390 ZONES AND REGIONS [Pt. Ill, Sect. 



the Araliaceae, with their rosettes of large leaves on a stem that is eithe 

 simple or but slightly branched. 



Although the above-mentioned types of shrubs or small trees are usual! 

 provided with inconspicuous flowers, a fine show is made, especially ii 

 tropical America, by a number of Melastomaceae with flowers of incompar 

 able beauty. The most varied kinds of Rubiaceae, such as Pavetta am 

 species of Psychotria, frequently bear their beautiful th)-rsoid inflorescence 

 of coral-red or white flowers on axes glistening in the same tints. If a sepa 

 is large, or blood-red in colour, we are dealing with a Rlussaenda (.Asia 

 or a Warszewiczia (America). Certain Rubiaceae of the Javanese forest 

 have a highly repulsive but characteristic odour of excrement, for instanc 

 Lysianthus purpureus. Among shrubs or small trees may also readil 

 be found, in America, flowering specimens of Vochysiaceae, Malvacea 

 (Abutilon), Samydaceae (Casearia), Mutisiaceae (Stifftia), Solanaceae 

 Mimoseae (Inga, Calliandra), and the beautiful species of Brownia (Caesal 

 piniaceae) wath their bright red cauliflorous clusters of blossom. In tropic; 

 Eastern Asia, again, besides the types already mentioned, in particula 

 species of Anonaceae, Ternstroemiaceae (Saurauja) and Myrsineae (Ardisij 

 are conspicuous by their flowers, b}- which they can easily be determinec 

 But nearly always such species with abundant and beautiful blossoms are k 

 less numerous than those whose flowers are few or inconspicuous, as 

 the case amongst Urticaceae, Piperaccae. P^uphorbiaceae. One will als 

 find, especially at the height of the rainy season, verj' man}' shrubs an 

 small trees without either blossom or fruit. 



The herbaceous vegetation is very poorly developed in the darkest pa; 

 of the virgin forest ; in the better-lighted portions, however, it is ofte 

 surprisingly luxuriant. The Scitamineae are certainly its most prominer 

 representatives, not only because of their dimensions and their large brightl 

 coloured inflorescences, but also frequently because of their great abundanc 

 (Fig. 135). On the Lesser Antilles I frequently saw Heliconia Bihai, I- 

 caribaea, and other species taller than a man (Fig. 17S) and formin 

 a dense thicket with their long-stalked leaves, between which the larg 

 inflorescences projected with distichous, red keel-shaped bracts. Sti 

 more striking, and at all events more varied in their appearance, ar 

 in the East Indies, the Zingiberaceae, several genera of which, such i 

 Elettaria, Hedychium, Zingiber, Costus, Alpinia. and man}- species fori 

 little woods in the high-forest. Thus, in the forests of Java, one frequentl 

 sees dense expanses of such Zingiberaceae taller than a man, with the 

 stiff distichous shoots allowing no other vegetation to grow between, an 

 their strange inflorescences, like bright red cabbage-heads, as in Costi 

 globosus, Elettaria sp., or like fiery stars, as in Elettaria coccinea, restii: 

 with broad bases on the bare soil. 



It is in fact a frequent phenomenon in tropical virgin forest that a wic 



