INSULAR FLORAS. 37 



6600 feet above the bottom of the sea, but nowhere rising 

 more than twenty feet above the level of the sea ; and they 

 are only 120 to 180 miles distant from the mainland of India. 

 Storm-waves have from time to time swept away half 

 the population ; yet many of the islands are still inhabited, 

 and they have a "human history" of over 500 years. 

 As to the vegetation, Dr. Prain enumerates eighty species 

 of vascular plants, including only two ferns, more than 

 half of which have probably been intentionally introduced 

 by man ; many others accidentally, and only a small re- 

 mainder reached the islands independently of man. Dr. 

 Prain concludes his very careful analysis of the flora with 

 some speculations on the probable origin of its elements in 

 the islands ; and he suggests that fifty-six species were 

 introduced by man, eleven by the sea, two by birds, and 

 two by winds. With regard to the coco-nut palm, he is of 

 opinion that the evidence, both intrinsic and extrinsic, 

 indicates that its appearance in the Archipelago preceded 

 that of man. Without knowing what evidence he relies on 

 for this statement, it would be bold to reject his theory ; 

 but if it can be satisfactorily established it would afford an 

 interesting link in the history of this tree. We must 

 dismiss this part of our subject with a brief reference to the 

 elaborate description and tabulation x of the components of 

 the vegetation of the Coco group — a group lying im- 

 mediately to the north of the Andamans. The total 

 number of species enumerated, including a few cellular 

 cryptogams, is three hundred and fifty-eight, whereof 

 seventy are set down as cosmopolitan in the tropics ; ten 

 others are nearly so; forty-nine are more or less widely 

 spread throughout the tropics of the Old World ; forty-one 

 extend from South-Eastern Asia to Australasia ; while one 

 hundred and eighty-eight species are confined to South- 

 Eastern Asia. The species are distributed among two 



1 " The Vegetation of the Coco Group," I). Prain, in the Journal 

 of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, lx., 1891, pp. 283-406. "On a 

 Botanical Visit to Little Andaman and the Nicobars," D. Prain, in 

 the Proceedings of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, 1891, pp. 156-175. 



