Chap. III.] THE KUMBUK. 99 



framework, tlie interstices of whicli retain the materials 

 that form the roadway.' 



The Kunibuk of the Singhalese (called by the Tamils 

 Maratha-maram) ^ is one of the noblest and most widely 

 distributed trees in the island ; it dehghts in the banks 

 of rivers and moist borders of tanks and canals ; it 

 overshadows the stream of the Mahawelli-ganga, ahnost 

 from Kandy to the sea ; and it stretches its great arms 

 above the still water of the lakes on the eastern side of 

 the island. 



One venerable patriarch of this species, which grows 

 at Mutwal, within three miles of Colombo, towers to so 

 great a height above the smTOunding forests of coco- 

 nut palms, that it forms a landmark for the native 

 boatmen, and is discernible from Negombo, more than 

 twenty miles distant. The circumference of its stem, as 

 measured by Mr. W. Ferguson, in 1850, w^as forty-five 

 feet close to the earth, and seven yards at twelve feet 

 above the ground. 



Tlie timber, which is durable, is apphed to the 

 carving of idols for the temples, besides being exten- 

 sively used for less dignified purposes ; but it is chiefly 

 prized for the bark, v^hich is sold as a medicine, and, in 

 addition to yielding a black dye, it is so charged with 

 calcareous matter that its ashes, when burnt, afford a 

 substitute for the hme which the natives chew with their 

 betel. 



Some of the trees found in the forests of the interior 

 are remai'kable for the curious forms in which they 

 produce their seeds. One of these, which sometimes 

 grows to the height of one hundred feet without throwing 

 out a single branch, has been confounded with the durian 

 of the Eastern Archipelago, or supposed to be an aUied 

 species^, but it differs from it in the important particular 



^ Mr. Ferguson, of the Surveyor- 

 General's Department, assures me 

 that he once measured the root of a 

 small wild fig-tree, growing in a 

 patena at Ilewahette, and found it 



11 2 



upwards of 140 feet in length, whilst 

 the tree itself was not 30 feet high. 



^ Pentaptera tomentosa (Ho.v.). 



^ It is the CnUenin e.rcelsa of 

 Wight's Icmies, &c. (7G1-2). 



