133 
1900.] A. F. R. Hoernle — Epigraphical Note on Palm-leaf, etc. 
of both is anything hut ‘ brilliant yellow.’ The fruit of Borassus is ‘ rusty 
brown,’ that of Corypha ‘grey,’ when they have respectively dropped 
from the stalk. Of course, there is a Palm, and that too one which is 
undoubtedly a native of northern India, with fruits that when ripe do 
most thoroughly deserve the description ‘ brilliant yellow.’ This is the 
Kajur or wild date. The difficulty then, of course, is the name ; was 
Tala ever commonly applied to what is now more generally known as 
Kajitr ? I find that Dr. Watt has been informed (see his Dictionary 
under Phoenix dactylifera, the Date, and Phoenix sylvestris, the wild 
date, which is not really botanically separable from the cultivated tree) 
that in Sind, where, by the Way, according to Mr. James and Mr. 
Strachan Borassus is not grown, one of the names of Phoenix dactylifera 
is tar to this day, and that in the Panjab the name Tdrl is still applied 
to the juice (taken to make Toddy) of the wild date, Phoenix sylvestris.’’^ 
Tliis seems to me to speak for itself, and shows the necessity of caution 
in dealing with botanical terms occurring in old Indian literature. 
(2) In the Introduction to the Jataka book there occurs the fol- 
lowing passage : puratthdhhimulcho nisiditvd ekntthitala-pahkappamdne 
ekunapanhdsa pinde katvd sahham appodakam madhupdydsam parihhunji, 
i.e. (as translated by Mr. Warren in his Buddhism in Translations, 
p. 74) “ setting down with his face to the east, he made the whole of 
the thick, sweet milkrice into forty-nine pellets of the size of the fruit 
of the single-seeded palmyra-tree, and ate it.” The meaning, of course, 
is tliat Buddha ate the milkrice in 49 mouthfuls. The passage occurs in 
the story of the dish of milkrice which was given by Sujata to Buddha 
shortly before his enlightenment. I referred this passage to Sir 
George King who replied “ the fruit of Borassus is too big to be likened 
to the ball which a native of India makes up when he eats rice. So I 
presume Corypha must be the species of Tala meant. Its fruit is small, 
globular, and not longer than a walnut. The fruit of the Palmyra is of 
the size of a closed human fist or a cricket-ball.” Measured by it the 
milkrice, and the “ mouthful ” would have been an enormous quantity. 
By the way, the expression “ single-seeded ” is curious. The rule with 
all palms is a single seed. The only Indian palm, which, as Sir George 
King informs me, has occasionally two seeds in its fruit is the Garyota 
urens, which is common enough in India and Ceylon. If the writer of 
the Introduction to the Jataka book knew that the Caryota had some- 
times two seeds, it would explain his applying the term“ single-seeded” 
to the Corypha. 
(3) There is a well-known passage in Arrian’s Indica (Ch. VII), 
in which Megasthenes is qouted as saying: “ They (the Indians) eat the 
inner bark {(pXoioG) of trees ; the trees are called in the speech of the 
J. I. 18 
