100 



niYSICAL GEOGRAPHY. [Part T. 



that its fruit is not edible. The real chirian is not in- 

 digenous to Ceylon, but was brought there by the Portu- 

 guese in the sixteenth century.^ It has been very recently 

 re-introduced, and is now cultivated successfully. The 

 native name for the Singhalese tree, " Katu-boeda," de- 

 notes the prickles that cover its fruit, which is as large as 

 a coco-nut, and set with thorns each nearly an inch in 



length. 



The StercuUa fcetida, one of the finest and noblest of 

 the Ceylon forest-trees, produces from the end of its 

 branches large bunches of dark purple flowers of ex- 

 treme richness and beauty ; but emitting a stench so in- 

 tolerable as richly to entitle it to its very characteristic 

 botanical name. The fi^uit is equally remarkable, and 

 consists of several crimson cases of the consistency of 

 leather, within Avhicli are enclosed a number of black 

 bean-hke seeds : these are dispersed by the bursting of 

 their envelope, which splits open to hberate them when 

 sufficiently ripened. 



The Moodilla [Barringtonia speciosa) is another tree 

 which attracts the eye of the traveller, not less from 

 the remarkably shaped fruit which it bears tlian from the 

 contrast between its dark glossy leaves and the delicate 

 flowers which they surround. The latter are white, 

 tipped with crimson, but the petals drop off early, and 

 the stamens, of which there are nearly a hundred to 

 each flower, when they fall to the ground might almost 

 be mistaken for painters' brushes. The tree (as its 

 name implies) loves the shore of the sea, and its large 

 quadrangidar fruits, of pyramidal form, being pro- 

 tected by a hard fibrous covering, are tossed by the 

 waves till they root themselves on the beach. It grows 

 freely at the mouths of the principal rivers on the west 



1 PoRCACCHi, in liis Isolario, wi-it- I qiiei coconieri, clie a Venetia son 



ten in the sixteenth century, enume- ; chianiati angurie : in niezo del quale 

 rates the true durian as being then trouano deutro cinque f'rutti de sapor 



amongst the ordinary fruit of Cey- i inolto excellente." — Lib. iii. p. 188. 



Ion. — " Vi nasce anchora uu frutto j Padua^ A.D. 1019, 



detto Duriano, verde et graude come | 



