28 



PLATE VII. 



UALAN. 



VEGETATION OF A VALLEY, AND OUTSKIRTS OF FOREST. 



December. 



On ascending another step, where there are no longer any periodical inundations, 

 the vegetation assumes a new feature. The level land of the valleys has 

 been brought into a certain state of cultivation, being planted, without previous 

 labour, with those products of the island which principally furnish food to man. 

 These plantations are so much favoured by the extreme fertility of the heavy soil, 

 for the irrigation of which Nature so liberally provides, that they interfere little 

 with the original aspect of the island. Bread-fruit trees, bananas, two gigantic 

 species of Caladium, and the Tahitian sugar-cane, grow here so intermingled that 

 there is some difficulty in determining whether there has been an arbitrary trans- 

 plantation or not, especially as most of these plants readily propagate themselves 

 by suckers, it being generally quite sufficient to put a slip, just torn off the parent 

 plant, into the fertile ground, in order to propagate it. We observed only in one 

 kind of plantation a certain arrangement, properly defined field, and on the whole 

 a greater amount of care ; it being that of the above-mentioned sugar-cane, which, 

 however, is seen in great abundance, perhaps naturalised, amongst other plants. The 

 cocoa-nut palm deserves particular mention, although not very common, and to all 

 appearance not indigenous in the island, but introduced by man, and still kept in 

 a state of culture. One would be inclined to suppose the same with regard to the 

 bread-fruit trees, abundant though they be, as we did not see amongst the nume- 

 rous fruits a single one having properly developed seeds. This seems to point to a 

 change brought about by cultivation ; but the irregular manner in which the trees 

 occur in the forests looks as if they had been dispersed by Nature's hand, and 

 argues against the supposition. Is the fruit of the wild trees really furnished with 

 seeds, and is it only eaten when necessity demands ? We did not remain long 



