2O2 



PARRICIDAL TREES. 



may be often for many feet -until they reach the ground 

 and take root there ; when the parasite tree will, in a 

 few years, form thick stems, and loosen or overturn 

 the stone work, if it be a building ; or choke the parent 

 stem, if it be that of a living" tree. Visitors to most 

 of the ancient temples and other monuments of Indian 

 antiquity will meet with numerous instances of this, 

 and in the old walls of almost any of the ancient 

 cities of India it may be seen doing the same thing 

 to the stonework of their fabric. Even so far north 

 as Delhi, if the tourist visiting this renowned fortress 

 will take the trouble to go out of the Cashmere gate, 

 along the ditch, past the breech made in the Water 

 Bastion hard by, by the British cannon during the 

 siege of 1857, and turning to the right passes along 

 the river front beneath the city walls, he will in a 

 short walk see several instances where these trees 

 have rooted themselves in the wall, and subsequently 

 fixed themselves in the ground at its base. Not 

 far from the Water Bastion too, he will see a most 

 curious example of a banyan tree which has seeded 

 itself in the parapet, quite fourteen feet above the 

 ground; from which numerous air roots have run 

 down the whole face of the wall, till they have anchored 

 themselves in a similar way below; and there can be 

 no doubt that in course of time these trees will breech 

 the walls as effectually as was ever done by British 

 cannon, if they are not removed before they have had 

 time to do so. 



This destructive faculty of the Bo-tree, is therefore 

 regarded by pious Buddhists as a species of sermon 

 written in stone, preached to man by his Creator. 

 Nowhere does the instability of human greatness receive 



