ch. vi.] Birds and Plants. 135 



and a few dexterous strokes of the paddle on the part of 

 a handsome young Kadyan man named ' Moumein,' who 

 acted as steersman, sent the canoe beneath the arching 

 nipa plumes to a bare spot where it was possible to land. 

 The wet branches of a low mossy tree were covered with 

 the elegant little Davallia parvula, among which grew a 

 cirrhopetalum only about two inches in height, and bear- 

 ing little purple flowers in semi-circular whorl-like tufts 

 at the apices of tiny scapes. On sandstone rocks near at 

 hand the handsome Dipteris Horsfieldii was abundant, its 

 stout rhizomes creeping over the nearly bare wet rock, 

 and adhering so firmly by its tiny rootlets that it was 

 difficult to displace.* Above one's head grew the great 

 glossy green umbrella-like fronds, borne aloft on stipes 

 varying from two to eight feet in length. Truly a noble 

 fern — alas ! how difficult to cultivate. At the time I 

 lived in the locality in which it is found in the utmost 

 luxuriance, I read of the plant being exhibited in London 

 and elsewhere, but each successive report of it unfortu- 

 nately recorded its decadence. This and the glorious 

 Matonia pectiuata — also Bornean, although first found 

 together with our old friends Cypripedium barbatum, 

 Nepenthes sanguinca, and Bhododcndron jasminiflorum, on 

 Mount Opliir, in Malacca — are two of the most noble of 

 all ferns, rivalling the palms indeed in stately beauty and 

 substance of frond-tissue. How unfortunate, then, is it 

 that both so persistently resist the efforts alike of collec- 

 tors and cultivators. As one of the two travellers before- 

 mentioned I had previously visited the spot Avhere we had 



* On mountains in Borneo above 7000 feet a form of Dipteris Horsfieldii 

 grows freely among dacrydiurus, droseras, dianella, dawsonia superba, 

 a tiny umbellifer, and other Australian types. It is dwarf, rarely above 

 two feet high, with glaucous leathery and brittle fronds, almost silvery 

 below. 



