TjIksehn society of lokdon. tg 



the sun (except during the rains), showing a thousand cracks ; it 

 is then possible in many places to walk for several hours among 

 the mangroves, the mangrove vegetation being quite scattered 

 and open. There are also (B) large open areas of grass : thej^e 

 may be in the beginning of the hot weather merely swampy 

 meadow ; by the end of the rains they are jungles of tall grass, 

 often full of beasts. Then there are (C) the Soondreebun proper, 

 where dense jungles of Soondree, themselves established on 

 tolerably firm mud, are invaded by creeks of every size in all 

 directions. There are all kinds of intermediate vegetation ; and 

 the typical forms themselves are distributed very irregularly : there 

 are, for instance, large areas of saline mud submerged at high 

 water, with mangroves, near Calcutta; while, on the other hand, 

 there are extensive grass-jungles in Khoolna and the south of 

 Buriaal not far from the sea; a large area of these has been 

 brought into cultivation within the last thirty years. The land 

 is exceedingly fertile, both for pasture and rice, if the salt water 

 can be excluded. Thirty years ago Mr. Woodrow made mud- 

 clay banks to keep out the salt water from a tract near Port 

 Canning; but these banks were so completely riddled by a small 

 crab (which Dr. Prain tells me was an Ocypode), that his schemes 

 were entirely defeated. In 1870 Lord Mayo was desirous to 

 exclude the salt water from a considerable area near the Cal- 

 cutta Salt- Water Lakes. The engineers undertook, in official 

 letters, that no water should flood the land during the rains. 

 John Scott, F.L.S., covered this area with crops during the hot 

 weather ; and Lord Mayo, on the ground, declared triumphantly 

 to me in the first week of June that it was the very finest farm 

 in all the world ; but only one week later the rise of the water 

 enabled the small crabs to attack the banks ; this fiue farm 

 became submerged, and remained 2-4 feet under salt water for 

 three months. 



On these mud-flats, submerged at high tide, the small fish 

 Fariophthalmus runs in great numbers ; it runs nimbly, moving 

 its two pectoral fins as a pair of legs. 



The grass jungles abound in animal life: the HMnoceros son- 

 daicus, the axis-deer, the tiger, and the buffalo are character- 

 istic among the larger animals. The tiger is troublesome to the 

 villagers, and takes a good many human as well as bovine lives ; 

 Grovernmeut pays 50 rupees for a tiger, 20 rupees for a cub. 

 I have seen many tiger-traps in various parts of Bengal and the 

 adjacent hills, but never knew a tiger caught in any of them. In 

 the Soondreebun traps, however, the tiger is caught successfully ; 

 villagers have assured me that they have captured thirty in one 

 year at one trap. There is no real diflerence m the design of the 

 traps ; but the Soondreebun trap, made of bamboos stuck deep 

 into the ground, is perhaps 15 feet high ; the tiger will not 

 creep into the low box-trap of the hills. The creeks contain in 

 certain places sharks and crocodiles — in other places none — the 



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