274 BURMA, ITS PEOPLE AND PRODUCTIONS. 



var. a cunia. Eeccptacles pyriform, stalked. 



var. ji conglomerata, Roxb. lleceptacles more globular, sessile. 



Kurz adds from the Nicobars : 



F. GiBBOSA, Bl. Tree forests of Kamorta and Car Xicobar. 



F. PEDUNCiJiATA, Rwdt. Nankowiy. 



Mason gives the following vernacular names for several species of figs : Yae-klia- 

 ong, Tae-tha-hpan, Pa-nioung, Yuae-tia-thie, Neoung-tha-bye, Nioung-peing-nC-, Bet- 

 ka-lat, Kha-ung-sung-ku, Louk-let, Sa-kha-ung, Thab-bu, Thap-pau ; andin Sgau-Karen, 

 We-tlia-kan-tho, We-tha-kau-hsa, We-tha-ku-pan, We-tba-ku-pan-tho. We-tlia-ku- 

 pan-bsa, We-ta-en-ua-tho, We-ta-en-na-hsa, "\Ve-liti, Wo tlia-dwi-tbo, We-khai-lisa, 

 Wc-kle-thu-mu. 



From tlie earliest times, down to the present, the fig-tree has ever held a 

 distinguished place among those trees associated with Phallic si/mbolism and the 

 worship of the reproductive force of nature. A familiar example may be quoted 

 in the traditional use of the fig-leaves as a covering for our first parents, and the 

 connection thereby indicated between the fig and the ideas covertly represented 

 by the serpent and the mythical applo or forbidden fruit (call it what you may), for I 

 presume there are few people now-a-ilays who have enjoyed anything approaching to a 

 liberal education, who are so unenliglitened or credulous, as to regard the account 

 of Adam's fall in a literal and material sense, and not as an allegorical and covert pre- 

 sentment of the course and development of human passion and frailty. No greater 

 mistake can be made than when we attribute indelicacy or profanity to certain acts or 

 things, which .to tlie eyes of men in an earlier and nidor stage of society appeared 

 neither indelicate nor profane, however much they may be judged to be so by ourselves. 

 To judge justly of either actions or persons, we must emancipate ourselves as much as 

 possible from our prejudices and present sui-roundings and view matters as they appeared 

 to those of old time. In our day, for example, if one man wishes to pledge himself to 

 another, he grasps his hand ; but in Abraham's time it was not the hand, but quite 

 another part of the person' (the ' thigh' as it is euphemistically called), which was 

 grasped when a solemn pact or engagement was made ; and yet we may be sure that 

 all notions of indelicacy were as absent in the one case as they are in the other, and 

 this peculiar mode of attestation simply added the sanctity of an oath to the obligation 

 about to he incurred. 



Tliis may appear to many too much of a truism to require comment, but so far 

 fi-om tliis being universally accepted and acted on, there are, I fear, too many among 

 us who would ratlier the uuiltitude remained in ignorance of the meaning of a good 

 deal they read in their Bibles, or entirely misinterpreted the same, than unsettle their 

 minds by letting them comprehend the truth; such, for example, as the real 

 meaning of the alK'gory of the Serpent in Genesis. These few remarks are, however, 

 made simply in explanation of the light wherein I view a subject rather difficult, 

 I confess, to deal witli, and need not therefore be prolonged. Speaking of tlie famous 

 Ficiis rumiiin/is- of Rome, beneath which it was believed Romulus and Remus were 

 nurtured, De Gubcrnatis remai'ks, " La fi(/uc dans le monde vegetal, . . . est un 

 symbol de la generation et de la fecondite, et elle preside tout naturellement a la 

 fondation d'une grand ville et d'une grand peuple." And again, " C'est sous un 

 figuiere qu'Adam se cache apres avoir mange le fruit defendu ; la figuo et la 

 pomme d'Adam cachent le meme fruit mythologique." And again " Nous avons 

 eu deja plusieurs fois I'occasion de noter que les animaux et les arbrcs phalUques sont 

 devenus des arbrcs sinistres, funeraires, diaboliques ; nous avons tache memo do 

 prouver comment I'arbre d'Adam a pu se transformer en arbre de la croix, en arbre 

 maudit, en arbre de Judas." 



In connection with this subject it may be remarked that the wood of the fig-tree 



1 Genesis xxiv 2. 



- For nuioh curious information tonchin.s tlie extremely ancient synibolieal sense attaohinjr to 'Jiffs' 

 ami 'Jiij-Uaies,' e(uisult ' Ancient Faiths embodied in Ancient Xanies,' by Tlioni.as Innian, under the 

 heads 'Apple,' 'Fig,' ' rammmnsis' ' Jiiiiimoii,' and Mvthologie des Plantes. ii. p. 137. 'the subject 

 is a deep one, but inadmissible in a work of general reading, in spite of the laudable proverb ' to the 

 pure all things are.' 



