530 THE XOETHERX FORESTS. [rvRT IX. 



mud and sea-weed, and for the first two years they must 

 be watered, and protected from the glare of the sun under 

 shades made of the plaited fronds of the coco-nut palm or 

 the fon-hke leaves of the palmyra. 



During the early stages, too, the anxieties of the planter 

 are incessant. He must invent plans to protect the young 

 plants from wild hogs, rats, and elephants, with all of 

 whom the tender shoots are especial favom^ites, and as 

 the stem ascends, it has to encounter the most destructive 

 enemy of all, the "cooroominiya" beetles (Batocera rubiis), 

 which penetrate the trunk near the ground and deposit 

 then' eggs ^ ; the grubs, when hatched, eating their way 

 upwards tlirough the centre of tlie tree to the top, where 

 they pierce the young leaf-buds and do incredible damage. 

 As the injmies from these united causes involve the loss 

 of about one-fourth of the plants put do^vn, constant re- 

 newal is required, in order to replace those destroyed. 

 After the second year, irrigation becomes unnecessary, 

 and all that is then requu'ed is to keep the ground 

 ploughed and fi'ee from weeds, and each alternate year 

 to dress the young palms with sea-weed and salt ma- 

 nure. 



Towards the end of the fifth year, the flower-stock may 

 be expected to appear; but the period varies, and is 

 sometimes delayed till the seventh year and even later. 

 Every stock will bring to maturity from five to thirty 

 nuts, a tree on an average yielding sixty in the com'se of 

 a year ; and each nut requires tweh'e months to ripen. 

 The fruit when collected is stripped of its outer bark, 

 which is macerated to convert the fibre into coir, whilst 

 the fleshy fining of the shell is dried by exposure in the 

 sun, preparatory to expressing the oil." The ordinary 

 estimate is, that one thousand full-grown nuts of Jaflha 

 will yield five hundi'ed and twenty -five pounds of coj^ra 



' See cmtc, \o\. I. Pt. ii. cli. vi. p. 241). 



