78 DR. O. STAPF ON THE FLORA OF MOUNT KINABALU, 
more imposing than many mountains of a much greater altitude, from the fact that it is 
an almost isolated mass, at the highest end mounting up to the height of 13,698 feet 
(Belcher) and finishing off abruptly in sheer precipices of 10,000 feet ; its proximity to 
the sea-coast, being less than forty miles in a direct line, allows of it being viewed at once 
from the lowest level, none of its imposing grandeur being lost by a series of intervening 
plateaus which dwarf so many mountains.” 
The following passage is taken from page 104, and refers to the view obtained from 
Melangkap, a village north-west of Kinabalu and close to it :— 
“At a glance one could see that the mountain on this side was a sheer precipice and 
quite inaccessible, the water falling thousands of feet without touching the rock. ... 
Between the main buttress (the summit) and the long jagged ridge (the northern spur) is 
a huge gorge surrounded on three sides by sheer precipices of bare rock, the entrance to 
this gorge being from the western side, facing Melangkap. At the most southern 
extremity the mountain suddenly terminates at its greatest altitude by precipices 
of rock. The top along the whole distance is bare of vegetation and very rough; here 
and there great scars, formed by rock-slips, may be noticed. Though Kinabalu is only a 
few miles distant, the intervening country is a mass of forest-clad ridges, which look from 
here very steep, and through which the Pantaran (a tributary of the Tampassuk) and 
other streams have cut, in the course of ages, deep channels.... The village of 
Melangkap is situated at the end of a huge spur which runs round in a slight curve 
almost to the base of the great buttress of Kinabalu. At the Melangkap end the 
altitude is over 1000 feet, but this spur gradually rises on nearing the mountain to over 
5000 feet. It is covered with a dense forest-growth and branches off in several directions, 
the Pantaran flowing along its base, the head-waters of this river falling from the top of 
the buttress itself. On looking to your left, when facing the mountain (from the village 
of Melangkap), another lofty spur sweeps round from the other end of the mountain. 
This spur is more broken up and about 4000 feet in altitude.... Directly in front of 
Melangkap, and between the two mentioned ridges, the My is a mass of huge spurs, 
mounting up, as Kinabalu is neared, to 5000-6000 feet.’ 
I may add that the first of the two spurs mentioned parts from the granite cap very 
near Maripari, a locality spoken of by Dr. Haviland in his account. This will help the 
reader to join Whitehead’s with Haviland’s description, which refers tothe south-western 
spurs and to the southern main range. 
METEOROLOGY. 
The ‘ Handbook of British North Borneo’ contains very valuable information on the 
meteorological conditions of British North Borneo, derived mainly from observations at 
Sandarakan and other places on the coast. We may assume that the same conditions 
prevail also on the coast west and north-west of Kinabalu and for some distance inland. 
But they undergo a considerable change as we approach the very foot of the ia. 
and still more as weascendit. There is, according to the * Handbook,’ a ** true wet season,” 
ho extending over the months November, December, and January, and often also parts of 
= and February, and a “true dry season,” following almost immediately and 
