eam, probably during the inundations of the rainy season.
These floods must also spread over the low land on the margin of the
river to a considerable distance, the deep red clay there, evidently the
washings of the hills, bearing the marks of having been under water. The
jungle in places is very dense, but, with the exercise of a little
patience and labour, it can be penetrated at almost every point. On
rising ground it is often bordered by a thicket of creeping and climbing
plants mixed up with bushes and patches of Hellenia coerulea. The low
wooded hills are covered with tall grass growing on very poor soil--of
partially decomposed mica-slate with lumps of quartz.

It being considered practicable to water the ship at this place, we
returned on board. In the afternoon the first load of water was brought
off, and in the course of the week we procured 78 tons with less trouble
than had been anticipated. I afterwards repeatedly visited the
watering-creek, and a brief account of the productions of its
neighbourhood may here be given as a popular contribution to the natural
history of the little-known Louisiade Archipelago.

The rock is scarcely ever exposed on the banks of the river except at the
rapid before alluded to. Though still mica-slate, it is there of much
greater hardness and denser texture than on Pig and Round Islands, and
stretches across the stream like a dyke, running nearly north and south
with a westerly dip of about 60 degrees. Elsewhere, along the shores of
Coral Haven, this mica-slate is of a leaden hue and glistening lustre,
yielding to the nail, with a slight greasy feel, especially in some
pieces of a shining ash-grey, acted upon by salt-water. From hand
specimens alone it is difficult to assign a name to this rock, as it
partakes more or less of the characters of mica, chlorite, and
talc-schists.

PLANTS.

Among the botanical productions Nepenthes destillatoria, the famous
pitcher-plant of the East, deserves mention. It grows abundantly among
the tall grass on the skirts of the jungle, and the pitchers invariably
contained a small quantity of limpid fluid of a slightly sweetish taste,
with small insects floating on its surface. The finest of the tree-ferns
(Hemitelium) grew alone near the watering-place, and was cut down to
furnish specimens. The trunk measured fifteen feet in height, with a
diameter at the base of eight inches.

ANIMALS.

No mammalia were procured on South-east Island--inde