12 



percentage of failure. It must be understood that 

 the numerous varieties of bamboo which are to be 

 found in British Burma do not in every instance 

 grow in distinct or separate areas, though it is perhaps 

 the exception to find more than two varieties inter- 

 mixed. Mr. Kurz, in his valuable work on the 

 Forests of Pegu,* has divided jungle-fires into two 

 classes, superficial t and destructive : the latter he 

 tells us "do not occur annually, but periodically, 

 and set in after the bamboo has come into flower. 5 ' 

 Elsewhere he says, that " all the bamboo stocks 

 usually flower together at the same time, and 

 this is the case also with those growing as under- 

 growth in the forest ; they then die off, one by one, 

 after maturing their seed. It is believed," he adds, 

 " that they do so regularly after a certain number of 

 years, which is variously set down at from 40 to 60 

 years. For the larger kinds this may be a fair 

 estimate ; but I know of a bamboo in Java, 25 feet 

 high, which flowers, and dies off every three years, 

 and of others which flower regularly at the ends of 

 the branches for many years (especially Schizos- 

 tachya), until they finally become a whole gigantic 

 panicule of flowers ere the close of their lives." 



11. The inference to be drawn from this extract 

 Bamboo best propa- is, that bamboo plantations must be 



gated by division of * 



carefully protected from fire, and that 

 seed is not at all times obtainable. This latter 



* Preliminary Report on the Forests of Pegu. By Sulpice Kurz 

 C. B. Lewis, Calcutta. 



t The superficial fires the author tells us occur " annually," and are 

 "really fearful." 



