826c 
THE TROPICAL AGKICULTURIST. [JuifE 1. 1899. 
that 1 took up my residence in an upland district of 
Malabar, where the slopes of the Western Ghauts 
were clothed with gigantic evergreen forfsts and from 
their base stretching for several miles into the Mysore 
territoi y, grew a veritable forest of Bamboo, intermixed 
with Teak'and other deciduous and hard -wooded trees, 
the Bamboo predominating. 
My primary object is to give some account of the 
seeding of the Bamboo, I yet cannot help writing a few 
words on the beauty and grandeur of thi.s forest as 1 
first beheld it, and before " decayV defacing fingers" 
had wrought desolation. Viewed as a whole from an 
eminence, nothing could well surpass the splendour of 
this vast area of waving plumes rising to a height of 
60 to 70 feet ; and individually the clumps as seen more 
or less isolated on the grassy lateiite knolls, were of 
surpassing beauty. From March until nearly Christmas, 
the Bamboo is clothed with leaVes of a pale delicate 
green, after which they begin to fall, and the jungle for 
a month or two is shorn to a great extent of its 
attractiveness. But there is extra beauty in the young 
leaves as they begin to appear in response to the first 
showers of spring. I shall never forgi.-ta ride I took on 
my first ai-rival in the country aloi g a road leading 
from Malabar into Mysore, and cut right through the 
heart of the Bamboo-jungle, ami when the trees had on 
their best attire. The huge clumps stood almost at 
regular intervals close by the road on either side, the 
culms bending over and forming a complete archwaiy 
of greenery for miles. This was the grandest triumphal 
archway I ever beheld, and when the subsequent 
seeding and destruction came, one could hardly help 
lamenting the inexorable laws of Nature. 
Very soon after my arrival in Malabar, I heard 
rumours that the Bamboo forests of Travancore to the 
south were in seed, and in the following season our turn 
came, and then that of Coorg to the north. So that 
this strange frutescence would appear to have taken 
place in sections, beginning at the most southern 
point of India, and travelling northwardu year by year. 
When the seed became fully ripe, the culms 
were quite divested of leaves, and bent down with the 
heavy load of oat-like seeds — a magnificent harvest, 
it is true, but one which only occurs twice in a 
century, and which is then accompanied with the 
annihilation of the parent plants. 
When the seed became quite ripe, it fell to the 
ground, which was quickly covered with what had a 
wonderfully close resemblance to Oats. This fall was 
the signal to the jungle tribes to lay up a store of 
the grain to serve them during the ensuing monst.on. 
and groups of men and women were to be seen all 
over the forests gathering and deftly winnowing 
the seeds, whilst pea-fowl, jungle- fowl, partridge, and 
others o£ the feathered tribe, were not slow in taking 
advantage of the bountiful supply of food, and waxed 
fat and lazy, and so became an easy prey to the fowler's 
gun. Long, however, before a tithe of the rich store 
could be consumed the season of jungle-fires began, and 
added by the thick coating of leaves on the ground, 
completely licked the Bamboo forests from end to end, 
to all appearance converting into charcoal every seed 
that had dropped from the trees, extingui.-=hing 
every hope that the land would ever again resume its 
former appearance. Nature, however, had her own 
secret way of preservation, and as time went on, tiny 
little Bamboo seedlings began to appear, which year 
by year increased in strength till, in 1877, or fifteen 
years from the time of seeding of the forests, the 
country had all but resumed its former grandeur. 
No "description of mine could possibly convey an 
adequate idea of the scene of desolation the country 
presented after the death of the Bamboos over the 
whole extent of this magnificent forest, which was 
transferred suddenly from a scene of surpassing 
spleadour into one of dust and ashes. The monsoon, 
which had brought revivifying power to the leafless 
Bamboos for the byegons fifty years, and bid them 
again and again burst into leaf and beauty, at last 
failed in its appeal to the "dull cold ear of death." 
The succeeding hot season began its drying process 
on the dead culms, preparing them for the fires which 
wer« destined eventually to clear the country of every 
vestige of the old forest. It was ieTeral years, however, 
before this process was completed, and heie Hgaia 
rested a mHrvel, viz., how llie youi g wediing* 
escaped with life and increased in stature throogh 
the years of heat snd t-moke. 
