302 MR. H. N. RIDLEY ON A COLLECTION OF 
In 1898 Mr. Н. M. Becher again attempted to reach the mountain by the 
same route, but perished in a spate of the Tahan river about five miles above 
the point at which the first expedition stopped. А few plants were added to 
the collections at Singapore Botanie Gardens by the Gardens’ plant-collector, 
who accompanied Mr. Becher’s ill-fated expedition. 
In 1899 Mr. W. W. Skeat went with the Cambridge expedition to explore 
the north of the Peninsula, made a hasty trip to the mountain from the north, 
and after much diffieulty and risk reached it. 
In 1901 Mr. John Waterstradt reached the mountain in a trip made chiefly 
for the purpose of collecting birds. An account of his expedition was 
published in the Journal of the Royal Asiatie Society, Straits Branch, vol. 
xxxvii. (1902) pp. 1-27. 
The collection of plants made by Messrs. Robinson and Wray is one of 
considerable interest, and contains a number of remarkable additions to the 
knowledge of the flora of the Malay Peninsula. It has long been known that 
the floras of the east and west coasts are very different, the eastern side 
showing a number of Australian and eastern Asiatic types not met with on 
the western side, the flora of which is more accessible and has been more 
thoroughly studied. 
The greatest interest centres round the plants, the geographical distribution 
of which is further extended. Two of these are specially noteworthy, viz. 
Pentaphylax malayana, n. sp., and Gentiana malayana : the former is the 
second representative of a Chinese monotypic genus of Ternstroemiaces 
previously known only from Hongkong; the latter is closely allied to a 
Bornean species occurring on Mt. Kinabalu and to a Javan species. 
A curious new genus of Melastomacee allied to Dissochvta, which I have 
«Пе! Orttrephes, is also an important addition. The genus Xyris is repre- 
sented in the Peninsula by several sea-shore species, but is seldom met with 
inland or at any altitude ; it is absent, so far as is known, from the Perak Hills 
and Mount Ophir, but one species, X. /idleyi, was found by me on Kedah 
Peak at about 3000 feet elevation. Two species occur on Gunong Tahan, 
one identical with that from Kedah Peak, the other, X. grandis, n. sp., perhaps 
the largest species of the genus, conspicuous from its stiff sword-like leaves 
resembling those of Cladium Maingayi, C. B. Clarke, of Mount Ophir. 
There are, as usual in such collections, several species of Didymocarpus, 
including two new to science, and a number of Orchids, а good proportion of 
which are also new. 
Among the previously described plants it is interesting to find several of 
those known only from Father Scortechini’s collections and distributed without 
any specific locality. It is probable that as they have not been met with on 
the western slopes of the Perak Hills, Seortechini must have collected 
them on the eastern watershed of the main range. Such are Gordonia imbri- 
cata, King, Polyosma coriacea, King, and Calophyllum venustum, King. 
