xvii AFZELIA BIJUGA 173 



mangrove- belt, or again thriving in the half sandy and half swampy 

 soil of some low islet off the mouth of the Rewa. Especially is 

 it to be found on those parts of the coast where the hill-slopes 

 descend rapidly to the beach, or where some lofty spur from the 

 mountains of the interior reaches the shore. It is also not un- 

 common on the banks of rivers both in their lower and upper 

 courses. But it is as a forest-tree of the interior that it is most 

 valued by both the white men and the natives on account of the 

 superior quality of its timber in that station. There, far removed 

 from stream or river, the Vesi, as the Fijians name Afzelia bijuga, 

 takes its place amongst the lofty forest-trees, such as the Ndamanu 

 (Calophyllum), the Ndakua (Dammara), and the Wathi-wathi 

 (Sterculia). It is not often that one finds a tree in these islands 

 that, like the Vesi, is able to make its home in almost any station, 

 excepting, however, the " talasinga " or " sun-burnt " regions of 

 the plains. Wherever tall trees grow gregariously in Vanua Levu, 

 one will probably find Afzelia bijuga, whether beside a sandy 

 beach, or bordering a swamp, or on a river's bank, or on some 

 rocky declivity, or on the great forest- clad mountain-slopes and 

 plateaux of the interior. No doubt the same diversity of station 

 is displayed in Samoa, where, according to Dr. Reinecke, the tree 

 is most frequent in the '• coast-bush." 



From the variety in station it might be expected that corre- 

 sponding variations in character would be found. There are differ- 

 ences, such as in the quality of the timber and in the size of the 

 seeds between coast and inland trees ; but the most important dis- 

 tinction in connection with the study of the dispersal of the species 

 is to be found in the circumstance that whilst the seeds of the 

 coast trees are, as a rule, buoyant, and often float for months, those of 

 the inland trees usually sink, even after being kept for three or four 

 years. I made a considerable number of experiments on the 

 buoyancy of the seeds of this tree in Vanua Levu, and found that 

 with the coast trees, as a rule, either all the seeds or the majority 

 of them floated in sea-water, whilst with the inland trees either all 

 of them or the majority of them sank. The buoyant seeds are 

 able in most cases to float for a long time. Thus, in one experi- 

 ment half were afloat after two months, and in another half were 

 afloat after five months. It is probable that several of the excep- 

 tions, where inland seeds float, will prove to be connected with an 

 inland station by a river. (I experimented on eight sets of seeds 

 of coast trees from eight different localities, and found 70 to be the 

 mean percentage of buoyant seeds. In the same way, four sets of 



