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The Philippine Journal of Science 
1920 
gregariously inland, where it sometimes almost exclusively oc- 
cupies considerable areas, as I have personally observed in Ha- 
waii. The reasons for its cultivation on some Polynesian islands 
were undoubtedly that it was the best, or one of the best, of 
the few fiber plants available to the primitive Polynesians, and 
that the number of plants growing naturally along the strand 
was not sufficient to supply the demands for fibers for all pur- 
poses. Hibiscus tiliaceus was never domesticated or even semi- 
domesticated in tropical America and in the Indo-Malayan 
region, for the reason that plants producing better fibers were 
available in both regions. 
I maintain on purely botanical evidence that Hibiscus tiliaceus 
is a species of natural pantropic distribution; that it grows in 
practically all tropical countries along the seashore, its natural 
habitat ; and that it has been disseminated in ages past by ocean 
currents. Its seeds are beautifully adapted to dissemination 
by floating for, although small, they are provided with a smooth 
impervious testa, and float for many months without sinking. 
In fact, no one has as yet recorded his ability to cause them to 
sink naturally, investigators being satisfied from experimenta- 
tion with the statement that they “float for months.” 
Even in Polynesia it is exceedingly doubtful if the Polynesians 
transmitted this species from island to island, it being far more 
probable that they purposely propagated it inland from the 
native seacoast stock on the various islands. From personal 
experience over a period of more than eighteen years I am 
familiar with the entire Philippine group from northern Luzon 
to southern Mindanao, and have observed that throughout these 
islands Hibiscus tiliaceus is a characteristic species of the sea- 
shore, often being the dominant, or one of the dominant, species 
on the strand ; it occurs not only on beaches contiguous to thickly 
settled areas but also on isolated and sparsely populated coasts, 
and on uninhabited islands and islets. From what I know of 
the Indo-Malayan region generally I am confident that the species 
occurs similarly on the tens of thousands of miles of coast line 
throughout tropical Asia, Africa, Malaya, tropical Australia, 
and many islands of the Pacific, as I have personally observed 
it in the Philippines and in the Marianne Islands. There can 
scarcely be any arguments as to other than its natural pantropic 
distribution, and claims to the contrary would appear to be not 
in conformity with the known facts regarding its occurrence and 
distribution in nature. 
