SEIFRIZ: PLANTS ON MT. GEDEH, JAVA 293 
are still present and of great size. One repeatedly stops to ad- 
mire the huge, tall, straight trunks of these superb giants of the 
mountain forest. 
The small trees of the second subzone include Meliosma 
nervosa, Elaeocarpus Acronodia (and four other species of this 
genus), Michelia montana of the magnolia family, Macropanax 
dispermum of the Araliaceae, and Pygeum latifolium, a rosaceous 
tree (PLATE 16, FIG. 2). 
Lianes are abundant. A conspicuous climber is the spiny 
Fagara scandens, one of the Rutaceae. The huge stubby spines 
' tipped with sharp thorns give to this vine a vicious appearance. 
Isolated specimens of the climbing aroid Epipremnum pinnatum 
are met wit 
Of ebiphytes. the beautiful bard snest fern, Asplenium nidus, 
still flourishes. The climbing 1 epiphyte Freycinetia 
is first met here. The smaller epiphytes of this second subzone 
are chiefly orchids, ferns and mosses. An attractive orchid 
frequently seen in Schoenorchis juncifolia, with long, drooping 
stems and spindling, awl-shaped leaves, resembling a Freycinetia 
in miniature. 
The forest floor assumes quite a different aspect in the 
second subzone owing to a greater abundance of light. Tropical 
forests are not as dark as most people who have never visited 
them believe; indeed, more light penetrates a tropical mountain 
rain-forest than enters a temperate closed deciduous forest, 
and a great deal more than reaches the ground in a Maine pine 
wood. The forest canopy of the second subzone is an open one. 
Trees are fewer than in the first subzone and the undergrowth 
flourishes proportionately better. 
The rattan and Pinango palms are more numerous here at 
6,000 feet than they were a thousand feet lower. Numerous 
species of Zingiberaceae are present. The two first subzone 
gingers, Amomum and Phaeomeria solaris, are still frequently 
met with. The coarse weed, Cyrtandra repens, with large, white, 
tubular flowers is widely spread in this as it is in the two ad- 
joining subzones. 
Terrestrial ferns grow in great luxuriance (PLATE 16, FIG. 2). 
Polypodium nigrescens is an interesting example which immedi- 
ately attracts attention not only because of itshuge, coarse fronds- 
but because of the exceedingly prominent sori which, when seen 
