Page:Africa by Élisée Reclus, Volume 4.djvu/533

 FLORA OF MADAGASCAE. 486 western slopes, with a dryer climate and more arid soil, have a correspondingly poorer vegetation. The plants of these regions, being subject to longer periods of drought and exposed to the hot winds from the neighlwuring continent, have a harder foliage and thicker roots. Nevertheless, thorny plants, such as abound in the badly watered parts of Africa, are nowhere met with in the districts of Madagascar possessing a similar climate ; nor are acacias anywhere seen. One of the most remarkable members of the insular flora is a species of baobab, first described by Grandidier. Without acquiring the colossal dimensions of its African congener, it excels in the grace and majesty of its outlines. The tamarind also is a very noble tree, but it occurs only on the west slope of the island, where the Sakalava chiefs usually construct their dwellings beneath the shade of its wide-spreading branches. The cocoanut-palm, which flourishes in all the maritime districts, is believed to be of exotic origin. According to some authorities, it was introduced, together with the bread-tree, by the Malays, from the Eastern Archipelago. But Madagascar also possesses some indigenous species of palms, amongst others the sago-tree, a variety of the hijphmna akin to the dum-palm of the Nilotic regions, and the raphia, noted for its large, thickset trunk, its masses of minute foliage, and enormous bunches of fruit, weighing as much as three hundred pounds and upwards. The pandanus (rakoa), with its spiral sword-shaped leaves, thrives on the more arid tracts along the seaboard, while the muddy estuaries and coast lagoons are everywhere overgrown with the widely diffused mangrove. The brushwood and herbaceous vegetation of the depressions, and occasionally of the hill slopes, is overshadowed by a magnificent species of cannacorus, remarkable for the perfect regularity of its broad fern-like leaves. This is the ravenala, or xtrania speciosa, more commonly known as the traveller's tree, because its foliage collects the rain-water in sufficient quantity to slake the thirst of passing wayfarers. But it occurs chiefly in well-irrigated regions where water is abundant, and its chief advantage is derived from the excellent building material which it supplies to the inhabitants of the rurul districts. The trunk is used for the framework of their houses, the larger branches for beams and rafters, the foli'.Jge for thatching the roofs. The endemic flora of Madagascar is represented by many other remarkable forms, such as the ovirandrona {urirandra fenestralis), an aquatic plant whose oval leaves are variegated like pieces of lace; the filao, or "club-tree" {casuarina laterifolia), whose enormous roots serve to bind the shifting sands along some parts of the seaboard ; the hrehmia spinosa, which, although a member of the poisonous strychnos family, nevertheless yields an edible fruit ; the angrcecum sesquipedale, a gigantic orchid which clothes with a mantle of verdure the huge stems of old forest trees ; the nepenthe, or pitcher-plant, whose large flowers affect the form of pendant vessels, and contain a considerable supply of water. Trees yielding useful timber materials, as well as fine cabinet- woods, are very numerous, including such valuable varieties as teak, ebony, matwood, violet ebony, and rosewood. Unfor- tunately, the process of disafforesting is carried on without interruption. It is