Ficus.] LXVII. URTICACE^E. 417 



other trees and killing them. Bark 1 in. thick, yellowish grey, longitudinally 

 wrinkled, with hard scales exfoliating. Wood pinkish white. The leaves are 

 used as cattle-fodder. The fruit is eaten. In the Durrung district of Assam it 

 is cultivated for rearing the lakh insect (G. Mann). 



7. F. retusa, Linn.; Bentlu Fl. Hongk. 327; Fl. Austr. vi. 166. 

 Syn. F.Benjamina, Koxb. 1. c. 550. F. nitida, Thunb. ; Wight Ic. t. 642. 

 F. pallida, Wall. (?) Urostigma pisiferum and ovoideum, Miq. in London 

 Journ. Bot. vi. (1847) 581. 



A large handsome tree with dense foliage, wholly glabrous. Leaves 

 coriaceous, shining, oval or obovate, acute or short-acuminate, blade 2-3 

 in. long, narrowed into petiole \ in. long ; main lateral nerves numerous, 

 slender, not very prominent. Fruit subglobose, \ in. diameter, sessile, 

 axillary, solitary or in pairs, purple when ripe, with small yellowish specks 

 (Roxb. Fl. Ind.) ; the 111. in Hb. Kew, No. 688, has greyish yellow fruit. 



Kamaon (Kosilla valley at 3000 ft., Strachey & Winterbottom), Banda, Bengal, 

 South India, Ceylon, Indian Archipelago, Burma, China, North Australia, Queens- 

 land. Dense shade, makes an excellent avenue-tree. Specimens collected in 

 Oudh, not seen by me, identified by Dr Stewart with this species, are described 

 by R. Thompson as from a small epiphytic tree, with full dark-green foliage. 



F. Benjaminea, Linn., has slender drooping branches, elliptic or broad-ovate, 

 shortly petiolate leaves, elegantly marked with numberless fine parallel lateral 

 veins, close together, and joined along the edge by a distinct intramarginal vein. 

 Fruit | in. diameter. East Bengal, Burma, Indian Archipelago, Queensland. 

 This species, as well as F. retusa, is called Nyaung-thabieh {Eugenia Ficus) in 

 Burmese. 



F. elastica, Blume ; Bijdragen tot de Flora van Nederlandsch Indie, 446 ; 

 Roxb. Fl. Ind. iii. 541 ; Wight Ic. t. 663 ; Griff. Ic. PI. As. rar. t. 552 the 

 Assam Caoutchouc-tree vern. Borgach, attah bar, Assam; Kagiri, Kasia 

 (Griffith) ; Kasmir, Silhet (Roxb.), is a large tree, with irregularly -shaped 

 stem and spreading branches, from which roots descend to the ground. The 

 leaves are thick - coriaceous, shining, elliptic, midrib very prominent, with 

 numberless straight parallel fine lateral veins, nearly at right angles to the 

 midrib, blade 3-6 in. long, on seedlings and root-shoots much longer, stipules 

 long, sheathing, rose-coloured. Fruit ovoid, greenish yellow, the size of an 

 olive. Sub-Himalayan tract from Sikkim to the extreme eastern boundary of 

 Assam, foot of the hills at the head and on the south side of the Brahmaputra 

 valley. Pandua and Jantipur hills, which bound the Silhet valley on the north. 

 The tree towers above the surrounding forest ; Griffith (Journ. As. Soc.vii. i. 1838, 

 132) describes a specimen, 100 ft. high, circumference of main trunk 74 ft., of 

 trunk and supports 120 ft., of area covered by the branches 610 ft. The Assam 

 Caoutchouc, when pure, is a superior article, but it seems certain that Para rub- 

 ber, the produce of several species of Hevea (p. 445), retains its firmness longer 

 and is more suitable for work requiring great elasticity and power of resistance. 

 In Assam, however, it is often mixed, not only with pieces of bark, wood, sand, 

 stones, but also with the milk of other species of Ficus which is inferior in 

 quality. 



F. elastica is a free and rapid grower, easily propagated by cuttings, and 

 its cultivation in Assam on a large scale will doubtless prove successful. In 

 Germany, where it is commonly grown as an ornament of drawing-rooms, it was 

 formerly known under the name of Berlin weed. It is cultivated in gardens 

 throughout the tropics and as an avenue-tree in Java. In that island, however, 

 it seems also to be indigenous ; Blume (1. a), in 1825, states that it grows on 



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