52 SYLVICULTURE IN THE TROPICS R .i 



which are liable to shallow inundations. Similarly, the 

 "Bullet-tree" (Mimusops Batata) of British Guiana, 

 where it is found between the Berbice, Demerara, and 

 Essequibo rivers, and also in Dutch and French Guiana, 

 parts of Brazil, the Antilles, and the Bahamas, and 

 which yields the substance, nearly allied to gutta- 

 percha, known as " Balata," grows on alluvial flats only 

 a few feet above the river banks. 



Although on the banks of rivers it is common to 

 see trees growing which are also found away from 

 running water, in perhaps wetter rain-zones than that 

 of the particular locality where they line the banks, 

 it is only a very limited number that can exist near 

 stagnant water, whose rise and fall is due to local 

 rainfall collected in depressions and to subsequent 

 evaporation. 



In the northern half of Ceylon the Sinhalese, before 

 and after the beginning of the Christian era, established 

 a very complete system of irrigation by damming water- 

 courses, and thus forming storage tanks for the water 

 required for their crops. In the eighth century a.d. 

 they began to be driven back by the devastating armies 

 of the Tamils from the Indian mainland. Their cities 

 were sacked, and the tanks, deprived of necessary repairs 

 and upkeep, were soon breached and forests invaded 

 their beds. Under the British Government cultivation 

 was again brought back to these regions, and many of 

 the tanks have been repaired and filled with water. 

 The result has been, as regards such of the trees as 

 were not removed beforehand, that most of them died 

 in the first year of inundation. A few, such as 

 Terminalia glabra which is found growing along rivers 

 and watercourses, struggled for a few years by throwing 

 out aerial roots (Fig. 11), but they also eventually 

 succumbed if immersed too deeply, or only survived 

 quite on the edge of the tanks. The species which 

 stood periodic inundations best were Barringtonia 

 acutangula, Vitex Leucoxylon, Bauhinia racemosa, 

 and Feronia elephantum, which elsewhere are indications 



