They are the Thugs of the vegetable world, for although not necessarily epiphytic, it may be said that in point of fact no single plant comes to perfection, or acquires even partial development, without the destruction of some other on which to fix itself as its supporter.
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, envelopes the trunk of the supporting tree with a network of wood, and at length penetrating the ground, attains the dimensions of a stem.

But unlike a _stem_ it throws out no buds, leaves, or flowers; the true stem, with its branches, its foliage, and fruit, springs upwards 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.[2] 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.

It is not unusual in the forest to find a fig-tree which had been thus upborne till it became a standard, now forming a hollow cylinder, the centre of which was once filled by the sustaining tree: but the empty walls form a circular network of interlaced roots and branches; firmly agglutinated under pressure, and admitting the light through interstices that look like loopholes in a turret.
[Footnote 1: Ficus Indica.] [Footnote 2: I do not remember to have seen the following passage from Pliny referred to as the original of Milton's description of this marvellous tree:-- "Ipsa se serens, vastis diffunditur ramis: quorum imi adeo in terram curvantur, ut annuo spatio infigantur, novamque sibi _propaginem faciant circa parentem in orbem._ Intra septem eam _aestivant pastores_, opacam pariter et munitam vallo arboris, decora specie subter intuenti, proculve, _fornicato_ arbore.

Foliorum latitudo _peltae effigiem Amazonicae_ habet," &c .-- PLINY, 1.xii.c.