THE BORI FOREST 305 



little gentle whistle, beginning soft, but when he got to 

 the sparrows fighting it was an angry sharp note. The 

 imitations were perfect. It is impossible to imagine a 

 cleverer or more charming little bird. 



Camp is next moved to Pachmari, The Forest De- 

 partment is , ordered to furnish timber for building 

 barracks. Here we must remain in permanent camp 

 for some time, and a temporary mess-house is run up by 

 the R.E., of clean wattle and daub, thatched well with 

 jungle grass for coolness. Before it became a sanatorium 

 for troops Pachmari was a charming place, almost a 

 wild jungle as nature made it. Here grew many kinds of 

 beautiful trees, dotted about everywhere in groups. 

 There were many fig-trees. Of these, besides the banian 

 and pipal, there was the paker-tree (Urostigma in- 

 fedorium), with stem resembling the banian, but without 

 the hanging roots. It grows to an enormous size, some 

 measuring 40 feet in girth, with noble spreading head and 

 arms stretching out every side. Then there is the gular 

 {Ficus glomerata or Urostigma glomeratum), a fine, shady, 

 fig-bearing tree with spreading head. Then must be 

 specially noticed the mahua-tree, which is, next to the 

 mango, the most remarkable fruit-producing tree in 

 India. It is even far more plentiful than the mango, 

 which has been mostly planted by the zamindars in 

 groves; but the mahua {Bassia lati folia) is a wild forest 

 tree, and reproduces itself from seed all over India. In 

 some districts the cultivated plains look like a continuous 

 grove-like succession of round-headed umbrageous standard 

 trees with great black stems. The ' fruit ' is not a 

 fruit, but the succulent, sweet corolla of the flower, which 

 falls to the ground in March and April. It is eaten greedily 

 by all birds and animals — deer, pigs, cows, and sheep — 

 and men. The natives collect as much as they want of it, 



20 



