"The family generally make their first appearance as slender roots hanging from the crown or trunk of some other tree, generally a palm, among the moist bases of whose leaves the seed carried thither by some bird which had fed upon the fig begins to germinate. This root, branching as it descends, envelops the trunk of the supporting tree with a net-work of wood, and at length, penetrating the ground, attains the dimensions of a stem. But, unlike a _stem_, it throws out no buds or flowers; the true stem, with its branches, its foliage, and fruit, springs upward from the crown of the tree whence the root is seen descending; and from it issue the pendulous rootlets, which on reaching the earth fix themselves firmly, and form the marvellous growth for which the banyan is so celebrated. In the depth of this grove the original tree is incarcerated till, literally strangled by the folds and weight of its resistless companion, it dies and leaves the fig in undisturbed possession of its place." [Footnote 25] [Footnote 25: "Ceylon," i., p. 95] But not trees alone do these vegetable garrotters embrace in their fatal grasp, ancient monuments are also destroyed by these formidable assailants. Sir E. Tennent has given an engraving of a fig-tree on the ruins at Pollanarrua, in Ceylon, which had fixed itself on the walls---a curious sight, indeed--"its roots streaming downward over the ruins as if they had once been fluid, following every sinuosity of the building and terraces till they reach the earth." An extremely interesting series of drawings is now to be seen in the Linnean Society's room at Burlington House, illustrating the mode of growth of another strangling or murdering tree, of New Zealand, belonging to an entirely different order from that to which the figs belong (_Urticaceae_), namely, to one of the _Myrtaceae_. The association of garrotting habits with those of the stinging nettle family is apt enough, we may be inclined to think; but it is rather disappointing to meet with these disagreeable peculiarities in the case of the myrtle group; but such is the fact: the Rata, or _Metrosideros robusta_--as we believe is the species---climbs to the summits of mighty trees of the forest of Wangaroa, and kills them in its iron grasp. But, notwithstanding these unpleasant impressions which "the reckless energy of the vegetation might produce" in the traveller's mind, there is plenty in tropical nature to counteract them: