44 MISS L. 8. GIBBS ON THE FLORA AND PLANT FORMATIONS 
a row of granite blocks, the crack association ran up to 0°50 metre in height 
and included a lot of male plants of Coprosma Hookeri, of typical habit, but 
no female plant. Here were also some other shrubs, probably Symplocos 
buaifolia, which with Rubus Lowii and Schenus apogon were the only 
recorded plants for the summit which I did not find in flower. 
Suddenly finding myself alone, deserted by the shivering Dusuns, who 
hardly knew where to shelter themselves from the bitter wind on the summit, 
I walked quickly on in the only possible direction to be taken, to break with 
dramatic abruptness on to the splendid granite plateau of the actual summit, 
whieh with a slope to the N.W. stretches for a mile in front. Huge 
peaks, almost all of the same height, align themselves on its surface 
like the columns of some roofless titanie temple, recalling the dissected 
plateaus of Skye, a similarity no doubt due to the even altitude of the 
peaks. The flat appearance of some of them suggested that their tops 
mark the original level of the whole plateau, the peaks, apparently of a 
harder rock, remaining while the granite of the plateau had worn away. 
They certainly could not be described as tors, as there were no planes of 
bedding or of cleavage. The granite of the plateau in the narrowest portion 
shown in the map is now weathering in huge slabs, which slide down the 
inclined surface and pile up towards the base of the slope (Pl. 7. fig. 6). 
Erosion under these conditions must be very rapid. The peaks showed 
every stage of disintegration from an unbroken wall to the perpendicular, 
flat-topped shape of St. John's Rock; while in the case of smaller ones, 
the tops had worn off altogether, and Low's peak was reduced to a 
heap of stones like a cairn, which being apparently the highest and the 
easiest, I decided to ascend for the view. Making towards it, I saw that it 
was connected with a smaller peak by a wall of rectangular cyclopean 
blocks, the latter very similar in appearance to some of the magnificent dykes 
exposed in the granite of the Rhodesian Matoppo Hills. This cyclopean wall 
marks the limit of the plateau, lying as it does on the brink of a stupendous 
abyss. The cold wind was whistling through the gap formed between the two 
peaks, the thermometer registering 50? F., approximately the same as in 
previous records. Half up the cairn I found a female plant of Coprosma 
Hookeri, about 1:50 m. high, sheltered between the blocks of granite and 
the remains of a vein of hematite, a detached portion of which still adheres 
to a piece of granite (altered granite). Dr. Cullis gives the following 
tentative explanation of the occurrence of this vein :—“ H:ematite veins 
probably formed by downward percolation of ferruginous water from the 
overlying formation, since removed by erosion." 
On the summit the view was magnificent, but I had lost the best of it, as 
the clouds already rolling up now obscured the whole of the N.E. coast. 
It was disappointing not to be able to see the bottom of the mighty abyss, 
