GOA POWDER. This medicine, which in India is procured from Goa only, is invaluable in the virulent eczema of Bombay, and other skin diseases. In eczema it sometimes acts like magic, but smarts like the cutting of a knife. It is obtained from Andira Araroba (N.O. Leguminosae), a native (we believe) of S. America. The active principle is Chrysophanic acid (Commn. from Sir G. Birdwood).
GOA STONE. A factitious article which was in great repute for medical virtues in the 17th century. See quotation below from Mr. King. Sir G. Birdwood tells us it is still sold in the Bombay Bazar.
1673.—"The Paulistines enjoy the biggest of all the Monasteries at St. Roch; in it is a Library, an Hospital, and an Apothecary's Shop well furnished with Medicines, where Gasper Antonio, a Florentine, a Lay-Brother of the Order, the Author of the Goa-Stones, brings them in 50,000 Xerephins, by that invention Annually; he is an Old Man, and almost Blind."—Fryer, 149-150.
1690.—"The double excellence of this Stone (snake-stone) recommends its worth very highly ... and much excels the deservedly famed Gaspar Antoni, or Goa Stone."—Ovington, 262.
1711.—"Goa Stones or Pedra de Gasper Antonio, are made by the Jesuits here: They are from ¼ to 8 Ounces each; but the Sise makes no Difference in the Price: We bought 11 Ounces for 20 Rupees. They are often counterfeited, but 'tis an easie Matter for one who has seen the right Sort, to discover it.... Manooch's Stones at Fort St. George come the nearest to them ... both Sorts are deservedly cried up for their Vertues."—Lockyer, 268.
1768-71.—"Their medicines are mostly such as are produced in the country. Amongst others, they make use of a kind of little artificial stone, that is manufactured at Goa, and possesses a strong aromatic scent. They give scrapings of this, in a little water mixed with sugar, to their patients."—Stavorinus, E.T. i. 454.
1867.—"The Goa-Stone was in the 16th (?) and 17th centuries as much in repute as the Bezoar, and for similar virtues ... It is of the shape and size of a duck's egg, has a greyish metallic lustre, and though hard, is friable. The mode of employing it was to take a minute dose of the powder scraped from it in one's drink every morning ... So precious was it esteemed that the great usually carried it about with them in a casket of gold filigree."—Nat. Hist. of Gems, by C. W. King, M.A., p. 256.
GOBANG, s. The game introduced some years ago from Japan. The name is a corr. of Chinese K'i-p'an, 'checker-board.'
[1898.—"Go, properly gomoku narabe, often with little appropriateness termed 'checkers' by European writers, is the most popular of the indoor pastimes of the Japanese,—a very different affair from the simple game known to Europeans as Goban or Gobang, properly the name of the board on which go is played."—Chamberlain, Things Japanese, 3rd ed., 190 seq., where a full account of the game will be found.]
GODAVERY, n.p. Skt. Godāvarī, 'giving kine.' Whether this name of northern etymology was a corruption of some indigenous name we know not. [The Dravidian name of the river is Goday (Tel. gode, 'limit'), of which the present name is possibly a corruption.] It is remarkable how the Godavery is ignored by writers and map-makers till a comparatively late period, with the notable exception of D. João de Castro, in a work, however, not published till 1843. Barros, in his trace of the coasts of the Indies (Dec. I. ix. cap. 1), mentions Gudavarij as a place adjoining a cape of the same name (which appears in some much later charts as C. Gordewar), but takes no notice of the great river, so far as we are aware, in any part of his history. Linschoten also speaks of the Punto de Guadovaryn, but not of the river. Nor does his map show the latter, though showing the Kistna distinctly. The small general map of India in "Cambridge's Acc. of the War in India," 1761, confounds the sources of the Godavery with those of the Mahanadi (of Orissa) and carries the latter on to combine with the western rivers of the Ganges Delta. This was evidently the prevailing view until Rennell published the first edition of his Memoir (1783), in which he writes: