1 Jan., 1898.] QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL’ JOURNAL. — 35 
dweller in the far East, native and European, must wonder why the Bamboo 
is not much more employed in our domestic life. It has everything to 
recommend it for use in many ways. It is light, strong, easily worked. Its 
flexible skin is shredded off in the Hast, and worked into hundreds of forms of 
household convenience and industrial aid. Baskets may be seen woven of it 
so perfect that they will hold water. It is frequently said that it quickly 
decays. Ornamental fences erected, here nearly five years ago show no signs 
of decay. Of course five years is a small time in the life of, say, a hardwood 
fence, but then these were cheaply and rapidly constructed, and were 
ornamental screens.. To get the same appearance from a hardwood fence 
would have been a serious matter, both as regards trouble and expense. 
It would not be generally supposed that £300,000 worth of walking 
sticks and canes are imported into, England every year, and of these various 
species of Bamboos form no inconsiderable. part, .The variety of Bamboo 
growing in, the Gardens has. been,used with considerable success in the. manu- 
facture of paper. irae 
Looking at a.tall waving Bamboo as.it sways to, and fro in the wind, the 
yery picture, of lightness combined with graceful strength, you would, hardly 
take, it to. be a grass., And yet such it is, It, belongs to a very large and very 
useful family, of which there are 3,500 distinct representatives in the world, 
spreading from the ovenlike. temperature of the tropical ravine to the breeziest 
mountain top. 
The rate of growth of the Bamboo is very rapid. There are a few well- 
authenticated instances.. Roxburgh (a most. accurate observer) records, that 
one species of Bamboo grew at the rate of from 20: to 70 feet in a 
month. Fortune says that the rate of growth of certain Bamboos he noted in 
China was from 2 to 24 feet ina day. - 
The introduction of useful varieties of Bamboo from Japan and elsewhere 
is having our attention, : 
_ It may, be mentioned that persons about to use Bamboos will find itimprove 
them very much to steep them for a fortnight in water before using. They 
will last longer and show a firmer grain. The storytellers of the East have a 
pretty legend about the Bamboo. They say that two lovers were escaping from 
the usual cruel parent, and came to the banks of a stream, when, asin the case 
of Lord Ullin’s daughter— oo. 
4 ; , Adown the glen 
Rode arméd men, 
Their trampling sounded nearer. ; 
Then the gods in pity changed the lovers into two Bamboos, and the whispering 
sound which is heard amongst the leaves at night, when there seems not a 
breath of air to ruffle a leaf in the sleeping jungle, is the whispered converse of 
the hapless lovers. You want to hear this story told by some eloquent old 
professional storyteller in the Bamboo jungle itself, when the camp-fire burns 
low, and the long mysterious shadows are falling athwart the open glade, to 
appreciate the beauty and charm of a tropical jungle at night. 
- The way in which Bamboos have been generally propagated here has been 
to cut out a shooting head with some roots attached.* ‘This is a’ somewhat 
troublesome thing to do, for the Bamboo sticks to its home asa barnacle to a 
rock. They have been propagated here recently in two other ways: By 
cuttings of the side shoots; and by laying the trimmed stem in a trench and 
placing 6 inches of earth on it, if kept moist, it springs up at the joints. This 
‘was discovered accidentally in making drains of the stems. 
In the pond which is surrounded by these Bamboos you will notice a green 
surface which most people call slime. It is not slime, but quite an interesting 
little plant, very widely distributed throughout the world, ‘and, like’ the ever- 
present sparrow, possessing a wonderful power of adapting itself to circum- 
stances. When the water sinks away from it, it just takes root on dry land; 
* The Bamboos growing at Cadarga, Milton, sprang f i idi 
Mr: Borin Has nia ) , Sprang from a switch cut for a riding cane by 
