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THE AMERICAN NATURALIST [Vol. XLIII 



strand forest, we pushed inland toward the south, not 

 without much exertion and perspiration. The unclouded 

 rays of an equatorial sun beat down pitilessly upon us, 

 and when, after struggling over blocks of pumice and 

 through thickets of tall grasses and bushes, we finally 

 reached a small grove of cocoanut palms, full of fruit, 

 we threw ourselves down on the ground under their grate- 

 ful shade and took a well-earned rest. No time was lost 

 in sending one of the natives up into a tree for green 

 nuts, which were thrown down and quickly opened, and 

 never did anything taste better than the cool, sparkling 

 cocoanut water after our exhausting inarch through the 

 fierce heat of the jungle. 



From the ship we had seen that the ravines on the 

 flank of the Kakata were filled with a dense growth of 

 trees, forming the beginning of a new forest, but it was 

 quite impossible to guess what the trees were. 1 We tried 

 to cross the open tract lying between the belt of forest 

 on the shore and the cone in the center of the island, but 

 we had to give up the attempt after penetrating some 

 distance inland, following the dry bed of a stream for 

 part of the way. The land was terribly rough and cov- 

 ered in many places with a dense jungle of grasses ten or 

 fifteen feet high, through which he had to hew a path with 

 the wieked-looking cutlasses which every Malay carries 

 when traveling. The way lay over steep ridges, which 

 grew worse and worse as we approached the cone, and 

 finally we realized that with the short time at our dis- 

 posal, and the limited means of cutting our way through 

 the jungle and scrub, we should have to give up the 

 attempt, which we did very reluctantly, and retraced our 

 steps to the shore, where we embarked for the ship. 



The monotony of the journey over the grass steppes in 

 the interior of the island was broken by encounters with 

 countless ants which built their nests everywhere, in the 

 crevices of the rocks, among the roots of the grasses and 

 shrubs, and even hanging from the branches of the 

 shrubs and trees ; and as we scrambled up the steep slopes 



