12 MR. С. F. M. SWYNNERTON ON 
on the coast as the *fever-tree," with its sickly-looking yellow bark and 
almost leafless twigs. Finally, after а hot tramp over comparatively barren 
country covered sparsely with a palm (//yphane ventricosa), mostly small 
Bauhinia reticulata, and, above all, a Combretum in a stunted form, I reached 
the Kraal of Inyamita. The river at this point is very broad and contains 
numerous islets, but its banks are largely inaccessible owing to dense reed- 
beds. A short journey through more open grass country with chiefly 
introduced trdes such as mangoes and oranges, some of them very old and 
stately, brought us to the Malata rubber, coco-nut, and sugar estate, whence 
it was a half-day’s sail in a small boat to Beira. 
Here I did a little collecting ; the beach itself is surprisingly rich in 
things which one finds commonly growing in the bush about Arucate and 
Chibabava. Next comes a strip of bare open grass-land, part of it more or 
less covered at high tide and supporting in places a dense but low growth of 
mangroves ; but four or five miles inland real open woods commence. These 
are composed of an admixture of typical low-veldt species with many of 
our commonest trees of the highlands. Collecting here on Christmas-day, 
I noted amongst others an Albizzia, probably A. fastigiata, а Parinarium, 
Vitex Cienkowskii, Uapaca Kirkiana, Acacia caffra, Eugenia owariensis forma 
latifolia, two species of Ficus, a Ximenia with edible fruits, Smilax Kraussiana, 
Landolphia Kirkii, and Anona senegalensis. 
Excepting for a slight shower at Zinyumbo and another at Beira, not a 
drop of rain had fallen during my journey and stay in the low veldt. I 
consequently found the country completely parched on my return journey, 
while in many parts swarms of larval migratory locusts were doing great 
damage to such low vegetation as was still green ; yet the Umswirizwi, when 
I reached it, was in full flood. The greenness and luxuriance of the vege- 
tation in the Jihu formed an extraordinary contrast to the bareness of the 
country I had just passed through. On reaching Chirinda on January 10th, 
I was informed that it had rained steadily ever since T left, an all-sufficient 
reason for the vast difference in the flora of the high veldt and the low. The 
grass throughout the lowlands is, I may here mention, short and very 
unlike that prevailing throughout Southern Melsetter and the Mafusi and 
Jihu districts. As to temperature, I have at Chibabava seen the glass 
standing at 108°5° Fahr. at 4 p.m. in a particularly cool thatched hut with 
a breeze blowing straight through, and it must frequently have been far 
higher at noon. During the same two months of 1908-1909 the highest 
point reached in my veranda at Chirinda was 79:59 at 1.30 р.м. on 
December 15th, the average noon reading for that period being nearer 
69° Fahr. Northern Melsetter is naturally yet cooler, in fact in the winter 
bitterly cold, frosts being then of daily occurrence. 
