AFRO-INDIAN REGIONS. 283 



an OmalantJivs? full as lofty, entered largely into the composition of 

 the forest; a tree, Terminalioid in its habit of growth, but the leaves 

 serrulate, was also abundant; a gen. Sopot., having Aegiceras like fruit, 

 was met with occasionally; also a lanceolate-leaved Calopliyllmn ; an 

 Uvaria seventy feet high ; and what surprised me, at this distance 

 from the coast, trees of Paritium tHiacenyn, intermingled singly and 

 hardly inferior in dimensions, certainly not less than sixty feet high. 



The above is but an imperfect list of the component trees : which 

 seemed as lofty as those of the primeval forest of Brazil, with more 

 shade, and the same upward tendency of the branches, carrying all 

 the foliage to a distance; but in place of enlivening gaudy f3owers, 

 either on the tree-tops or anywhere in the forest, the few flowers 

 present were either white, or inclining more or less to greenish. 

 Everywhere, the peculiarly Samoan tendency to the peltate form of 

 leaf or umbrella-like foliage, was abundantly manifest. 



From descriptions in books, I had been accustomed to regard the 

 FJcujeUaria as only a reedy plant; and was therefore astonished to see 

 the tallest forest-trees mantled, and even covered up by a single stock. 

 A climhing Piper in like manner overspread other tree-tops; and even 

 the climbing Freyci.netia, so profusely enveloping the trunks, sometimes 

 ascended to the extreme branches. I could discover no epidendric 

 Orchidaceas in the deep forest, and if present, they must have been 

 out of sight in the tree-tops; but on the dripping trunks, among other 

 investing plants, an lierhaceous Cyrtand raid was observed to be fairly 

 epidendric. 



Among the signs of increased luxuriance and productiveness, ji)o/?»6' 

 make their appearance : a tall Areca, seventy to eighty feet high, grow- 

 ing on a distant hillock, and differing from the cocoa-palm by its 

 hemispherical summit, the lower fronds extending, instead of down- 

 wards, horizontally outwards. 



Beneath the large forest-trees, were scattered trees of only medium 

 size ; as, different species of Ficns, and the two Myristicos already- 

 noticed ; also, young stocks of the large forest-trees in every stage of 

 development. — A set of woody plants was also intermingled, that 

 can hardly be regarded as either shrubs or trees; the stem being 

 extremely slender and perfectly upright, and at the height of twenty- 

 five or thirty feet, crowned witli a tuft of very large leaves, radiating 

 in some instances to the distance of three feet all around : or if there 

 are branches, these keep upright and closely parallel, and in like 



