96 VOYAGE FROM INDIA TO SIAM AND ]\rALACCA. 



Sunday. An English ship arrived here yesterday; it is bound for 

 China, but. it is doubtful whether it will accomplish this journey 

 because the change of the monsoon in the Chinese sea is so 

 near. 



The fruits of the Ci/sio Md!dccenM, which are called karamun- 

 tin here, were being- sold in the streets ; they have a sweetish- 

 sour agreeable taste and are filled with many seeds. They are 

 smaller than the common European plums and more eg'gshaped 

 and preserve their calyx. The surface which is really red, 

 looks white on account of a woolly substance covering it ; the 

 juice is red. It is considered an excellent remedy against 

 dy sentry and is given to the invalids to cure them of this 

 illness. 



20. — I botanized on the high hill, which lies a cannon- 

 shot from the town in the south east, and which is generally 

 called Bukit-Ohina by the Malays, because the Chinese bury 

 their dead here. It is higher than the Paulus mountain inside 

 the fortress, is long stretched, and slopes off towards the south. 

 It consists of red mountain mould and various porous red tufa- 

 ceous stone. The mountain is quite bare now ; formerly it was 

 covered with shrubs, specially with Melastoma Jistus Malaccensis, 

 Sufa-Itadja JRumpJiii, Cassia alata, etc ; i ow there were only small 

 plants, among them a beautiful Polygala with red or white 

 blossoms, a new Stedyotis Leonurns tartarica Teylonica, Cassia 

 lliora, etc. On the opposite side is a large swamp ; in it I found 

 many thmgs interesting for botany. All five spec, of Utriculariis 

 grew here often, and both my new plants, one of which 1 

 believed to be a Gyiunuhist. I found that they had only female 

 blossoms at the top, and that the male ones grew lower down. 

 The detailed description is in Lit. A. pag. 13. 



Xepenthes Cissus, Smilox, Cattuhrus, a kind of Opldoryza 

 were specimens for my Malacca Chloris, with which I shall be 

 busy during the following days. 



23. — During the last few days I was very busy with the 

 plants, which I found on the 20th. To-day I hired a man who 

 was to show me a real shrub of the Bais de Madre de Deus 

 We went to the forest for this purpose, and found the first 

 shrub half a mile from the town. It was a real 6^/;?c//»m ; the 

 leaves were large, orbicular and ended in a point. The upper 

 side is somewhat rough, the lower side is woolly. The thorns 



