IN THE DEPTHS OF THE FOREST.
Bewilderment and wonder grow upon anyone riding through the forest for the first time, but after a few days one gradually becomes accustomed to these luxuriant surroundings, and is able to appreciate the forest in detail.
How beautiful the undergrowth is! Palms and bamboos wave gracefully above a mass of flowering plants, among and over which climb convolvuli of many kinds, tropæolum, honeysuckle, and a variety of other creepers, forming natural arbours, with whose blossoms mingle those of the festoons hanging from the trees.
Teak, india-rubber, and cutch trees rise high above the undergrowth, and in turn are dwarfed by such giants as the pyingado and the cotton-tree. These grow to an enormous size. The pyingado, straight and smooth, often rises 150 feet before it puts forth a branch, and I have seen ponies stabled between the natural buttresses which support the huge trunk of the silk-cotton tree, sometimes 250 feet in height.
Orchids of great size grow upon the boughs, and add to the wealth of foliage, in which the large-leafed teak or rubber trees contrast with the feathery pepper or acacia; and it is interesting to notice that most of the feathery kinds bear thorns.
Though generally straight and tall, the trees are often twisted into curious joints and elbows, which give them a very fantastic appearance; but most strange of all are the creepers which bind these forest growths. Some are very large, and stretch for immense distances, linking tree to tree in twining loops, from which their hanging tendrils reach the ground, or perhaps crossing some forest glade or stream to form an aerial bridge for the lemurs or the monkeys.
One creeper in particular I must tell you about. This is called "Nyoung-bin" by the natives, and is a very strange plant. It very often springs from a seed dropped by some bird into the fork of a tree, where, taking root, it sends its suckers downwards until they become firmly bedded in the ground, then, growing upwards again, it slowly envelops the parent tree until it is entirely enclosed by the new growth, which kills it, but which in its stead becomes a new tree, larger and more lofty than the one which first supported it. This is one of the many species of ficus, of which its equally strange cousin, the many-trunked banyan, is another common feature of a Burmese forest.
Naturally these forests are alive with birds. Parrots and parakeets live among the tree-tops, and doves and pigeons, jays and mynahs, and a great variety of small birds, find their home here. Woodpeckers are busy among the tree-trunks, sharing their spoil of insects with the lizards and the tree-frogs, and among the lesser growths tits, finches, and wagtails rear their young broods.
The birds are not the only occupants of these wilds, however, for in no country is there a larger variety of game than in Burma. Herds of wild elephants roam the forests, in which are also tigers, panthers, and bears. Many kinds of deer are there, to be preyed upon by man or beast, from the pretty little gyi or barking deer to the lordly sambur. Wild pig also are very numerous, and lurking in the dank undergrowth or fissures of the rocks are many venomous snakes and large pythons.