158 
WILLTS AND GARDINER : BOTANY 
banks of rivers to preserve them. At last when its roots 
are completely submerged, as off Turadu, it too dies, but 
even here it must have been in this condition for some 
three or four years, so that the process is slow. 
Of other trees the cocoanut lives with the waves washing 
all round it at each tide until it falls. Some considerable 
portion of its root mass must always be above the water. 
When grown in a rocky soil it bears about three times as 
well as in a sandy one, and has larger nuts. On new rocky 
islands it flourishes at once, and bears in eight years, but on 
sandy ones its growth is very slow and it takes about 
twenty years to come into bearing. The best place for it is 
the junction of the two sub-strata. Sea-borne cocoanuts 
are usually bored into and destroyed by the shore and other 
crabs. Pandanus does not appear readily on any rocky or 
sandy bank. It is almost certainly sea-borne, and its 
segments may very probably be dragged out of the reach 
of the waves by the crabs. On an eroding coast as the sea 
approaches root after root is killed until the whole goes. 
In general it flourishes best on sand rather than rock. 
It very quickly appears in clumps on old grain land, and in 
places this is a perfect jungle of its stems and roots. This 
again may be attributed to rats and crabs. Of large trees 
the banyans do not like salt water, and as with Pandanus 
root after root dies and the whole tree goes when the centre 
root is reached. Bread-fruit goes still more quickly, but 
Calophyllum and Barringtonia will continue to flourish 
until absolutely washed by the waves. Even then their 
dead trunks continue to be conspicuous features of the 
beach, as for instance on Mamaduwari, S. Mahlos. 
Mangroves are not well represented as a formation in the 
islands. On new sandbanks or on true outer beaches they 
are never found. They flourish at the heads of deep bays, 
or on the inner shores of crescent-shaped islands. Where, 
as in Ehasdu, Landu, and Fendikolu, Miladumadulu, they 
are found round pools and lakes, it seems probable that they 
