458 



SUMATRA'S WEST COAST 



bamboo, some .of tbe shoots of which, although eighty feet or 

 more in height, were evidently newly grown, with leaves still 

 immature. I shook one of these young shoots lightly Avith my 

 hands, and, to my surprise, the whole top, fifteen feet or more 

 in length, snapped off, and, falling at my feet, was broken into 

 a half dozen fragments. Few experiences could give one a better 

 idea of the rapid growth of plants in the tropics than this — 

 growing like a giant asparagus shoot at the rate of a foot or more 

 a da} 7 , in a short three months it is a tree of the forest towering 

 above the tops of many centuiy-old monarchs, and yet, after all. 

 it is botanicall} 7 nothing but a grass. 



Though acquainted with the luxuriance of vegetation for which 

 Java is justly celebrated, [ was little prepared for the overwhelm- 

 ing exuberance of growth around Padang Pandjang, and when 

 the time came for us to leave I was almost ready to abandon the 

 enticing trip already promised me by my friend in favor of a 

 little longer sojourn amid its beauties. 



Fort de Kock, our next stopping-place — 940 meters above the 

 sea — is known all over the Dutch East Indies as a sanitarium 



iW OF SU.MATRAN HOUSES NKAII KOIIT UK KOCK, SHOWING CURIOUS GABLES 



