8 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, 1892. 
to the well-water.* The island is sacred to a Pir whose tomb, 
Mr. Eobinson was told, has about 200 coco-nut trees planted round 
it as votive offerings to his name. Mr. Hume speaks of the coco-nut 
trees but does not mention the tomb. It stands, Dr. Alcock informs 
the writer, near the north end of the island in the middle of the 
Coco-nut grove, surrounded also by patches of one of the Tiilsi 
plants. An indication that the island is often visited is the presence 
in the Investigator collection of specimens of Ricinus communis 
which is frequent as a weed. Besides the Castor-Oil, the Tulsi, and 
the Coco-nut, the collections of Mr. Hume and Dr. Alcock contain 
16 species, all but three of which are undoubtedly plants of the 
littoral, sea-introduced class. It is important to note that the 
Coco-nut does not occur in a fringe round the coast as would probably 
be the case were that species here introduced by the sea ; besides 
their being confined to the middle of the island we have the express 
statement of the islanders to Mr. Robinson that the trees were 
deliberately planted during their fishing and egg-collecting visits. 
The most interesting species on the island is Pisonia alba, here 
clearly sea-introduced, which has not been reported from any other 
member of the group, and has never indeed been found growing 
undoubtedly wild either in India or in Ceylon. 
To the south and a little west of Bitrapar, in Lon. 72° E. and Lat. 
11° 10' N., is situated the third open reef of Pirmalpar which has 
been visited by Mr. Hume, who describes it f as a huge triangular 
atoll with only one small bank, at the north-east corner, about 200 
yards long and 50 yards across, uncovered at high water but with 
the greater portion of the reef visible at low tide. The islet—which 
derives its name of Pirmalla from a tradition of the people that their 
ancestors, the original settlers in the archipelago, formed part of an 
expedition which set out from Malayala (the Malabar coast) for 
Mecca in search of their apostate King Barman Pirmal, but was 
wrecked in these islands J—is not composed, like those on the Cher- 
baniani reef, of accumulations of coral debris, but is a bare, smooth. 
* Eobinson, “ Madr. Journ.” vol. xiv., p. 27. 
t “ Stray Feathers,” vol. iv., p. 450. 
J Robinson, “ Madr. Journ.,” vol. xiv., p. 8. 
808 
