30 Expedition of 1906 



gigantic lanceolate leaves. The lowest branches bear the mitre-like 

 and light fruits in all stages of development in association with the 

 flowers. 



Still further south coconut palms, the leaves of which we had 

 seen through our glasses from the ship, tower above the groups of 

 trees (PI. VIII., fig. 11). It was with some difficulty that we made 

 our way to them over large blocks of pumice, through a tangle 

 of reeds and grasses and thick bush. Half-way we came to a 

 group of large-leaved fig-trees, Ficus fnlva and Ficus fistulosa, in 

 full fruit, and, like many other tropical trees, bearing flower and 

 fruit on the stem and older branches instead of on the younger 

 shoots. The slender stems of Trichomnthes tricnspidata, a Cucur- 

 bitaceous climbing plant, sprawl over the twigs and branches of the 

 fig-trees, its light-red fruits standing out against the dark green 

 foliage. The fig-trees, now represented by six species in Krakatau 

 and Verlaten island, and Trichosanthes belong to those colonists the 

 seeds of which are said to have been brought to the island by fruit- 

 eating birds (endozoic). 



To our great delight we found the coconut palms laden with 

 fruit. The large number of ripe nuts on the ground, several of which 

 had germinated and produced plants reaching one metre in height, 

 showed that they must have attained the fruiting stage some years ago : 

 a renewal of the forest is thus amply provided for. We were all 

 refreshed by a quantity of unripe fruits which one of our Javanese 

 companions brought down from the crowns of the palm-trees. 



The region north-east of the Casuarina forest seemed to us to 

 afford the most appropriate route by which to penetrate into the 

 interior of the island and to the slopes of the cone. The strand- 

 forest is here reduced to a very narrow zone and the girdle of creeping 

 vegetation is at several points interrupted by the extension of the 

 bush to the tide-level. Among taller plants which overlap the others 

 are some coconut palms and handsome Pandanus clumps, reaching 

 a height of 6 8 metres (PL VI., fig. 8 and fig. 9, PI. VII.), with their 

 slender stems bent like snakes and anchored to the wave-swept beach 

 by thick columnar roots ; the yellow and red masses of fruit as large 

 as a man's head make a brilliant show in the dense crowns of narrow 

 sharp-edged leaves. Close by we found a young coconut palm not 

 yet at the fruiting age, a plant of the dwarf variety, termed by the 

 natives " Kalapa gading," the fruits of which when fully ripe are of 

 a beautiful orange-yellow colour. 



Following inland one of the broad stream-beds which the rapidly 

 flowing water after the heavy rains had carved out of the soft strata, 

 we soon found ourselves in the midst of a vegetation entirely different 

 from that of the strand-flora. At the edge of the bed of the stream 



