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JOURNAL

OF THE

ASIATIC SOCIETY.

PART II-PHYSICAL SCIENCE.

No. II.-1867.

On the Jungle products used as articles of food by the Inhabitants of the districts of Manbhoom and Hazaribagh.

By V. Ball, Esq. B. A.
Geological Survey of India.

It is perhaps not generally known that throughout Manbhoom and Hazaribagh, as well as in many of the adjoining districts a considerable number of the poorer classes of the people depend solely upon the jungle to supply them with the means of subsistence for from two to three months of every year. In time of famine the number so dependent is of course greatly increased.

In some of the more jungly parts of these districts, where the cultivation round the villages is very limited and deficient, nearly the whole of the inhabitants who have survived the past famine, can have had little else but the roots and fruits of the surrounding jungle upon, which to subsist. While passing through some of these villages last season, I was told that but few deaths had occurred in them.

On the whole I am inclined to believe that people living in such villages are more independent and less affected in every way by famine than those, who residing in the centre of cultivation, have no jungle readily accessible. Were a census to be taken, it would probably be

found that the relative proportion of deserted houses and villages, the result of the famine, to those still inhabited, would be much greater in the open, cultivated parts of the district than in the densest jungles, Indeed the jungles may be regarded to a certain extent as the saving of the lower races of the population; did they not afford nutritious food in abundance, the result of a famine like that of 1866-7, would probably be not merely decimation, but utter depopulation throughout extended areas.

It is not to be supposed that even those who are in the habit of using this description of food regularly, for a greater or less portion of every year, regard it as in any degree an equivalent to rice. Many have spoken to me of eating Mhowa, which is by far the best of these products, as being only better than suffering from absolute famine, and they always consider themselves legitimate objects of charity, when they can say they are living on it alone.

The list which is appended to this paper, includes nearly 80 distinct species of plants which furnish articles of food. Owing to the difficulty of identifying the fragmentary specimens which were all that I could in some instances obtain, it has been impossible to make it fully complete. I believe, however, nothing of importance has been omitted.

To S. Kurz, Esq. curator of the Herbarium in the Botanic gardens, I am indebted for considerable assistance which has enabled me to bring forward this paper sooner and in a more correct form than would have been otherwise possible.

The species mentioned are of course of varying importance, some being merely edible, and in a few cases injurious if eaten in large quantities; while others, as the Mhowa, Sál, Bier, Bur, Pipál, Singárá, Chehur, various roots of the species of Dioscorea, and many of the varieties of Sag (leaves) may be considered as bona fide staple articles of food.

BASSIA LATIFOLIA, Roxb. Mhowa, H. & B.

The Mhowa is found in Bombay and Bengal; those who have not visited the more remote portions of one or other of these presidencies, can hardly realize the importance of this tree as a source of food

to the poorer classes of the natives, more especially to such improvident races as the Bheels, Coles and Sonthals.

In the districts of Manbhoom and Hazaribagh, Mhowa groves as well as stray trees in the jungle are on the whole abundant. All the trees, with the exception of a few in the neighbourhood of roads, are the property of the zemindars, and are rented out by them at prices varying chiefly with the bazaar nirik or price of rice.

As the crop of Mhowa approaches ripeness, the corollas, becoming fleshy and turgid with secreted juices, gradually loosen their adhesion to the calyx and fall to the ground in a snowy shower. The duty of collecting the fallen blossoms is chiefly performed by women and children; at dawn they may be seen leaving their villages with empty baskets, and a supply of water for the day's use.

Before the crop has commenced to fall, they take the precaution to burn away the grass and leaves at the foot of the tree, so that none of the blossoms may be hidden when they fall. The gleaners generally remain under the trees all day, alternately sleeping and collecting the crop; the male members of the family, visiting the trees once or twice during the day, bear off the produce in banghys.

It often happens that the people who collect come from a considerable distance, in which case they erect with the branches of Sál a temporary encampment of huts in which they live until the crop is all gathered in. In front of each of these huts a piece of ground is made quite smooth and hard, for the purpose of spreading out the crop to dry.

When perfectly dry, the blossoms have a reddish brown colour, and in size they have lost three-fourths of their original dimensions and about half their original weight. It is the custom with some of the natives, before spreading them out to dry, to pull off the little ring of foliaceous lobes which crowns the fleshy corolla.

It is very difficulty to collect trustworthy statistics regarding the amount of yield of the Mhowa trees. I have been told, and it has been repeated to me several times, that a first class tree will yield as much as thirty cutcha maunds of 12 chittacks to the seer, or about th of a ton; in other words, an average daily fall of two maunds is said to continue for 15 days. This estimate I believe is more than double what it ought to be.

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