196 BOTANY. 



PAPER PLANT. 



The Burmese make a coarse paper from the bark of a 

 large creeper that is found in the forests. The paper is 

 as thick as paste board, and the surface is blackened and 

 writtenupon with a steatite pencil. I have never seen 

 the plant in flower, but it is probably a species of daphne. 

 Daphne. 



GSCGCOii OOin 9"l. COGOgfill 



PALM-LEAF. 



All the Burman books are made of the leaf of a species 

 of corypha, but the orders that are issued from the Bur- 

 mese courts are written on strips of palmyra palm-leaf. 



ABRUS. 



The jewellers use the seed of a species of abrus, red, 

 with a black eye, or black with a white eye, for small 

 weights. It is a popular belief that they almost " uniform- 

 ly weigh exactly one grain, troy ;" but I have weighed 

 many and found them to vary from one to two grains. 

 The Burmese use them within a fraction for two grain 

 weights. One hundred and twenty, by one mode of reck- 

 oning, and one hundred and twenty eight by another, 

 make one tick al, which weighs according to Capt. Low 

 253' 75 grains troy. 



Abrus precatorius. 



Ggj8CoSnsj|8Ggj8M gooS^coSo (Tavoy) 



13cei. oocopBm 



ADEN ANTH ERA. 



Another seed which the books represent as usually 

 weighing four grains, is in common use by the Burmese, 

 as equivalent to two of the preceding, which is about four 

 grains. The seeds, however, have to be selected for the 

 purpose; many of them not weighing more than two, or 

 three grains each 



A den anther a pavonin a, 

 Ggs(c§8!i GQoSojc§gfl (Tavoy) 



