Notes on Plants at Roraima. 153 
plete absence of the more ordinary forms and the sub- 
stitution within their limits of an entirely new and 
generally very distin6l set of species. These areas with 
a few localized species, of which several were passed by 
us on our way to Roraima, and still more these areas of 
quite distinct vegetation, of which the Kaieteur savan- 
nah, across which we passed, and still more Roraima 
itself, are remarkably fine examples, seem of the utmost 
botanical interest. 
A few notes must first be given of the species here 
described as localized. It must be remembered that 
these notes were made during a single walk, long as it 
was, through a country otherwise almost absolutely un" 
known ; so that though these species were noticed by 
me because I saw them either only in one spot or at 
least in very few spots — i.e. I passed through either only 
one distinct group or through very few such groups of 
them — yet it is of course impossible to assert that many 
other such distinct groups do not occur wherever the 
requisite soil and other circumstances permit. 
A considerable number of such localized species occur 
on tracts where the soil is of so peculiar a nature as to 
have earned a special name for such places from the 
Indians, who call them Eppellings. This name is applied 
by the Arekoonas to certain tracts in which the underly- 
ing substance of very soft sandstone is overlaid by a 
coating of hard dense and dry mud or, in some other 
cases, of hard conglomerate. Wherever, as is often the 
case, this hard mud surface is unbroken it resembles an 
asphalt pavement, or perhaps rather a floor made of 
hard-beaten earth. But this curious earth-surface over- 
lies hill and dale alike, and is therefore not often level. 
u 
