14 MISS L. S. GIBBS ON THE FLORA AND PLANT FORMATIONS 
plantations, the railway following the Padas river, which here passes in 
impetuous rapids through a narrow gorge, where sections show banded clays 
in fantastically contorted synclines and anticlines. 
The vegetation is luxuriant. Huge clumps of the giant grass T'Aemeda 
gigantea with the Matonia-like Pteris tripartita are seen along the railway- 
track and on open promontories and banks in the river, and a beautiful palm 
with broad simple leaflets pinnately arranged up the frond, possibly an 
Arenga sp., is very conspicuous on the banks, which are clothed with forest 
to the water's edge. 
Immediately before Tenom we pass through some marshy forest. In one 
place where the railway embankment has altered the level of the water, a 
whole grove of derelict trees raises its buttressed trunks from a lonely 
‘swamp, forming with the spreading grey branches a landmark suggestive 
of some ruined cathedral; prostrate logs covered with Stereum elegans are 
‘exposed, one splendid clump of Cyperus elatus emphasizes a picture of 
desolation, then follow fine trees of Wormia excelsa, apparentlv quite at 
‘home in the standing moisture, and covered with huge pale yellow flowers. 
2. TENoM. 
This Residency is 700’ above sea-level, and has only been opened about 
iten years, since the construction of the railway, of which it is the terminus. 
A little branch line runs up to the Melalap Rubber and Tobacco Estate, 
ten miles to the east, and Tenom is the starting-point for the bridle-path to 
the interior, on which Kaningau, about forty miles farther on, is the first 
:station. 
The Resident of the Interior, Mr. A. B. C. Francis, resided here with the 
Treasurer of the district,and their official residences with a comfortable rest- 
house, the necessary Government offices, and inevitable Chinese “ Kedehs,” 
-completed the inventory of the place. 
Situated at the foot of the Rayoh hills, Tenom commands the wide and 
undulating valleys of the Padas and Pengallan rivers, the latter bounded to the 
‘south-west by a long range of hills about 5000’ high, called the Walker 
range, while the Limbakauh range, estimated at 10,000’, is seen in the 
«distance to the south-east. 
In the valleys long stretches of open “ Lalang” on poor soil, recent 
clearings showing all stages of jungle upgrowth and small plots on the hills 
for the cultivation of hill padi, break the otherwise preponderating evergreen 
mesophytie mixed forest. 
In the immediate vicinity of Tenom an old Murut * campong ” is situated 
con the banks of the Pengallan river, while several Chinese gardens spread 
along the Kaningau bridle-path for a short distance. By the " campong ”’ 
Erythrina indica, Clerodendron Bethuneanum, Costus speciosus var. argyro- 
phyllus, Mucuna pruriens and Piper sarmentosum are casually associated. 
