe, West Indies, and Pierre, of France, commended the bark of A. digitata highly as an antiperiodic. (A. G. M., 3e ser., xxiii, 535.) It is said to be acceptable to the stomach, and to produce no other observable physiological effect than increase of appetite, increased perspiration, and perhaps diminished frequency of pulse. An ounce may be boiled in a pint and a half of water to a pint, and the whole taken in a day. (J. P. C., 3e ser., xiii, 412 and 421.)
