C 51 ) 



Thespesia, and similar ones, scattered over the plains, turn up one by one as we proceed 

 southwards, until we enter the tidal forests themselves. 



10. Natural padurcs. 



The natural pastures in centra-distinction to meadows, which latter are either produced 

 by culture or grow up in neglected culture-lands, are of very limited occurrence, not only in 

 Pegu, but in India generally, for they are usually replaced by the savannahs and bamboo- 

 jungles above described. The characteristic of these pastures is the absence or scarcity of 

 such coarse grasses as have been already treated of as elephant-grasses. While the savannahs 

 give fodder only to buffaloes and elephants, these afford pasturage for domestic cattle. They 

 are found best developed in the higher regions of hill ranges, especially iu the alpine recion. 

 Those which occur lower down in the plains are all of very doubtful character, beiug either the 

 undergrowth, left after forests have disappeared by some natural cause (fire ?), or the growth 

 upon tracts of lands, which may possess one or the other peculiarity by which the growth of 

 trees became suppressed. The hills of Burmah are not high enough to produce, as in the 

 Himalaya, alpine pastures which come nearest to European pastures, in aspect as well as 

 in character, and we have only the following three varieties to discuss here : 



a. Long-grassed or jungle-pastures. 



h. Short-grassed or lowland-pastures. 



c. Hill-pastures (not represented in Pegu) . 



a. Long-grassed or jungle pasture. The jungle pasture is a variety, which is to be 

 found chiefly on shallow alluvium resting on impermeable strata, chiefly along the base of 

 the Yomah hills. Such pastures are found most developed in the Pazwoondoung valley. 

 "We fall in with them, when crossing the cultivated alluvium towards Kya-Eng, where they 

 alternate and often border the low forests. They are actually nothing but the undergrowth 

 of these low forests and consist of the same andropogonous grasses aloug with the same 

 shrubs and other plants which are to be found in them. I need therefore do no more than 

 refer to 5, c, where they are characterised. 



h. Slwrt-grassed or lowland-pastures. The lowland pastures appear either as dry and 

 meagre or as moist or sappy pastures. On such dry pastures prevail the following plants . 

 Chnjsopogon aciculatus, Andropogon portusus ? Spadiopogon obliquivakis, Alysicarpns vaginalis, 

 Eragrostis, Scleria, Digitaria, Fimbristylis diphylla, Ischaemum rugosum, Sporobolus diander, 

 Cynodon dactylon, Dactyloctenium, etc., along with /S/f/a re^Jwa, Vernonia cinerea, Desmodium, 

 auricomum f and triflorum, OsbecMa, Sida acuta, Panicum brizoides and repens, Lejndagathis 

 hyalina, Knoxia lasiocarpa, etc. 



During the dry season Gramineae prevail in such short-grassed pastures, but during the 

 rains Oyperaceae get the supremacy, and then associate with a number of other plants, of 

 which during the hot season hardly a vestige can be seen, such as Geissaspis cristata, Smiihia 

 sensitiva, Burmannia juncea, Anilema ochraceiim, Drosera Indica, Mitrasacme Indica, Selaginella 

 Junghunii, Impatiens Chinensis, Aneilema nudiflora, and nanum and vaginatum, and such like. 



The moist or sappy pastures are to be found chiefly in swampy places or in shallow lakes 

 that dry up during the hot season. The vegetation of these consists of a very few kinds only 

 of soft and sappy grasses, such as Hymenachne myurus and interrupta, Paspaliim scrohi- 

 culatum, Panicum cms galli, and antidotale, a soft debile Isachne, Leersia hexandra, and a few 

 others, which grow in great profusion, sometimes to a mass of a foot in thickness which 

 floats when the rains set in ; these form dense floating meadows very fine to look at, but 

 very difficult to penetrate even with boats, as the boats soon become so entangled in the mass 

 of vegetable matter that no progress can be made except by cutting it. 



Owing to the moist situation swamp-plants accompany these grasses, such as Jussiaea 

 repens and aujfruticosa, Adenosma triflorum, Xyris, Eriocaulon, Scirptis juiicoides, etc., Hygro- 

 phila salicifolia, Dysophylla verticillata, Justicia peploides, Hydrocotyle Asiatica, Gommelyna 

 communis, etc. 



The latter variety of pastures offer possibly the best pasturage* for all kinds of cattle. 

 In general appearance they resemble European meadows, more than any others do between 

 the tropics. Those that cover the bottom of shallow lakes offer also during the hottest part 

 of the year splendid emerald-green grass plains of limited extent, but they are chiefly restrict- 

 ed to the lower parts of the Sittaug valley, especially North of the town of Pegu, while in 

 the Irrawaddi valley, on account of the greater dryness of the atmosphere, they ofteu entirely 

 disappear around the swamps of the savannahs. 



C. Hill pastures. The hill pastures are of limited extent and are restricted to the sub- 

 temperate region above 6OO0 feet elevation. Such as deserve the name of hill-pastures, I 

 met with on the higher part of the Loko ridges and on the top of the Nattouug itself. The 

 escarpments of a western and S. W. situation are also often occupied by them as low down 



However, strange to say, I invariably observed the grazing bullocks (and also my own pony) to prefer 

 the dry pastures wherever these bordered (as is often the case) the lower lying moist pastures. 



