BOTANIZING WITH THE OKINAWANS — WALKER 371 



the people's official welcome to the colonel and his party, where we were 

 entertained far into the night by speeches, food, and drink, and an 

 elaborate program of native and Japanese dances. 



On Yonaguni, botanizing on the tag end of one day and the whole 

 of the next yielded a relatively few new plants, but since I was the 

 first American to collect here, so far as known, we tried to make as 

 o-ood a collection as we could in this limited time. Fortune attended 

 this venture, and we returned to Iriomote without mishap or rough 

 seas. We could have been stranded for days or even weeks, had a 

 typhoon blown up and held the police boat in the diminutive port. 



After a few more days of collecting on Iriomote, my kind host from 

 the mine operations took us and a load of Okinawans to Ishigaki Is- 

 land in an ancient LCM, a relic of that great fleet of shallow-draft 

 landing ships which proved so important and serviceable in the war. 

 Here Colonel Schouman and his staff graciously provided all we 

 needed, especially a jeep, for six more days of collecting. Here were 

 roads reaching almost everywhere, and again we sallied forth on rub- 

 ber tires as on Okinawa. 



Ishigaki Island is in rather striking contrast to the islands visited 

 to the west. It is about 8 miles in diameter, with a long, slender 

 peninsula extending from the eastern shore northward, and shorter 

 and stubbier peninsulas on the northwest corner and upper western 

 side. The lower half or more of the island is a highly cultivated 

 rolling plain, largely of raised limestone with much evidence of hav- 

 ing once included coral reefs. Heavy forested mountains, rising up 

 to about 1,700 feet, stretch across the northern part, dropping down 

 almost to the water's edge on the farther side. The mountains are 

 largely of igneous Paleozoic rocks overlooking the plains of younger 

 gravels, sandstones, shales, and limestones. The shores of Ishigaki 

 are generally low and reef -lined. There is no harbor, but the coral 

 reef on the south runs far out to sea, partially protecting the open, 

 shallow roadstead off Ishigaki City, where all but the smallest ships 

 must cast anchor. On threat of a typhoon, they take shelter in 

 Funauki Bay, one of the deep, protected estuaries on the far side of 

 Iriomote Island within sight to the west. Agriculture here is some- 

 what different. Farmers more often live in the city and ride out 

 daily on horseback or springless carts to work their fields of sweet- 

 potatoes, rice (both upland and wetland) , sugarcane, and other crops. 

 Fresh pineapples were seen and enjoyed. Many other crops are 

 raised, and improved farming is encouraged by a thriving agri- 

 cultural research station, an agricultural high school, and other 

 organizations. 



The city of Ishigaki, on the broad, flat southern coast, is neat and 

 • laid out on an unusually regular pattern of streets. These are almost 



