Democratic Sentinel, Volume 15, Number 45, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 November 1891 — THE BAMBOO. [ARTICLE]

THE BAMBOO.

There Are-Countries Where It Seem* to i Supply Every Human Want. There ace oowntrios where bamboo toeiiis-to supply almost every human requirementi, and Where the feathery .masses, of its. foliage, drooping like 'the weeping willow over road and river and. village, bespeak an Ideal of ilife beyond the reach of loss primitive communities. Here man is unspoiled' by aiitlßclal wants, untouched by thc-macch of thought or of science, land nature;, unsolicited, supplies with lavish, hand his simple needs. It is an ideal which It seems almost sacrilege to disturb, and in presence of which, the highest alm of the foreign intruder should be to preserve its i primary conditions intact. No better example- caji be cited of the land of the bamboo than one of those Indo- ; Chinese- provinces, of which Burmah lls the best known to Europeans. . Like the flir in the Northern climates, i Lt Is. the bamboo which here gives an uumtetakahle stamp to the rural landI scape, while it is literally the framework and fbnndatlon of nearly every work of man. It is no exaggeration bo-suy that the same jungles which give cover to animal life of every form and tribe exert a beneficent i influence also on every step of life of their human inhabitants. The Burmese child plays with bamboo toys-in, a house of which roof and walls and, : floors are for the most past made from the same generous plants Through boyhood and manhood andi old age this helpful comrade is. ever by his side. On land or water,, in, peace or war, In the homes of rich, and poor, in art and manufacture, in the market and the field, at. feast and funeral, this is the substance of all that man most needs and; values for ornament or use. Towns andiTillages are built from Its. stems- and leaves: the fisherman’s rod, a nd'float and raft; the hunter’s snare, it bridges the torrent, bears water from the well and irrigates the fields. It is food and medicine for catkin, and even for men; and there, is. music, too, not only in the rustle- of its leaves, but In its woody heart, from which more than one musiaali instrument is made.— Black wood’s. Magarzine.