1: Pentaptera tomentosa (Rox.).
One venerable patriarch of this species, which grows at Mutwal, within three miles of Colombo, towers to so great a height above the surrounding forests of coconut palms, that it forms a landmark for the native boatmen, and is discernible from Negombo, more than twenty miles distant. The circumference of its stem, as measured by Mr. W. Ferguson, in 1850, was forty-five feet close to the earth, and seven yards at twelve feet above the ground.
The timber, which is durable, is applied to the carving of idols for the temples, besides being extensively used for less dignified purposes; but it is chiefly prized for the bark, which is sold as a medicine, and, in addition to yielding a black dye, it is so charged with calcareous matter that its ashes, when burnt, afford a substitute for the lime which the natives chew with their betel.
Some of the trees found in the forests of the interior are remarkable for the curious forms in which they produce their seeds. One of these, which sometimes grows to the height of one hundred feet without throwing out a single branch, has been confounded with the durian of the Eastern Archipelago, or supposed to be an allied species[1], but it differs from it in the important particular that its fruit is not edible. The real durian is not indigenous to Ceylon, but was brought there by the Portuguese in the sixteenth century.[2] It has been very recently re-introduced, and is now cultivated successfully. The native name for the Singhalese tree, "Katu-boeda," denotes the prickles that cover its fruit, which is as large as a coco-nut, and set with thorns each nearly an inch in length.
1: It is the Cullenia excelsa of WIGHT's Icones, &c. (761-2).
2: PORCACCHI, in his Isolario, written in the sixteenth century, enumerates the true durian as being then amongst the ordinary fruit of Ceylon.—"Vi nasce anchora un frutto detto Duriano, verde et grande come quei cocomeri, che a Venetia son chiamati angurie: in mezo del quale trouano dentro cinque frutti de sapor molto excellente."—Lib. iii. p. 188. Padua, A.D. 1619.
The Sterculia foetida, one of the finest and noblest of the Ceylon forest-trees, produces from the end of its branches large bunches of dark purple flowers of extreme richness and beauty; but emitting a stench so intolerable as richly to entitle it to its very characteristic botanical name. The fruit is equally remarkable, and consists of several crimson cases of the consistency of leather, within which are enclosed a number of black bean-like seeds: these are dispersed by the bursting of their envelope, which splits open to liberate them when sufficiently ripened.
The Moodilla (Barringtonia speciosa) is another tree which attracts the eye of the traveller, not less from the remarkably shaped fruit which it bears than from the contrast between its dark glossy leaves and the delicate flowers which they surround. The latter are white, tipped with crimson, but the petals drop off early, and the stamens, of which there are nearly a hundred to each flower, when they fall to the ground might almost be mistaken for painters' brushes. The tree (as its name implies) loves the shore of the sea, and its large quadrangular fruits, of pyramidal form, being protected by a hard fibrous covering, are tossed by the waves till they root themselves on the beach. It grows freely at the mouths of the principal rivers on the west coast, and several noble specimens of it are found near the fort of Colombo.
The Goda-kaduru, or Strychnos nux-vomica is abundant in these prodigious forests, and has obtained an European celebrity on account of its producing the poisonous seeds from which strychnine is extracted. Its fruit, which it exhibits in great profusion, is of the size and colour of a small orange, within which a pulpy substance envelopes the seeds that form the "nux-vomica" of commerce. It grows in great luxuriance in the vicinity of the ruined tanks throughout the Wanny, and on the west coast as far south as Negombo. It is singular that in this genus there should be found two plants, the seeds of one being not only harmless but wholesome, and that of the other the most formidable of known poisons.[1] Amongst the Malabar immigrants there is a belief that the seeds of the goda-kaduru, if habitually taken, will act as a prophylactic against the venom of the cobra de capello; and I have been assured that the coolies coming from the coast of India accustom themselves to eat a single seed per day in order to acquire the desired protection from the effects of this serpent's bite.[2]
1: The tettan-cotta, the use of which is described in Vol. II. Pt. ix. ch. i. p. 411, when applied by the natives to clarify muddy water, is the seed of another species of strychnos, S. potatorum. The Singhalese name is ingini (tettan-cotta is Tamil).