330 VEGETATION- 



GOVERNORS HARBOR, ELBUTHERA. 



Landing in the town on the west side of the island, the first thing of 

 interest observed was a grove of Gasuarina trees under which were a great 

 number of their seedling plants. These seedlings were most abundant in 

 damp soil on the edge of a small, brackish marsh. They were the only young 

 Casuarinas that we saw during the trip. In only two other places had we 

 noticed that Oasuarina had established itself uncultivated. These were on 

 ISTew Providence, where one or two small trees were seen on the south beach 

 and near the margins of the salt marsh described in the treatment of that 

 island. 



Passing over the usual ridge through the center of the island, we found 

 on the eastern beach the best example of dunes that we met with in the Ba- 

 hamas. These dunes, the highest of which were about 40 feet above the sea, 

 are arranged in a broken series with slight depressions between them. They 

 slope landward to a low meadow of Oynodon dactylon (L.) Kuntze (Bermuda 

 grass), which passes easily into the rocky slope of the hills behind. The 

 beach at the foot of the dunes is covered at high-tide mark by an association 

 of TJniola paniculata L., Tournefortia gnaphalodes (.Jacq.) E. Br., Iva imbri- 

 cata Walt., and Cakile cequalis L'Her. Behind these is a fringe of tall Suriana 

 maritima L. with which is mixed a little Salmea petrobioides Griseb. and 

 Cenchrus tribuloides L. Cyperus hrunneus Sw., Cenchrus and Salmea, to- 

 gether with scattered individuals of Agave rigida Mill., cover the seaward 

 slope of the dunes and their outer ridges are occupied by TJniola paniculata L., 

 Cyperus brwrmeus Sw., and fine beds of Hymenocallis arenicola Forthrop. 

 The slight depression between the outer and inner ridges is filled with Setaria 

 glauca (L.) Scribn., CMoris petrcea Desv., Salmea petrobioides G-riseb., Agave 

 rigida Mill., and Hymenocallis arenicola Northrop, which is here even more 

 abundant than on the higher places. The tops of the inner ridges are covered 

 with CMoris petrcea Desv., Cyperus brunneus Sw., Strumpfia maritima Jacq., 

 Salmea 'petrobioides Griseb., Euphorbia buxifolia L., and the trailing Am- 

 brosia hispida Pursh. Urechites andrewsii (Chapm.) Small, here low, bushy 

 and scarcely trailing, is also rather abundant. The abrupt, landward slope 

 of the dunes is furnished with an open growth of Setaria glauca (L.) Scribn., 

 Cenchrus tribuloides L., Leptilon canadense (L.) Britton, and Malpighia 

 polytricha Juss. The latter is here very depauperate, and not over a foot and 

 a half high. 



The growth on the western slope of the central elevation is not of the 



