Calamus erectus, Roxb. Its seeds are used as a substitute for betel-nut.
Calamus extensus, Roxb., Nela poka, TEL. Its seeds are used for betel-nut. See Canes.
Calamus fasciculatus, Roxb. Rattan cane.
Buro•bet, . . . BEND. Parambu, . . . TAM. Perambu, . . 14IALEAL. I Amla Vetasawmu, TEL.
This cane is a native of Bengal, used for walking sticks.
Calamus inermis, T. And., furnishes the finest alpenstocks.
Calamus of Chittagong, Burma, and the Andamans, is used for tying timber rafts, and to make cables.
Calamus montanus, T. And., of Sikhim and Bhutan, is the best cane for suspension bridges and for dragging logs.
Calamus rotang, Linn. Rattan cane.
C. Roxburghii, Griff., Boyle.
Bet, Beta, . . . BENG. Betamu, Bettapu, TEL. Rotan, . . . . MALAY. Nirii Prabba, Pemu, „ Bed, PERS. Pepu, Perambu, TAM.
This species of calamus is said to furnish the stouter of the rattan canes of commerce, which are readily split into strips, are extensively used for the caning in the backs and bottoms of chairs, sofas, and light carriages ; are made into matting, seats, sofas, baskets, and cabinets ; and throughout the Archipelago vessels are furnished with cables formed of cane twisted or plaited. They are like wise formed into ropes by the people of the forests, to drag heavy weights and to bind wild elephants. The kinds employed for caning chairs, etc., are known in commerce by the name of rattan cane, and are yielded by long trailing species which abound wherever the genus is found. The most northern one, Calamus Royleanus, no doubt yields the rattans collected in the Debra Doon, while C. Roxburghii doubtless yields those collected in more southern latitudes. Dragon cane is thick, both light and dark coloured, with long internodes and a hard bark, less flexible than the common rattans, but strong, springy, and much valued. C. Royleanus, C. rotang, common in Bengal and on the Coromandel coast, are used for all the ordinary purposes of cane ; as also are C. tennis of Assam, gracilis, extensus, and others. Canes form a considerable article of commerce. Between four and five millions of them have been exported from the East Indies. Dampier says: Here we made two new cables of rattans, each of them four inches about. Our captain bought the rattans, and hired a Chinese to work them, who was very expert in making such wooden cables. These cables I found serviceable enough after, in mooring the vessel with either of them ; for when I carried out the anchor, the cable, being thrown out after me, swam like cork in the sea, so that I could see when it was tight, which we cannot so well discern in our hemp cables, whose weight sinks them down, nor can we carry them out but by placing two or three boats at some distance asunder, to buoy up the. cable,. while the long
boat rows out the anchor.' The tow-ropes men tioned by Marco Polo as used by the Chinese for tracking their vessels on their numerous rivers and canals, seem also to have been made of cane, and not of bamboo, as sometimes stated, as they were split in their whole length of about thirty feet,• and then twisted together into strong ropes some hundred feet in length. In Java, Sumatra, and throughout the eastern islands, vessels are furnished with cables formed of cane twisted or plaited. This sort of cable was very extensively manufactured at Malacca.
Mr. G. Bennet says (Wanderings, ii. p.121) that near Macao the rattans are split longitudinally, soaked, and attached to a wheel, which one person keeps in motion, whilst another binds the split rattans together, adding others to the length from a quantity carried around his waist, until the required length of the rope is completed.
Caimans Royleanus, Griff:, the most northern of the canes, being found in the Debra Doou, where it abounds. Plentiful in the eastern Kamaou forests, and used in all cane-work.
Calamus ruden tum, Loureiro, grows on the Mahabaleshwar hills and Dekhan, also in Cochin China and the Moluccas. Loureiro describes this large species as being twisted into ropes in the eastern regions, and employed, among other purposes, for dragging great weights, and for binding untamed elephants.
Calamus scipionem, Loureiro. Griffith con sidered this to be the species which yields the Malacca cane, but the plant does not appear about Malacca. He was, however, informed that the canes are imported from Siak, on the opposite coast of Sumatra. Some of these are simply mottled or clouded, others of a brown colour, in consequence, it is said, of their having been smoked. The more slender specimens with the longest internodes are those most highly valued.
Calamus vitninalis, Ainslie.
Bet, Doxx. I Perupum, . . . . TAM.
Vetra, . . . SANSK. Betta, TEL It grows in the woods, and its fruit is eaten by the common people.— Roth. ; Griffith; Seeman ; Voigt ; .Royle, Fib. Pl. ; Mason; 0' Sh. ; Bennet ; Thompson ; Ainslie, p. 231 ; Gamble.