MYSORE, CAN.' BA, AND MALABAR. 393 
most commonly become the lurking places of snakes ; but some- CHAPTER 
times give shelter to the Togriga bee. Its nest is therefore easily 
accessible ; but it is very small, and contains only about a See?' ol J ’ 
honey, and half a Seer of wax. 
From the seed dropped by birds, or by accident, great numbers wild-date, or 
of the palm called Ejalu (Elate sylvestris) grow here wild. It will 
thrive on any good soil that does not contain lime, and grows in- 
deed on the poorest lands ; but in these it affords hardly any juice. 
To rear it requires no trouble, as the prickly nature of its leaves 
sufficiently deters cattle. The English use only one name for the 
juices of all the different palm-trees in India, and call them all 
Toddy , which seems to be a corruption of Tdri, the Mussulman name 
for the juice of the Palmira , or Bnrassus jlabelliformis. r Ihe natives 
have distinct names for each kind of juice ; and, in fact, there seem 
to be considerable differences in their qualities. That of th 0 Elate 
is by the Mussulmans called Sindy; in the Karnata language Henda; 
and in the Telinga and Tamul dialects Callu. The juice ol the Bo- 
rassus , although the tree grows well enough, is here never extracted, 
and the natives deny their extracting Sindy. The Sindy is never 
drunk by the natives till it has fermented, when it becomes ex- 
ceedingly intoxicating, and in many villages great quantities are 
consumed. In this place it is never distilled ; though, no doubt, it 
would afford a spirit that, by rectification and age, might be made 
palatable. Much of the Sindy, when fresh, is boiled down into Ja- 
gory , which sells for about -f of the price of that made from sugar- 
cane, and is chiefly used for distillation. The process here is 
exactly the same as that described at fValuru. 
All the Ejalu palms in this district are let to a person of the Manner of 
Idiga cast, who pays annually 120 Pagodas, or rather more than Lhese 
40 1 and lets them out again to the Idigas of the different villages. 
Each palm gives juice for three months in the year, and they will 
do this at any season ; so that every man divides his trees into four 
Yol. L 3 E 
