266 PITCHER PLANT. 



banks of the rivers, or in the interior of the forest. The 

 Nepenthes has been frequently and well described, but as 

 I have seen it growing in dense masses, in every stage of 

 developement, a short notice of this very remarkable plant 

 may not be found uninteresting. Besides the N. destil- 

 latoria I have observed another species, particularly com- 

 mon on the Island of Moarra, near the mouth of the river 

 of Borneo. This kind has narrower leaves, is a smaller 

 plant, but climbs in the same manner, and has small, 

 long, narrow pitchers. Both species are slender twining 

 plants, chiefly supported by the shrubs that grow around 

 by the twisting of the stalks of the pitchers. The flowers 

 are simple perianths, consisting of four sepals, of a brick- 

 red colour, with a yellow stigma, arranged in terminal 

 spikes, which grow upright and crown the summit of the 

 plant. The young plants have only the round, gib- 

 bose, and fringed pitchers. There are two kinds of 

 pitchers in each species, one growing at some distance 

 from the ground, which is long, slender, and usually 

 green, or marbled, spotted at the mouth only, and fur- 

 nished with a very long foot-stalk; the other kind is 

 formed of the lower leaves, and is generally placed upon 

 or near the surface of the ground. These latter Monkey- 

 cups, as the Malays term them, are most generally half- 

 full of insects, chiefly ants. The pitchers, when full- 

 grown, almost invariably contain fluid, in different 

 proportions. In some cups there is nearly an ounce, in 

 others only a few drachms. Many of them contain 

 insects, which if not killed, find it difficult to escape out 

 of the limpid and musilaginous liquid. In one pitcher 

 I found five crickets, hundreds of small ants, mostly dead, 



