CANNABINACEA. 343 
caoutchouc, the best known quality of that valuable product being 
obtained from F. elastica. The leaves of F. Indica are ovate, heart- 
shaped, three-ribbed, and entire; when young, downy on both 
sides, smooth when more matured, and from five to six inches long, 
and three to four broad, having a broad, smooth, greasy-looking 
gland on the under side of the leaf-stalk at the top. The figs grow 
in pairs from the axils of the leaves; they are downy, and about 
the size and colour of a ripe cherry at maturity. 
fF. elastica, the Indian Caoutchouc tree, will be known to most 
readers; it is now common in all the hothouses in the country, 
and numbers of fine plants may be seen in the Palm House at 
Kew. It has large glossy leaves, thick, oval, and pointed ; small , 
axillary, uneatable fruit of the size of an olive, and long reddish 
terminal buds composed of rolled-up stipule. In its native fields 
it grows to the size of the European Sycamore, chiefly among 
decomposed rocks and vegetable matter over the declivities of 
mountains, growing with great rapidity as a young tree, attaining 
the height of five-and-twenty feet in four years, and with a trunk a 
foot in diameter. The milk is extracted by making incisions through 
the bark to the wood, at the distance of a foot from each other, all 
round the tree, and up to the top. After one course of tapping the 
tree requires to rest a fortnight, when the process may be repeated. 
When the liquid is exposed to the air it becomes a firm and elastic 
substance, fifty ounces of pure milky juice yielding about fifteen 
ounces of clean, washed caoutchouc. The Pippul, or Sacred Fig of 
India, F. religiosa, isknown by its reotless branches and heart-shaped 
foliage, with long attenuated points. It is common in every part of 
India, where it is planted for the sake of its grateful shade. It is 
held in superstitious veneration by the Hindus, because, according 
to tradition, Vishnu was born under its shade. The long pointed 
leaf has a wavy edge and long slender and flat footstalks, which 
produces a tremulous motion in the air, like that produced by the 
Aspen-tree (Populus tremula). Silk-worms. seem to prefer this 
leaf to the Mulberry, and they are used by the natives of Arabia 
for tanning leather. The Sycamore Fig (/. sycamorus) is a large 
_ tree which grows in Egypt round the villages near the coast, and 
Sives grateful shelter to the villagers under its widely-spreading 
The leayes are broad, ovate, and angular, and the fruit is 
