owards
the end of the year it is covered with orange blossoms, which finally
develop into a somewhat acid fruit. In the country the dwellings of the
Javan peasants are almost universally surrounded by palms, bananas, and
bamboos. While the palms and bananas supply the native with fruit, from
the bamboo he has learnt to make numberless useful articles, ranging
from a house or a boat to a drinking-vessel or a musical instrument.
Cooking-utensils, baskets, hats, and all manner of tools are constructed
out of the material provided by this useful tree. While I was staying at
a friend's house at Weltevreden I had a singular illustration of the
variety of uses to which the bamboo could be put by observing the method
of cutting the grass adopted by a native gardener. He was squatting on
the ground, and had by his side about half a dozen sections into which
he had split some bamboo rods about two feet in length. These he rapidly
passed over the grass backwards and forwards with a semicircular sweep,
and their sharp edges mowed the grass down as cleanly as the blade of a
scythe. In this way he cleared a space around him, and, gradually
advancing, eventually trimmed off the whole plot of grass.

The tropical forests, again, are characterized by a remarkable
uniformity and sombreness which gives them an aspect quite unlike that
of European woods. The vast cylindrical trunks of the great forest
trees, rising like pillars from the midst of ferns and lesser growths,
support a lofty roof of leaves. Beneath this screen innumerable forms of
plant-life develop without let or hindrance, and the whole abundant
foliage is bound into an inextricable mass by parasites and creepers.
On every side the eye is met by one monotonous tone of verdure, for the
supremely favourable conditions for plant-life which obtains tend to
produce a total effect, not of variety, but of sameness.

One of the most interesting facts connected with the Javan flora is the
appearance of European flowers upon the higher levels of the mountains.
The phenomenon is the more remarkable in the face of the consideration
that the seeds of such flowers are so heavy, and the distance from their
present habitat so great, as to negative the supposition that they have
been carried by the wind; nor can their presence be satisfactorily
referred to the agency of birds.

At first sight, therefore, the existence of flowers such as the violet,
the buttercup, and the honeysuckle in an i