43 



SANSEVIERA ZEYLANICA 



44 



182. ROTTBOELLIA PERFORATA 



Panoocoo of the Telingas. 



Culms many, erect, simple, round, smooth, jointed, but not piped, 



from three to five feet high, and about as thick as a crow- 

 quill. 



Leaves small for the size of the grass, slender and smooth, margins 



hispid, mouth of the sheaths and for a little way up the base 



of the leaves, very woolly. 



Sp 



round, smooth, as thick as a crow-quill; from three to six 



flowers 



is an oblong perforation, so that the b 

 glumes of the calyx touch each other. 



Flowers in pairs, nearly opposite, on the lower half, or more, of 



the spike; above alternate, sometimes all hermaphrodite, 

 sometimes hermaphrodite and male intermixed. 



Ca/yxone-two-flower'd, two-valved: valvelets simple, the exterior 



rigid, the interior firm and white, but obliquely linear- 



oblong. 



Corol 



when 



double, the exterior one is male, and the two have four 



memb 



•*r 



g 



This species is rather rare; it grows on low rich pasture 



ound. 



Both species are of a very coarse nature; cattle do not eat 



them. 



183. GISEKIA PHARNACEOIDES 



Linn. mant. 562. 



Ishi-rash-kura of the Telingas. 



Stems prostrate, round, smooth, jointed, from one to four feet long, 



and 



L 



three 



quarters of an inch long. 



Peduncles axillary, many, bowing, one-flower'd. 



Flowers small, g 



dg 



by 



184. SANSEVIERA ZEYLANICA 



Linn. spec, plant, edit. Wildenow %.p. 159. 

 Salmia spicata. Gavan. ic. 3. p. 24. t. 246. 

 Aletris hyacinthoides «. zeylanica. Linn. sp. plant 



Katu-kapel. Rheede Malab. 11. p. 83. /. 42. 



456 



Bow-string hemp. 



Tshama-cada Nar of the Telingas. 



Roots perennial, stole-bearing : stoles as thick as the little finger, 



run 



under the ground, invested with sheathing scales. 



L 



broad 



from one to 



four feet long, semi-cylindric, groov'd on the upper side, 



eacl 



g 



they are all 



d 



b 



tp 



flower 



long, (including the raceme or 



round, smooth, about as thick as a small rattan; 



erect, 

 m the 



raceme and the base, there are, at regular distances, four or 

 five pointed, alternate, sheaths. 

 Raceme erect, about as long, or longer, than the scape below the 



flowers, striated, smooth. 



s of the inner Flowers greenish-white, erect, collected in fascicles of four to six, 



from little, regularly distant, tubercles of the raceme. 



Bractes small, membranous. 



Pedicels club'd, short, ascending, one-fl 



Caly 



x none. 



Corol one petal'd, funnel-form, half six-cleft : d 



nearly 



linear. 



Filaments length of the divisions of the corol, and inserted into 



their base. A 



linear-oblong, 



mb 



half two- 



cleft. 



lob'd. Style 



club'd, entire. 



Berries one, two, or three, slightly united above, but each berry 



globular, fleshy, orange-colour, smooth, size of a pea, one- 



seeded. 



be remarked, as in Sapindus and Men 



mum, that there are the rudiments of three, both in the germ 



but all the three seld 



Seeds srlob 



It grows commonly under bushes in thin jungle, and almost 

 in every soil. Flowering time the cold, and beginning of the 

 hot season, that is, from the beginning of January till May. 



good soil, and where plants are regularly and mode- 



to 3-4 high; they contain a 



In 



a 



row 



rately watered, the leaves i 

 number of fine, remarkably strong, longitudinal, white fibres, the 

 length of the leaf, of which the natives make their best bow- 

 strings. To separate the fibres from the pulpy parts, the natives 

 lay a single fresh leaf on a smooth board, and securing one end by 



wi 



a thin slice of wood held by both hands, and quickly separate 

 the pulp. The same purpose is effected by steeping the leaves in 



b 



water, as practised in Europe with flax and hemp 



found, upon trial, the colour of the fibres much injured by that 



mode. 



About 80 pounds of the fresh 



pound 



the clean dry fibres. The leaves were gathered at once, frorn^a 

 small bed of the plants, (scarcely three yards square), which had 

 been planted about twelve months before in my own garden, 

 and they were, upon an average, under two feet long, owing 

 to their having been gathered before they were at their full size. 

 Full grown leaves of 3 and 3i feet long, yielded proportionally 



fresh 



fl 



vated 



advantage ; for even according to the first mentioned rate, of one 

 pound of the fibres, from a bed of three square yards, one acre 

 would yield 1613 pounds of flax at one gathering, and two crops 

 may be reckoned on yearly, in a good soil and favourable season, 



