PROBLEMS OF TRANSPORTATION. 99 



you are at once astonished to see that they are of a kind 

 of which no representative may he found in all the atoll " 

 (italics ours). 



"It is a strange chapter in Nature's story, for these 

 seeds have been arriving at the atoll from time immemorial; 

 they have been cast on to its beaches by the waves, all 

 ready to grow, but unable to take root in the broken 

 coral that composes the beaches. A link in the chain is 

 missing ; for there is no bird or beast that will move them 

 the very short distance to the resting-place, where they 

 could tarn centuries of failure into a successful colonising 

 enterprise." 



A most interesting instance of the truth of these state- 

 ments is mentioned by Mr. Geo. Hirst in his " Notes 

 on the History of the Cayman Islands," but apropos oi 

 another subject. It appears that a Mrs. Webster, of 

 Frank Sound, about the year 1846, found on the beach, 

 washed up by the tide, a seed, the likes of which she had 

 never previously seen." This seed was planted. It 

 sprouted and grew into a tree, and the tree was 

 found to be an almond tree, of which species there 

 was not a single other example on the island. 

 Mr. Commissioner Hirst states that all the almond 

 trees now growing on Grand Ca3T2ian are descended 

 from this one seed. 



Again, one has only to read Mr. Guppy's Observations 

 of a NaturaHst in the Pacific " to become impressed with 

 the idea (right or wrong) that after all, the colonization of 

 plants in tropical islands through the agency of floating 

 seeds is confined to a comparatively very limited number 

 of species, and to a very narrow zone of territory extending 

 along the shore. Moreover, in these shore belts, there 

 is a sort of floral currency, which, to a great extent, passes 

 muster all the tropical world over. Thus, for instance, 

 one may easily recognize thereon, perhaps a dozen or more 

 trees and plants which may be seen on almost any tropical 

 beach in whatsoever ocean. These floral navigators 

 have hardly ever succeeded in pushing their advantage 



