418 NATURE'S GIFTS TO MAN. 



pally of the lissus, a species of vine peculiar to tropical countries. 

 It was discovered by Dr. Arnold, while in attendance upon Sir Stam- 

 ford Raffles, Governor of Java. It produces only a fleshy flower, of 

 a wine-like colour, with an intolerably disgusting odour ; but it 

 acquires extraordinary, and one might say monstrous dimensions, for 

 "it seldom measures less than a yard in diameter, and its weight fre- 

 quently exceeds four pounds. 



Upon the humid coasts of Borneo and Sumatra, the Casuarinas 

 mingle their weeping branches with those of the mangroves and fig- 

 trees. Palms are common in these two great islands, as well as at 

 Ceylon and at Java. I may mention among the most useful the Nipa 

 fruticans and the Sugar Palm (Areca saccharifera). The transformed 

 leaves which accompany the inflorescence of the Nipa are brimful of a 

 sugared and effervescent liquid, which is extracted by pressure, and 

 converted into a palm wine of indifferent quality, consumed in great 

 quantities in the Sunda Archipelago. A very sweet liquid, a species of 

 syrup fit for the confection of dainty sweetmeats, escapes from inci- 

 sions made into the floral envelopes of the Areca saccharifera. A 

 tree-wax, analogous to that of the Croton sebiferum, is furnished by 

 the tree which the natives of Borneo designate Pallagrar-Minjok (Dip- 

 terocarpus trinervis). And, finally, it is at Borneo and at Sumatra 

 we meet with the Dryobabanops camphora, whence is procured a 

 species of camphor preferred by the Chinese to that of the Lauras 

 camphora; the Urceola elastica, whose milky sap indurates into a 

 kind of caoutchouc, called Suitawan ; and the Isonandra-Percha 

 (genus Bassia butyracea, family of the Sapotacese), which of recent 

 years has become the staple of an extensive commerce. It is from 

 this tree we obtain the valuable product of gutta-percha, which has 

 received such various and ingenious applications, and is scarcely less 

 useful in the arts than in the sciences. 



Java is perhaps the most fertile of the Sunda Islands. Immense 

 forests extend over its plains, and climb up its mountain-slopes to an 

 elevation of upwards of 6500 feet. The damp localities are peopled 

 with Clusiacese, and with other trees of thick soft trunks and 



