66 VOYAGE FROM INDIA TO SIAM AND MALACCA. 



numerous thread like roots, which have the thickness of about 

 a little finger, have been cut away, which places are marked by- 

 little spots. The other end of the tree is bluntly hewn off, and 

 closed with another kind of wood ; on the top it is cut flat on both 

 sides, and a plank as seat for the steersman and those at the oars is 

 nailed upon it. There is an opening- scarcely half a foot wide 

 along the whole length of the boat, but the inside is entirely 

 scooped out, and more than twice as wide, specially at the 

 thicker end. They are two fathoms long. They easily upset 

 because they are round. The wood is taken from the black 

 palms.* They are here called Saugeri. All the boats lying 

 here were built out of black palm wood. Those which were 

 built round had some planks from the root and stem of the 

 Mimosa mlotica, which grows here very tall and strong. Those 

 however which were blunt at the two ends, had been built en- 

 tirely from palm wood, most of them being also quite round on 

 the top with a little intersected railing, and all those that wen 

 up the river were built in this way. 



I did not find anything particularly interesting in natural 

 history but many pieces of shells which had been thrown up by 

 the sea during the last rainy season, among these were Tel- 

 Una, Solines, Ostrea ephippium, and Achatina, and broken pieces of 

 the green Mytilus which must have been very big. There was a 

 Paspalum growing here in the sandy soil, the stolons were very 

 long, creeping, leafy with a thick, red juicy stalk, the stalk stood 

 straight up and was not surrounded with the flower sheaths of 

 the leaves. The inflorescence was divided into two parts, 

 spreading apart, and each had a short stalk, which was bordered 

 with fine hair ; it is very much like the Paspalvm distichum. 



A kind of Portulaca, with a creeping, red shiny stalk, and 

 long fleshy leaves with red blossoms, f grew here frequently in 

 the sand, and the Stipa spinifex covered the little sandhills here 

 with some Salsolas. 



Towards twelve o'clock I returned and had a good boat. 

 The water had risen meanwhile. 



16. — I visited the manufactories of the cottons made here, 

 they are not so beautiful as those from Madras, the colours are 

 not as vivid, but there is very little better material manufactured 



* No doubt Borassus flaheUiformis, L. 

 t Sesuvium portulacast?'um, L. 



