The Australian species of Cailitris yield a resin which can scarcely be distinguished from the African. The principal species seem to he C. verrucosa [Frenela crassivalvis], C. cupressiformis, and C. [P.] robusta. They are abundant on the sandy tracts of the Murray River (Victoria), and are scattered rnore or less throughout the whole continent, being recorded from King George's Sound and Shark Bay (W. Australia), and from Arnhem Land (N. Australia). The resin might easily become an article of local commerce, if not of export.
Sarcocolla.—The plant and country affording this medicinal gum-resin are unknown. It has been referred to a Penwa sp., found only in the Cape, but this is obviously incorrect. Dr. Dymock believes it to be produced by one of the desert Leguminosce, probably an Astragalus. Native evidence ascribes it to Persia and Turkistan ; this is borne out hy the fact that the Bombay imports of the drug, which are considerable, come entirely from Bushire, in the Persian Gulf. It arrives in bags containing about 2 cwt., always largely intermixed with remains of the plant (except leaves) and with sand, whence Dymock supposes it to he collected by beating the bushes after the leaves have fallen, aud allowing it to accumulate upon the ground. It holds an important place in Indian native pharmacy.
Satin-wood.—The satin-wood tree of India and Ceylon (Swietenia Chloroxylon) occurs in fractured and agglutinated tears, brittle, brown, translucent, and soluble in water, giving a turbid, dark mahogany-coloured mucilage, having an odour of fusel-oil. It is not a commercial article.
Scammony.—See Drugs, pp. 823-4.
Schaufite.—This name has been applied to a fossil resin found in sorne abundance in schistose sandstone beds traversing the petroleum region in Bukowina, Galicia, Bohemia, and S. Austria. It forms veins of in. in thickness. The colour is purplish to blood-red, and the hardness sufficient to admit of polishing., but not turning. It is slightly soluble in alcohol, benzine, and chloroform, entirely in sulphuric acid, and is saponiflable by caustic alkali. Distilled, it leaves a reddish-brown colophony, giving a brilliant varnish with turpentine and fatty oils.
Storax (FE., Styr= ; GER., Storax).—Several products call for description under this head, the most important being liquid storax or liquidambar.
Liquid Storax.—This is obtained from Liguidambar orientate [imberbe], a plane-like tree forming forests in S.-W. Asia Minor, notably near Melasse, about Budrum and Monghla, near Giova and Ulla, by Marmorizza and Isgengak in the valley of the El-Azi, and possibly near Narkislik, a village near Alexandretta ; but it is unknown in the islands of the Mediterranean. The resin is collected by the Yuruk nomads, by first removing the outer bark, and then scraping away the resinous inner hark, accumulating it in some quantity in pits. This bark is then either pressed dry in the first instance, or at once boiled with water in large copper vessels, whereby the resin is separated and can be skimmed off. The boiled bark is packed in hair bags and subjected to pressure while hot water is poured over. Thus a second quantity of resin is procured. The water used in the boiling is probably from the sea or saline lakes, as attested by the presence of salt in the drug. The result of the process is an opaque, grey, semi-fluid resin, of pleasant balsamic odour after long keeping, and pungent burning aromatic flavour ; and cakes of fragrant brown bark, which. coarsely powdered, is mixed up with storax, honey, and other substances, into an odoriferous compound, of which there are many qualities. Some 25 years ago the production of the resin was computed at about 800 cwt. per annum. It is mostly exported in casks by way of Constantinople, Smyrna, Syra, and Alexandria; some is packed with water in goat-skins for transport to Smyrna, and sent thence in barrels to Trieste. The use of the resin in this country is trifling and wholly medicinal (see Drugs, p. 826); the chief markets for it are India and China. Scherzer (1880) states the exports from Smyrna at 25,000-30,000 okes (of 2.83 lb.), worth 7 piastres (say ls. 3d.) the oke, chiefly for China and Egypt, for use in perfumery, fumigation, and church incense. It is said to have been employed in the United States as an adulterant of tolu.
True Storax.—True storax was a benzoin-like fragrant resin, afforded by the stem of Styrax officinale, of Greece, Asia Minor, Syria, Italy, and S. France ; it has ceased to be produced since the trees have been reduced to mere bushes by cutting.