22G BURMA, ITS PEOPLE AXD PRODUCTIONS. 



Order JUGLANDACE^. 



Floicers unisexual, the males in axillary spikes or catkins, the females solitary, 

 or in terminal or axillaiy spikes or clusters. Males: Perinnth simple, irregularly 

 2-6-cleft, adnate to the scale-like bracts. Stameyis indefinite, sometimes 3 or more 

 in 2 or many rows. Anthers sessile or nearly so, 2-celled, the cells opening longi- 

 tudinally. Female floicers more or less connate with the bract, or free. Perianth 

 double or simple ; if double, the outer one more or less connate with the ovary, cup- 

 shaped, 3 or more toothed at the apex, or fonuing a bractcd involucre, the inner 

 peiianth connate with the ovaiy, 4-toothed ; if simple, forming a 4-toothed cup. 

 Ovary inferior, 1 -celled (or 2- or 4-eelled at the base) with a solitaiy erect or 

 pendulous ovule in each cell. Style short. Stigmas usually 2, rarely 4. Fruit 

 a drupe with a fleshy or membranous pericarji (the enlarged perianth), indehiscent, 

 or dehiscing iiTCgularly or in 4 valves. Xid consisting of the indurated ovary bony, 

 usually free from the pericarp. Testa membranous. Albumen none. Cotyledons 

 fleshy, with a superior radicle. Trees with unpaired or rarely spuriously abruptly 

 pinnate leaves. Stipules none. 



The timber of all the members of this family is valuable. The bark is acrid and 

 often astringent. 



JuGL.ixs, Linnaus. 

 Fruit a large drupe, with a fleshy pericarji. 

 J. EEGiA, L. Ava Hills. 



"VValnut. 



Valuable for furniture. The nearest approach to this wood in appearance among 

 common Burmese woods is Ilpanyah [Terminalia tomentelhi), selected planks of which 

 would be no bad substitute for ordinary walnut. Logs of walnut wood are transplanted 

 from Kashmir across the passes on men's shoulders to Jamu, and thence by cart to 

 Wazirabad, whence they go by rail to Bombay, and so to Europe ! In sight of this 

 fact, the result of private energy and industrial perseverance, is it not strange that 

 some of the many fine fancy woods of Pegu and Tenasserim should not ere this have 

 been brought to the notice of European dealers and a trade therein established ? 

 Burma, one of the richest areas for its size in the world for the finer sorts of woods, 

 with its matchless sea-board, and intersected by rivers and creeks penetrating the 

 virgin forest, is actually distanced in the race by an inaccessible valley, more than 

 a thousand miles from its only available port ! ! In the one case, however, the 

 development of the resources of the soil is undertaken by private entcrprize, whilst 

 in the other, everything is in the hands of a department, vigilant, no doubt, and 

 inexorable in enforcing its own rules, but which has hithei'to done less than might 

 be expected towards the practical development of the magnificent resources it guards. 

 Kurz remarks: "In the Shan States east of Ava grows another species of 

 Juglans, with smaller, almost globose, quite smooth nuts, but nothing is known about 

 the tree itself." 



The term Walnut is a corruption of the Anglo-Saxon tvealh-hnut, or foreign nut, 

 the tree having been introduced into Northeni Europe from Italy (Prior).' 



Regarding the mythological stories and virtues attached to the walnut, De 

 Gubcmatis writes: "11 convient de faire un distinction raythologique entre la noix 

 et le noyer : la noix est le plus souvent consideree comme propice, favourable aux 

 mariages, a la generation ct symbole d'abondance ; le noyer au contraire est craint 

 comme un arbre triste, haute avec predilection par les sorcieres." It was perhaps 

 the estimation in which the walnut was held that led to its finding a place in the 

 renowned (th(jugh absurdly simple as it appears to us) prescription of Mithridates — 



" Bis denum rutse folium, salis et breve gi-anum 

 Juglandes que duas, terno cum corpore ficus." 



And after relating many customs connected with this fruit, De Gubematis remarks : 

 " La noix, et sans doute, tout specialement la noix a trois nocuds, est le iJeus ex 



' P 



ipiilar Xamcs of British Plants, p. 248. 



