One of them is generally identified with the seeds of Moringa pterygosperma—see [HORSE RADISH TREE]—the Ben-nuts of old writers, and affording Oil of Ben, used as a basis in perfumery.
This article we have been unable to find. Dr. Hunter in As. Res. (xi. 182) quotes from a Persian work of Mahommed Husain Shirāzi, communicated to him by Mr. Colebrooke, the names of 6 varieties of Halīla (or Myrobalan) as afforded in different stages of maturity by the Terminalia Chebula:—1. H. Zīra, when just set (from Zīra, cummin-seed). 2. H. Jawī (from Jau, barley). 3. Zangī or Hindī (The Black M.). 4. H. Chīnī. 5. H. 'Asfar, or Yellow. 6. H. Kābulī, the mature fruit. [See Dr. Murray's article in Watt, Econ. Dict. vi. pt. iv. 33 seqq.]
"Confettiamo," "make comfits of"; "preserve," but the latter word is too vague.
This is surely not what we now call Cassia Fistula, the long cylindrical pod of a leguminous tree, affording a mild laxative? But Hanbury and Flückiger (pp. 195, 475) show that some Cassia bark (of the cinnamon kind) was known in the early centuries of our era as κασία συριγγώδης and cassia fistularis; whilst the drug now called Cassia Fistula, L., is first noticed by a medical writer of Constantinople towards A.D. 1300. Pegolotti, at p. 366, gives a few lines of instruction for judging of cassia fistula: "It ought to be black, and thick, and unbroken (salda), and heavy, and the thicker it is, and the blacker the outside rind is, the riper and better it is; and it retains its virtue well for 2 years." This is not very decisive, but on the whole we should suppose Pegolotti's cassia fistula to be either a spice-bark, or solid twigs of a like plant (H. & F. 476).
This is probably Balanitis aegyptiaca, Delile, the zak of the Arabs, which is not unlike myrobalan fruit and yields an oil much used medicinally. The negroes of the Niger make an intoxicating spirit of it.