i:S^ A JOURXEY TO THE NAGA. HILLS. 131 



recollect ever seeing before. The great mass of tlie forests at 

 5000-SOOO feet is oak all round Kohima; the most abundant 

 tree at the 5000-GOOO feet level is Alnus^ I think the same species 

 as in Sikkia:i. It grows here into a tree with an enormous trunk, 

 some as big as the largest English oak I ever saw ; but big trees 

 of tl»e Ahius are scarce, as the ]N"agas pollard it at six feet from 

 the ground, and cut the innumerable sprouts for firewood. 



1 have also collected in the 5000-GOOO feet level two Z)/o5/)yro5, 

 largish trees, one Avith largish smooth fruit, the other with large 

 hairy fruit, both of them trees that have a tropical, non-Sikkim, 

 aspect to me. 



The flora here is thus verj interesting, and exceedingly rich, 

 nevertheless my collections contain few new species. I had a 

 vague idea that I could, in a mere passing visit, collect a nearly 

 complete set of the Kohima species in flower in October; but, 

 if for no other reason, I cannot do this for want of paper. Trans- 

 port here is exceedingly difficult; the approach to Kohima is 

 admitted to be the worst ''line" in India; the sixty-four miles 

 tlirough tlie IN'ambre swamp-forests often take the Government 

 convoys ten to twenty days, and the road is decorated wdth 

 broken carts and the bones of bullocks, and sanded sometimes 

 for half a mile with Government grain. Kohima is not a place 

 wliere you can get paper of any kind. I have therefore in col- 

 lecting often gathered only a scrap of the species where Avell 

 knoAvn — this will be enough for identification. 



In the richer soil and warm climate of Kohima many plants 

 grow unusually large. One plant here which the English denizens 

 have not overlooked is the Kohima thistle : it is abundant and 

 attains fifteen to twenty feet (I am told that in some places it is 

 twenty-five feet high) ; this is I believe only a large form of the 

 Sikkim Cnicus (like our European Cn. eriopliorus) with yellow 

 flowers. Similarly I gathered here an enormous liutca\ even of 

 a small leaf of it the ordinary-sizedpaper cannot hold one leafletj 

 at first I thought it quite new, but I now believe it is only a large 

 form of Butea mino)% Wall. There is another " Carduoid " here 

 (I forget the genus, but it is not C/iicics), which attains ten to 

 fifteen feet, and is quite unlike my recollections of the plant 

 (this may be sp. nova). The rice is, as I have stated, the Coix, 

 and all the crops grow exceedingly strong. Naga-land is in fact 

 a very rich country, and it is not a little place like Sikkim or 

 Khasia; there must be 200 miles of it, all nearly equally good. 



LiNx. jorny. — bota>'y, vol. xxti. i< 



