322 A NATURALIST IN THE PACIFIC chap. 



bananas. It is to Acrulocercus, one of the Hawaiian genera of the 

 Meliphagidee, that Mr. Perkins refers me, on my asking him to 

 name some of the fruit-eaters in that group. 



These climbing shrubs, as Dr. Warburg observes, mostly fre- 

 quent the tropical forests up to 4,000 feet and over. Though their 

 most familiar habit is as tree-climbers in the forests, in localities 

 where there are no trees they adopt a trailing habit and cover 

 mountain peaks and ridges with a dense growth to the exclusion of 

 almost all other plants. Many a peak in the Pacific islands would 

 be inaccessible if it were not for the dense growth of these plants 

 on their precipitous sides. It was owing to the friendly aid of 

 a tangled mass of Freycinetia stems that Lieutenant Heming and 

 myself were able to clamber to the summit of Fauro Island 

 (1,900 feet) in the Solomon Group, where I discovered a tree that 

 under the name of Sararanga forms the type of the third genus of 

 the Pandanaceae. 



Whilst describing their station, it will be of interest to also 

 record the altitudes at which these plants have been observed in 

 the tropical Pacific. Since they can be independent of trees and 

 are as much at home on treeless rocky peaks and mountain crests, 

 the upper limit would usually be determined by climatic conditions, 

 abundance of rain and great humidity being the chief requisites ; 

 but, as will be seen below this limit, does not seem to be reached in 

 the tropical islands of the South Pacific except perhaps in Tahiti. 

 In the Fijis the Freycinetias ascend to the highest mountain peaks. 

 Thus, three of the species discovered here by Seemann were found 

 at elevations of about 4,000 feet on Voma Peak in Viti Levu and 

 in the highlands of Taviuni. In Vanua Levu, as I found, they 

 cover the highest peaks 3,500 feet above the sea. They are espe- 

 cially abundant on the lofty mountain ridges, and clothe the higher 

 slopes of the Mbatini Ridge which terminates in the highest peak 

 of the island. In no locality did I find them growing in such 

 densely tangled masses as on the long ridge-like crest that forms 

 the upper part of Mount Freeland, 2,740 feet above the sea. For 

 more than an hour in order to reach the summit I had to clamber 

 along the crest of a ridge covered with a dense growth several feet 

 deep of these trailing plants, without touching the ground beneath. 



In Samoa, as we learn from Reinecke, Freycinetias are common 

 on the mountain ridges, climbing the trees and forming also a 

 dense undergrowth covering the ground and concealing the rocks. 

 They occur at all levels from 1,000 feet above the sea up to the 

 highest region of Savaii, rather over 5,000 feet in elevation. In 



