3^0 Account of a Banian Tree 



emperorsj and fown there. The groves and fafliion of the 



ground, as well as the fruit-trees, and a large ftone wall 



O-bout them, indicate the place to have been once a garden, 



and it is called to this time Btjum-le Baug, or the Queen's 



Garden. 



On my arrival at Patna, oh the ad of January 17^8, I 

 luckily met with a gentleman named Kerr, celebrated for 

 Ills fkill in botanical refearches, who told me that the above- 

 mentioned tree was of the fpecies clafled in the Liniiaean 

 fyftem under the name of Adanfonia, a defcription of which 

 is to be found in the fixth edition of his Genera Plantaru7ny 

 printed at Stockholm 1764, p. 3^3. 



V. Account of a Banian TreB in the Province of Bahar. 

 By Colonel Ironside *, 



Ni 



EAR ManjeCf a fmall town at the confluence of the 

 Devah (or Gogra) and the Ganges, about twenty miles well 

 of the city of Patna, there is a remarkably large tree, called 

 a bur or banian Iree, which has the quality of extending its 

 branches, in a horizontal dire6lion, to a confiderable diftance 

 from its ftem ; and of then dropping leaflefs fibres, or fcions, 

 to the ground, which there catch hold of the earth, take 

 root, embody, grow thick, and ferve either to fupport the 

 protrafted branches, or, by a farther vegetation, to compofe 

 a fecond trunk. From thefe branches other arms again 

 fpring out, fall down, enter the ground, grow up again, and 

 conftituie a third ftem, and fo on. From theoppofite pretty 

 high bank of the. Ganges, and at the diilance of near eight 

 miles, we perceived this tree of a pvramidical fhape, with 

 an eafy fpreading flope from its fummit to the extremity ot 

 its lower branches, and miftook it at firft for a fmall hill: 

 we had no quadrant to meafure its height; but the middle 

 or principal ftem is confiderably higher, I think, than the. 

 highefl elm, or other tree, I ever f^w in England. The fol- 



• From the 0:e-i:d Cnknions, Vol. I- 



lowing, 



