10 A NATURALIST'S WANDERINGS 



Bordering the stream is quite a little forest of oaks, laurels 

 and figs, many of them yet unknown to science, merging in a 

 long, dark, tunnel-like corridor of banyan trees. In a dense 

 clump affixed to tall tree ferns and Cambodias, whose white, 

 heavy-odoured flowers entirely carpeted the ground, were 

 thousands of orchids from all countries, most of them blossom- 

 ing as profusely as in their native habitat, except a few of 

 the higher and cooler-living New World species, such as the 

 Cattleyas, which gradually dwindle away and die out in a few 

 years. More strangelj"-, the native Phaloenopses (amabilis and 

 grandiflora) refuse to thrive in the gardens, 750 feet above 

 the sea, while in Batavia few plants flower so luxuriantly as 

 they do. 



On the left of the central walk there are two remarkable 

 avenues ; the one of stately Brazilian palms, the Oreodoxa 

 oleracea, whose globular base and smooth ringed stems, were as 

 straight and symmetrical as if turned in a lathe, and in their 

 whiteness contrasted markedly with the deep green of the leaf 

 sheaths and crown of foliage ; the other of bamboos, remarkable 

 for the number and luxuriance of its species. The curious root- 

 growing Rafflesias, the Amorpliophallus titanum, a giant arUm, 

 and the Teysmannia altifrons, a rare broad-leafed palm, from 

 Sumatra, and others as rare, which would require too long a list 

 to enumerate, were to be studied here. My daily morning 

 round of the garden invariably terminated in a seat under an 

 umbrageous india-rubber tree, in front of which a fountain 

 played into a circular pond dotted with blue and white flowers 

 of water-lilies and Victoria regias. In the sparkling light of 

 the early sun it was the most charming of spots for a rest. 



