THE TEAK-TREE. 267 



island, but for bread they use rice and a bark wMcli 

 tliey call sagu, from wbicb also tliey extract oil in 

 like manner as tbey do from palms." 



As maize is not difficult to be transported on 

 account of its bulk or liability to any injury, and 

 formed tlie chief article of food among most of our 

 led-men, it would be the very provision they would 

 take with them on their migrations ; and as the part 

 eaten is the fi-uit, they would have plenty of seed, 

 and would know from their previous experience pre- 

 cisely how to cultivate it. 



One part of the suiTounding forest is a grove of 

 jati^ or teak-trees, Tectona grandis^ Linn. Those 

 found here are only a foot or fifteen inches in diam- 

 eter and forty feet high, a size they attain in Java in 

 twenty-five or thirty years, where they do not reach 

 theu" full growth in less than a century. The na- 

 tive name jati is a word of Javanese origin, signify- 

 ing true, or genuine, and was probably applied to 

 tliese trees on account of the well-kno"^^^l dui*ability 

 of the wood they yield. Kow, near the end of the 

 diy monsoon, they have lost nearly all their foliage ; 

 for, though it is sometimes asserted that in the trop- 

 ics the leaves fall imperceptibly one by one, that is 

 not tine, in this region, where there are well-defined 

 wet and dry seasons. The teak also thrives in a few 

 places on the continent, and is found in the central 

 and eastern provinces of Java, in Madura, Bali, and 

 particularly in Sumbawa, where the wood is consid- 

 ered better than that of Jav^a, l)ut it is said to be un- 

 known in Sumatra, Borneo, and in the peninsula of 

 Malacca. It exists in some places in Celebes, but 



