SUMATRA'S WEST COAST 



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approached, the tall gray marble cliffs rose perpendicularly before 

 us to a height of 200 or 300 meters ; on either side, like silken 

 threads, we counted fifteen waterfalls tumbling down from the 

 table land above. The niches and crevices of this gray marble 

 formed footholds for the most varied of tropical plants, and these 

 in their growth covered great patches with luxuriant verdure or 

 brilliant coloring. Bathed in spray from the waterfalls, there 

 were countless tropical ferns and lichens, algae, liverworts, and 

 mosses. Through the gorge, at places not more than 70 feet 

 wide, flowed a stream of clear water, its banks and bed clothed 

 with insectivorous water plants and overhung with flowering 

 shrubs and rank growing grasses and sedges. The fall of Batang- 

 Harau suggests by its height and volume the Staubbach near 

 Lauterbrunnen,but at its foot is a mass of moss and fern-covered, 

 boulders instead of the barren shale, worn by tourists' feet. In- 

 stead of the flower-covered carpet of the Alps the narrow valley 

 was filled with palms, rank grasses, small rubber trees, and a 

 host of strange shrubs and flowering plants, among them curious 

 melastomas and a large orange-fruited fig which decorated the 



SUMATRVN MESSIGIT OR TEMPLE, WITH PRIEST IX FOREGROUND — PA JO KOMBO 



