TO THE COURT OF AVA. 
215 
ward, they become more and more scarce, until at 
the capital they are only to be seen as rarities. 
The upper provinces, however, abound in the 
palmyra, or Borassus flabelliformis , especially the 
arid country, extending for two hundred miles 
below the capital, where immense groves of it 
are cultivated. A cheap but impure sugar is 
obtained from the wine of this palm, which is a 
substitute for that of the cane, and universally 
consumed throughout the country, forming an 
article of considerable export from the upper to 
the lower provinces. 
The sugar-cane, called Kran in the native lan¬ 
guage, seems to have been long known to the 
Burmese, but it is cultivated only in trifling quan¬ 
tities, to be eaten in its crude state; and the art of 
manufacturing sugar from it, is either not known, 
or not practised by them. Many parts of the 
country seem well suited to the growth of this 
plant, for the purpose of sugar; and if the Go¬ 
vernment were to give the same encouragement 
to the Chinese, as that of Siam does, sugar would, 
no doubt, soon become a valuable article of ex¬ 
port ; but in its present disposition, so wise and 
liberal a measure is hardly to be looked for.— 
Tobacco is chiefly cultivated in the upper pro¬ 
vinces, of which the climate appears most suitable 
to it, and it is an article of import from thence 
to the lower. It requires, as usual, the best soils, 
and its growth is consequently confined to a few 
