NOTES OX THK VK(iKTATIOX OF XKAV GUIXEA. 



By F. MANSON BAILEY, F.L.S. 



'[rtrtiil before the Itojffd Societi/ of (Jiirenshnul, 20th Auf/u.'it, 1898.] 



In the hope that it may be of interest to the V)otanical portion 

 of the Society's members I have sketched out a few stray notes 

 on the plant life of IJritish New Guinea, observed during a 

 recent visit Avith his Excellency Lord Lainington's party to that 

 place. First, it struck me that the plants of this large island 

 resembled the natives in one thing, namely — as it would be hard 

 to find one of the latter with a clean skin, all of them being 

 more or less covered by skin disease, so the plants are nearly all 

 infested with various kinds of insect and fungus blights. The 

 vegetation, however, even under this great disadvantage, makes 

 in all directions most vigorous growth, but, so far as I was able 

 to judge, not a timber growth. I come to this conclusion from 

 specimens Avhich have been forwarded to me for determination 

 during late years, from the various published accounts of other 

 botanists, and from my own observations. Likewise, the grasses 

 are, as compared with Queensland, few in variety, and are for 

 the most part coarse kinds, the better ones only being seen here 

 and there in small isolated plots. A large number of the trees 

 and shrubs, as well as plants of smaller growth, are identical 

 with those met with in tropical Queensland. These, as one 

 might expect in such a moist cliuuite, have in many instances 

 much larger foliage, and the variegat«d kinds are of a much 

 brighter colouring, than one meets with on the same species 

 grown even in bush or hot houses. My visits to the land were 

 only close to the beach, excepting one trip for about six miles 

 up the ]\landjare River, and here the scrub was so dense that it 

 was quite impossible to penetrate more than a few yards from 



