404 PULNEY HILLS : Chap. XXIY. 



forests are the Poliars, a race of timid wild men of the woods. 

 Chenatumby told me that they have no habitations of any 

 kind, but run through the jungle from place to place, sleep 

 under rocks, and live on wild honey and roots. The women 

 run with them, like wild goats, their children slung in rows 

 on their hips. The Poliars occasionally trade with the country 

 people, who place cotton and grain on some stone, and the 

 wild creatures, as soon as the strangers are out of sight, take 

 them and put honey in their place, but they Avill allow no one 

 to come near them. 



The undulating hills and valleys of the interior plateau are 

 covered with an aromatic grass {Andropogon), which grows 

 in large coarse tufts, like the Stipa ycliu in Peru ; and it is 

 not until the young tender shoots come out that it affords 

 good pasture for cattle, of which there is a small herd on the 

 hills, belonging to American missionaries and others. The 

 grassy slopes are dotted with tree-Rhododendrons, Gaultherias, 

 Osbeckias, Lobelias, the Hypericum Hookerianum, and brake 

 feriis. This upper plateau is admirably adapted for the 

 growth of English fruits and vegetables. In Mr. Levinge's 

 garden there were bushes of Fuchsias, Daturas, roses, and 

 geraniums ; and behind the house grew peach, apple, plum, 

 and loquot-trees, strawberries, potatoes, green peas, and 

 artichokes. 



Where there are springs or watercourses on the higher 

 range, there are generally fine wooded "sJiolas" facing 

 inwards, and very extensive tracts of forest on the outer 

 slopes ; but the timber, especially teak and black-wood, has 

 been very extensively cut by the people of the hills. I 

 examined a shola called Minmurdi-karnal near Pattoor, on 

 the south side, another between that and Kodakarnal, and 

 two others, and observed trees of the following genera : — 

 Michelia, Cinnamomum, Dodonoea, Mlllmgtonia, Myrsine, 

 Monocera, Symplocos, Bignonia, Crotalaria, Passifiora, Os- 



