The Zoologist— November, 1867. 981 



molten lava. Down these hills streams of water have poured during 

 the brief and uncertain wet season, forming water-courses which run 

 between the rounded knolls, which look like roches monlonnes at the 

 base, and intersect the lava-fields clown to the beach. Other hills are 

 hollow and crateriform, the sides formed of loose masses of slag or 

 clinker of various sizes. Up one of these I clambered, and found the 

 interior deep and cup-shaped, but incomplete or one-sided, the bottom 

 being a small level deposit of mud and sand, produced by the washings 

 of the cinders in wet weather : among these cinders I found several 

 fragments of exploded volcanic bombs, such as are described and 

 figured by Mr. Darwin in his notice of the island. 



From this elevation the view was most striking : a deep and broad 

 rocky valley in the fore ground, covered with screaming sea-fowl, 

 beyond which arose an irregular series of naked and desolate conical 

 hills piled one above another in chaotic confusion, but surmounted by 

 the verdant and fertile heights of Green Mountain, upon which may 

 be descried trees, meadows and pastures, like; the delectable mountains 

 seen afar off by the pilgrims. 



It must not be supposed, however, that the surface of the island 

 is absolutely without vegetation. The cinders in many places are 

 incrusted with white and gray lichens (Parmelia and Roscella), and 

 I also observed a deep green incrusting lichen on the sea-shore. 

 Many spots also, in the water-courses, are quite cheerful with patches 

 of bright green, and several flowers spring up here and there which 

 have escaped from the gardens on Green Mountain. I was informed 

 that some person had been in the habit of scattering seeds over various 

 parts of the island. I noticed two species of grasses, a Sonchus, an 

 Aster with scented leaves, &c. The most common plants, however, 

 were the castor-oil (Riciiius), a very handsome j'ellow poppy with 

 prickly white-veined leaves, and a large-flowered plant which is known 

 on the island as the Madagascar rose, and is reported to have been 

 imported from thence. 



Among this vegetation a few insects occur : large red-winged locusts 

 fly about among the rocks, and a fat black cricket is common — I also 

 saw a pale brown one, but could not catch it. A little moth (a species 

 of Pyramidella), very prettily marked, is common wherever the succu- 

 lent plant above mentioned occurred, and flew about among the rocks, 

 settling for a moment and then taking wing again, unless it happened 

 to get in the shelter of a crevice in the honeycomb of a cinder, where 

 it seemed to consider itself safe. A somewhat larger pale brown moth 



