VOYAGE FEOM INDIA TO SIAM AND MALACCA. 103 



The most frequent illness here is cardialg-y, of which many 

 people died; dysentery was not as dangerous here as in many other 

 parts of India, specially Batavia. There were few contag-ious 

 kinds of illness, and people leading- a reg'ular life grew very old. 



Rays cle Madre de Deus was well known here, specially 

 among the Portuguese ; it is sent from here to Goa, and grows 

 pretty frequently in the jungles. The hospital had at present 

 about twenty inmates, most of them suffering from the 

 venereal disease. I found many kinds of Filices near the old 

 walls of the town only few of them had any pericarps left ; among 

 them was Polypodium lanceolatum. The Agyneia generally 

 very big on this coast, only was very small here ; near the wall 

 grew Oldenlandia, Urtica interrwpta, Bryurn murale, Hypnum 

 sericeum, Eclypta ; at the side of the lane grew a Conyza which 

 was unknown to me, and Morinda citrifolia was in blossom, 

 although it was not two feet high. There were few kinds 

 of grasses in bloom, only Sciiyus corymbosiis and Cyperus 

 were among them. Paspalum, Agrostis cruciata, Cynosurus iiidi- 

 cus, and the new kind of grass which 1 had found in Madrepolam 

 grew here, and also the species of Aira with a long compressed 

 panicle I found here, and it was in bloom. x\lthough the 

 ground was covered with green grasses few of them had reached 

 their perfection on account of the rainy season, which was just 

 beginning. 



In a garden I found the kind of grass the roots of which 

 when dried smell so agreeably, they furnish the Tenschaurian 

 fans and the roofs of the Palanquins. Generally they extend 

 over much land near the rivers hindering the Palanquin bearers 

 very much. I have already described it before and called 

 them Andropogon ecliinatum. The blossoms have no awn. 

 The male ones as well as the hermaphroditical spikelets 

 are twisted a little at the end and at the side they are overgrown 

 with tiny prickles. The anthers are yellow-green, and the pistil 

 purplish red.* 



In the afternoon I went to the north part of the Tranchur, 

 where one has many gardens on one side and the harbour on 

 the left. There was a beautiful smooth and even avenue, consist- 

 ing only of big Pterocarpus trees. They were all covered with 

 fohage, but had not a single blossom. The branches, which bore 

 * Andropogon muricatus Retz. The retiver. 



