44 8 A NATURALIST IN THE PACIFIC chap. 



others, again, being typical seedlings of R. mucronata. Only those 

 seedlings, or " keimlings " as we might term them, were noted that 

 had dropped plumb from the branches above. 



Such were the results of my investigations on Vanua Levu. 

 My field of inquiry was then shifted to the Rewa delta, where, with 

 the assistance of the Daku natives, who, like most Fijians, display a 

 keen interest in matters relating to their plants, I spent a few days 

 in investigating the origin of the Selala trees that grow sporadically 

 in that locality. On pulling up some of the young trees we found 

 that the original radicular or hypocotyledonary portion of the 

 keimling could be still distinguished. My zealous native friends 

 also pointed out to me that though the leaves in form and colour 

 were those of the Selala, the rootstock was reddish like that of 

 R. mucronata, and not white as with R. mangle. The natives 

 averred that the Selala trees are produced in the first place from 

 fruits of R. mucronata. When young, they said, they are Tiri- 

 tambuas (R. mucronata), but when old, Selalas. Yet although 

 R. mucronata may be now regarded as the source of the Selala 

 trees, and my Vanua Levu observations pointed unmistakably in 

 this direction, it could not be definitely settled whether this was the 

 result of a cross with the male element of R. mangle or whether the 

 Tiri-tambua (R. mucronata), in producing two types of seedlings, 

 one fertile with the parent characters and the other seedless of the 

 Selala type, brought about the same end. On the whole I am 

 inclined to the view that the Asiatic Rhizophora presents us in the 

 dimorphism of its seedlings the true explanation. 



This inference is supported by the behaviour of Rhizophora 

 mangle on the coast of Ecuador, a subject which is discussed in 

 Chapter XXXII, and I have given the results of my observations 

 on the Ecuadorian Rhizophoras side by side with those on the 

 Fijian trees in the table before given. There are two very distinct 

 forms of the American Rhizophora (R. mangle) in the swamps of 

 Ecuador. There is the low coast tree, the " Mangle chico " of the 

 Ecuadorians, ten to fifteen feet in average height, which grows on 

 the sea- front of the swamps and has all the general appearance and 

 the more conspicuous characters of the American Rhizophora in 

 Fiji. There is also a tall tree, 60, 80, or even 100 feet high, 

 that forms the great mass of the mangrove swamps. In its 

 inflorescence, in the dark green colour of its foliage, and in other 

 characters, it comes near the Fijian Selala ; but it differs in fruiting 

 abundantly. This is locally termed the " Mangle grande," and its 

 true relation to the Fijian Selala appears to be as follows. Whilst 



