7 



being fertilized later by any hawk-moth which might visit it in the 

 evening. The mere opening of the flower too early in the day 

 prevents its producing fruit. 



Many herbaceous plants especially the European cultivated 

 annuals, such as Zinneas, Helianthi, Tagetes fruit regularly and 

 abundantly the first year, their offspring are inferior in strength, 

 and dull in colouring, with often smaller flowers, or capitula, and 

 fruiting more and more feebly each year soon die out. The climate 

 seems to have a deteriorating effect on them. 



Plants which have long been cultivated from cuttings seem also to 

 lose their reproductive functions. Justicia Gendaruzza, is cultivated 

 to a small extent in all native villages and constantly flowers, but 

 its fruit seems to be quite unknown. Pogostemon cablin, the 

 Patchouli cultivated abundantly, very rarely flowers and has never 

 so far as I know been known to fruit. The Indigo cultivated all over 

 Singapore from cuttings, though flowering abundantly never seems 

 to set seed. The Lemon-grass, Andropogon citrdtus, and a species 

 of PandanuSj commonly cultivated all over the East for its leaves 

 used to flavour rice, have never been known to flower. 



Uvaria purpurea, a native of Singapore and various parts of 

 the Peninsula has long been cultivated in the Gardens and is always 

 in flower, yet it has only produced two or three fruits, while an 

 exotic species from Saigon, fruits annually. It seems, however, not 

 uncommon for a shrub or tree to fruit more heavily in a new country 

 than in its own. Dichopsis Gutta, for instance, flowers and fruits 

 comparatively rarely in the Peninsula, but in Java we are informed 

 it flowers and fruits abundantly. Many of the forest trees, too, fruit 

 naturally very rarely, Homalium grandiflorum flowers very rarely, 

 a tree in the Botanic Gardens has only flowered once in 18 years, 

 and though it then flowered heavily I was unable to find a single 

 fertile fruit on it. Most of the Diptercarpex fruit but once in five 

 years. 



A certain number of the forest trees and shrubs are very regular 

 in flowering and fruiting, some having two annual flowerings, but a 

 number must certainly flower at very rare intervals, for of many by 

 no means rare plants I have never been able to find flowers, notably 

 among the Laurineoe. 



Many exotic shrubs, however, flower and fruit regularly, and in a 

 few cases have quite established themselves in the country. Napo- 

 leona imperialism of West Africa, Cryptostegia madagascariensis , 

 Strophanthus kispidus, the Gustavias of Brazil, Duranta Plumiari 

 Franciscea exirnia, Diospyros discolor \ and very many others repro- 

 duce themselves with great regularity. Lantana mixta and Mimosa 

 sepiaria, Clitonia cajanifolia are quite established here. 



Imported shrubs. — Most exotic shrubs which grow at all or survive 

 the climate for any length of time flower sooner or later, some, such 

 as Camellias, flower on the old wood shortly after importation, once 

 or perhaps on the second year, then cease to flower though they 

 may live and grow slowly for many years. The flower buds which 



