774 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol. XIV. 



Very often the advances are not cleared by work done and some of the 

 defaulters decamp to other parts of the District, where for a time they exist 

 in the forests on scarcely anything else but these tubers and rats, if they can 

 find them. In a famine year the demand for tubers of all kinds is enormous, 

 not only in the District biit also outside. While going through a forest, during 

 the famine of 1896-97, I met large bodies of women and children grubbing 

 up these and other tubers from beneath bushes and trees, and in the famine 

 of 1899 cart-loads of Londee and Karva K^nd ( Dioscorea bulbifera) were 

 exported to the Deccan for sale there, from Central Thana and Mokhada. 



Mode of preparation for food. 



The tubers are first cleaned of their root hairs, then washed in cold water, 

 afterwards peeled like potatoes, boiled, cut into slices, and eaten usually with 

 salt. It is said that an adult can be maintained on 3 to 4 lbs. per diem of the 

 tubers. 



Chemical Analysis. 



The fresh tubers submitted to chemical analysis afforded the following 

 constituents : — 



5-55 



20-75 



0-77 



61-77 



6-23 



4*93 



Water 



Protein 



Fat 



Starch 



Fibre 



Ash 



100- 



For the sake of comparing the dietetic value of these tubers with that of the 

 potato, the following results of the analysis of this well-known food is repro- 

 duced from the Journal of the Department of Agriculture, Western Australia : — 



Water 78-3 



Protein ... 2'2 Nitrogenous 



matter. 



Fat ... 0-1 



Carbohydrates 18'4 Principally 



starch. 

 Mineral matter ., I'O 



100- 



The above figures, like others for composition of food-materiala, represent 

 general averages, from which there are wide variations in individual speci- 

 mens. 



