90 BOTANICAL INFORMATION. 
The extensive use of Opium and Rice Arrack among the Chinese 
and Malays is too well known to require notice here; also that the 
Burmese and Mughs are extensive consumers of spirits is a fact equally 
well known. On this side the Ganges the use of alcohol made from 
Rice-sugar, Palm-juice in its various states, from the flower of the 
Bassia, from the bark of Acacia Sundra, is, if not equally common, at 
least widely spread. The Rajpoots also, and Kolies of Western India, 
are great Opium-eaters, and the employment of this drug in rearing 
ehildren of the most tender age is universal among all classes of 
Indian society; and from what can be observed there seems every 
reason fo think, not only that the moderate use of the drug is in- 
noxious to children, but positively beneficial, in bringing them through 
the eritical periods of dentition. In the more southern parts of Western 
India the spirits used are distilled from Palm-juice, from Sugar in 
its various forms, and less frequently from the cereal grains, whereas 
north of Bombay and throughout Guzerat and Rajpootana the distil- 
lation from the flower of the Bassia latifolia, Roxb., is greatly the most 
common. 
This flower is collected in the hot season by Bheeis and others, from 
the forests, also from the planted trees, which are most abundant in 
the opener parts of Guzerat and Rajwarra. The ripe flower has a 
sickly sweet taste, resembling manna. Being very deciduous, it is 
found in large quantities under the trees every morning during the 
season. A single tree will afford from 200 to 400 Ibs. of the flowers. 
The seed affords a great quantity of concrete oil, used in the manufac- 
ture of soap. The forest or Bheel population also store great quan- 
tities of the dried flowers as a staple article of food; and hence, in 
expeditions undertaken for the punishment or subjection of those 
tribes when unruly, their Bassia-trees are threatened to be cut down 
by the invading force, and this threat most commonly ensures the 
submission of the tribes. 
In Guzerat and Rajpootana every village has its spirit-shop for the 
sale of the distilled liquor from the flowers; in the island of Caranja, 
opposite to Bombay, the Government duty on the spirits distilled 
(chiefly from this flower) amounts to at least £60,000 per annum; I 
rather think that £80,000 is most generally the sum. The Parsis are 
the great distillers and sellers of it in all the country between Surat 
and Bombay, and they usually push their distilleries and shops into the 