For several seasous in succession the country was 
filled nilhsnsoke from the combustion of the dead and 
dry culms from about January to April which made it 
very unpleanant to the lives of the Coffee-planters and 
others. There was kept up night and day nlao a 
succession of loud reports from the ignition of t ha p<nt- 
up gases between the joints of the huge culius. 
I do not knos'. , but I sometimes doubc if there is aay 
example in the vegetable kingdom which can boast of a 
more rapid growth in a given sp.ice of time than the 
culms of a fully-devel'jped plHiitof Bambu» < ai undiuacae 
in its native clime. The clunips seed up a yearly 
pupply of culms, which begin to appear in FtbroHry, 
and by th*; end of July they have reached alieight of from 
60 to 70 feet, and are Well furnished with lati rul branches 
from top to bottom, with a diameter, close to the ground, 
of some 8 or 9 inches. The culms, aa they isaue from the 
ground, are furnished with a curious proleciing capping 
of brown-colonred sheaths, which they retain tili th»y 
reach a considerable height, and the points aie out of 
danger — an admii-Aljle protective process of nature. 
With reference to the longevity of thu Bamfiro, I 
took considerable pains to arrive at the approximate 
truth. I questioned and crosp-questioned ou many 
occasions the jungle tribes, who had their homes in 
the seclusion of these Bamboo v,'ild8,and alio, previous 
to the advent of the Collee-planting industry, liRrdly 
ever left but lived ou the produce from their nmall 
clearings, edible roo s dug with pointed etikes from 
the woods, honey, and the fruits of the chss*. One 
tribe was called Jain Cooi ambers, or, in plain English, 
honey men, or honey collectors. Tbey are a lively 
race of people, with a wonderful amount of in'elligence, 
and withal n rare appreciation, among natives, of fun 
and humour. I singled out sfveral of the elder and 
most intelligent of this interesting tribe for my iuquirier, 
ard arrrived at the conclusion that fifty years, er 
theieabonts, was the limit to the life of Uimbusa 
aruudimicea. There wera several other fcpeciea of 
Bamboo in the district, which, curiously enough 
seeded simnltaneonply with B. arandicaces. 
The uses to which the larger Bamboo ia pat in 
Malabar and other provinces of Southern India are too 
numerous to mention, and it ^^'ould be difiicnlt to 
imagine what the natives would do without ii. 
The Bamboo in Malabar is found almost from the 
sea level up to an elevation of something over 3,000 
feet so that its range is considerable, and although 
it is generally described as a store-plant in England, 
it might, I think, flourish in a house with lesshep.t than 
that usually assigned to a stove, and might possibly, 
without hurt from an interesting object in the sub- 
tropical garden during a warm summer. To make the 
canes more lasting, and, in some measure prevent tire 
ravages of the white ant, the natives of Malabar i-.dopt 
the practice of soaking them in water for soiiie months 
before putting them to use. 
The belief, or rather superstition, obtaining in some 
parts of England with regard to the influence of the 
moon on vegetation is also found amo!)'.^-;: the natives 
of Malabar, and no native will cut >; ties or a 
Bamboo for his own use during the wane of the moon. 
For some reason unexplained these B -mboo forests 
of Malabar are very unhealthy, alike to European and 
native. Ague and fever prevail, more especially 
during the showery weather of .spring, and immediately 
after the end of the south-west monsoon, when the, 
ground begins to dry, or, as the nalivts put it 
'• during the making of mud and the making of dust.'' 
The natives sometimes attribute the prevalence of 
malarial fever in these jungles to the quality of the 
water, and I have frequently known a gang of coolies 
fresh from the Mysore stop at a Coffee plsntation and 
taste the water, and then pass ou to the nezt plantation. 
If I am correct in thinking that the life of Bambusa 
arundinacea is limited to fifty years, those forests in 
Malabar which I saw in seed and then perish, will 
again come to matuity about the year 1913, when will 
be witnessed a very curious phenomenon im the 
vegetable kingdom.— J. JuowBiE.— Gardenefa' Chronicle. 
