THE TAIMORO TRIBE 273 



habitat. I have, however, noticed it at some distance from 

 water. 



Farther north along this coast there is a large proportion of 

 trees of considerable size, in addition to the pandanus and more 

 shrubby vegetation seen farther south. The latter also attain 

 a much greater height in the struggle to get up to the light 

 amongst the crowd of other trees. In one spot for some dis- 

 tance there wa^ ^o undergrowth, but " a pillared shade " of the 

 slender trunks of the pandanus, while high overhead their 

 graceful crowns of long saw-edged leaves made a canopy 

 impervious to the sun. Among the larger trees one called ataja 

 (Terminalia catappa) is prominent ; in these the branches strike 

 directly at right angles from the trunk and then spread away 

 horizontally for a considerable distance. The leaves are 

 spatula-shaped and from eight to ten inches long, and a large 

 proportion of them are always a ruddy brown or scarlet, giving 

 a blaze of colour. The tree is called also the " Indian almond," 

 and the kernel of the fruit is edible. While waiting for a canoe, 

 we walked two or three hundred yards towards the outlet of a 

 small river, and were startled by a crocodile only a few feet 

 in front of us, rousing himself from his nap in the setting sun- 

 shine, and waddling off into the river. 



About seventy miles north of the Matitanana river we came 

 to an extensive lagoon stretching northward for several miles 

 This appeared to be the first from the south of that remark- 

 able series bordering the shore and extending with but few 

 breaks nearly to Tamatave, a distance of two hundred and 

 sixty miles (see Chapter III.). Along the northern side of 

 this lagoon are masses of lava rock, some of it in enormous 

 blocks. 



We found here that we had reached another centre of pop- 

 ulation, an important settlement of the Taimoro tribe ; the 

 principal chief, a very fine tall man, came to see us, and was ex- 

 tremely polite and kind. We were amused to see his daughters, 

 two nice little girls, attended by all the other children of the 

 village, who were going through the peculiar monotonous 

 native singing with clapping of hands ; while these two girls 

 moved together slowly backwards and forwards, and with a 

 slow movement of their feet, and a graceful movement of the 

 hands, performed a native dance. They were strikingly different 



