GAMBOGE, the drug Cambogia, a gum-resin procured from Garcinia Morelia, Desrous., var. pedicellata, a dioecious tree with leathery, laurel-like leaves, small yellow flowers, and usually square-shaped and four-seeded fruit (see R. Jamie, Pharm. Journ., 3d ser., vol. iv. p. 802), a member of the natural order Guttifera , f and indigenous to Camboja (see Cambodia, vol. iv. p. 725), and parts of Siam and of the south of Cochin China, formerly comprised in Cambojan territory. The juice, which when hardened constitutes gamboge, is contained in the bark of the tree, chiefly in numerous ducts in its middle layer, and from this it is procured by making incisions, bamboo joints being placed to receive it as it exudes. Gamboge occurs in commerce in cylindrical pieces, known as pipe or roll gamboge, and also, usually of inferior quality, in cakes or amorphous masses. It is of a dirty orange exter nally; is hard and brittle, breaks with a conchoidal and reddish-yellow, glistening fracture, and affords a brilliant yellow powder; is odourless, and has a taste at first slight, but subsequently acrid; forms with water an emulsion; and consists of from 20 to 25 per cent, of gum soluble in water, and from 70 to 75 percent, of a resin, gambogic acid, soluble in alcohol and ether, and, according to Johnston, of the formula C 20 H 23 O 4 , together with moisture about 5 per cent., and a trace of ligneous fibre. Its commonest adulterations are rice-flour and pulverized bark. Some quantity of gamboge is shipped from Kâmpot in Camboja, but the principal places of export are Bangkok in Siam, and Saigon in Cochin China. Gamboge is a powerful lιydra-gogue purgative, less drastic only than elaterium and croton ‘oil. Like aloes, it appears to exert its chief influence on the lower bowel {Brit, ...