8 MR. С. Е. M. SWYNNERTON ОХ 
one meets with dense thickets of Brachylana, Conopharyngia, Markhamia 
and other trees, but Landolphia is rare. 
The above description, with the exception of the last sentence, would apply 
almost as well to the vegetation of the Chikambogé Valley anda great part of 
the Mafusi district. It may give a clearer idea of this type of jungie if I state 
that, in order to get about when I was locating a concession on the 
Kurumadzi, we had to cut our way everywhere with axes and hoes, and the 
backs of my men were often pouring with blood, the intense irritation of 
the “ buffalo-beans ". (Mucuna coriacea) which clustered everywhere in the 
tall grass and bush, forcing them to scrape themselves with sticks and 
sharp-edged stones as their velvety stings fell in showers on them. 
At the northern edge of the Jihu, and only eight miles by path to the 
south-east of Chirinda, are the Spungabera forest-patches, notable for some 
splendid specimens ef Chrysophyllum fulvum. 
Leaving Chirinda on November 18th, I was rained up on the Kurumadzi 
and could do but little collecting, but on the first fine afternoon pushed on 
past the Chinyika river and Mount Singuno to the flats of the Umswirizwi ; 
for the latter, whieh had now to be crossed, had taken yet another sharp turn, 
this time from west to east. It keeps this direction till it finally joins the 
Buzi, having meantime in its circuitous course received every water that 
flows from Chirinda. 
The vegetation between the Chinyika and Singuno was extraordinarily 
rank and dense, even for the Jihu. Consequently the contrast was all the 
more marked when, on erossing a small stream halfway down the hill, we 
found its banks lined by huge Khayas and the typical Jihu vegetation, at 
that point sharply separate from that of the valley below. A little higher up 
I had already noted the first few Holarrhena febrifuga and some of the taller 
forms, such as Bridelia, continued down for a short distance, but they rapidly 
mingle with and give place to Diplorhynchus mossambicensis, а Terminalia, 
and а Combretum, Securidaca, and other forms of which I should soon see 
more. Ormosia angolensis remains, however, one of the commonest trees. 
The change in the grass was more abrupt and striking, for from here onward 
it was only 6 or 8 feet high—later still less—and free from intermixture with 
Mucuna, ete. The * Idema," а Dolichos (probably D. brachypus), much used 
by the natives for poisoning fish, is common, and four species of Bauhinia 
are found in the valley (В. Galpini, В. reticulata, В. fassoglensis, and 
D. Petersiana), where the soil, though still fertile in good rainy seasons, and 
supporting, twenty years ago, a large native population, is full of stones and 
boulders. The open bush of the valley is mostly stunted, and it was not till I 
reached the river that I found any good tree-growih, Неге, lining the banks, 
were fine specimens of Kigelia and Sterculia Triphaca, Trichilia umbrifera, 
as well as many more familiar species such as Khaya nyasica. A steep stony 
