124 



small. This would explain that in the first years in the interior espe- 

 cially such higher plants rapidly multiplied whose flowers are 

 pollinated by the wind (the 5 grasses) or are frequently autogamous 

 (the 3 orchids and the 5 Compositae) and which moreover possess 

 seeds or fruits which may be easily spread over land by the wind 

 or by rain-water flowing down. On this point there exists however 

 no certainty for we know absolutely nothing of the vegetation of the 

 higher parts of the mountain in those years. 



No. 15, A/bizzia chinensis, is a tree which in the plains often in- 

 habits river-sides. Its pods or the fragments of these possess floating 

 power; therefore this species, if it has really been found, might, as 

 P e n z i g supposes, have been carried to Krakatao by sea-currents. 



Remains Ficus toxicaria, which, in spite of its ominous name, is 

 not toxical at all. The figs of many Javanese species of Ficus are 

 sought after by birds and frugivorous bats. It is certain that in Java 

 Ficus hispida and F. septica are spread by such bats; they often 

 spring up under the margin of penthouses which serve to these ani- 

 mals as a resting-place and beneath which one very frequently finds 

 the dropped remnants of figs carried over by them from elsewhere. 

 Possibly the big figs of Ficus toxicaria also are eaten by birds or 

 bats. But this may not be considered proof that these animals have 

 introduced the species into the island, as long as it has not been 

 observed, that they, after having eaten the fruit on any other island, 

 fly over to Krakatao and drop the seeds there. On the very acci- 

 dented island, many parts of which are most difficultly accessible 

 and whose flora always was but very imperfectly known, such obser- 

 vations could hardly be made. But as long as they have not been 

 made, the supposition that in this manner plants have been introduced 

 by animals, remains a mere guess, nothing more, and certainly no 

 proof for such an introduction across a broad sea-arm. 



The results of the excursion of 1897 are summarized by Penzig 

 in 3 conclusions: 



/. The islands which in 1883 were completely deprived of their 

 vegetation, receive but very slowly a new flora. The total 

 number of the vascular plants observed is not yet trebled 

 in /0'/2 years (on Krakatao in June 1886 26 species, in March 

 1897 52 1 ), hence double the number of species; 62 on the 

 entire group). 



') Including the 5 species collected in 1886 by Treub but not found back in 

 1897. See p. 119, 120. 



