Page:EB1911 - Volume 15.djvu/312

Rh (including the cobra di capella) are poisonous and these are responsible for the deaths of between one hundred and two hundred persons per annum. Adders and lizards are abundant. Geckos are familiar visitants in the houses of the natives. There are two species of crocodiles.

As in other tropical-rain forest lands the variety and abundance of insects are amazing. At sundown the air becomes resonant for hours with their myriad voices. The Coleoptera and the Lepidoptera form the glory of all great collections for their size and magnificence. Of butterflies proper five hundred species are known. Of the beetles one of the largest and handsomest is Chalcosoma atlas. Among the spiders (a numerously represented order) the most notable is a bird-killing species, Selene scomia javanensis. In many parts the island is plagued with ants, termites and mosquitoes. Crops of all kinds are subject to disastrous attacks of creeping and winged foes—many still unidentified (see especially Snellen van Hollenhoven, Essai d’une faune entomologique de l’Archipel Indo-néerlandais). Of still lower forms of life the profusion is no less perplexing. Among the worms the Perichaeta musica reaches a length of about twenty inches and produces musical sounds. The shell of the Tridacna gigas is the largest anywhere known.

Flora.—For the botanist Java is a natural paradise, affording him the means of studying the effects of moisture and heat, of air-currents and altitudes, without the interference of superincumbent arctic conditions. The botanic gardens of Buitenzorg have long been famous for their wealth of material, the ability with which their treasures have been accumulated and displayed, their value in connexion with the economic development of the island and the extensive scientific literature published by their directors. There is a special establishment at Chibodas open to students of all nations for the investigation on the spot of the conditions of the primeval forest. Hardly any similar area in the world has a flora of richer variety than Java. It is estimated that the total number of the species of plants is about 5000; but this is probably under the mark (De Candolle knew of 2605 phanerogamous species), and new genera and species of an unexpected character are from time to time discovered. The lower parts of the island are always in the height of summer. The villages and even the smaller towns are in great measure concealed by the abundant and abiding verdure; and their position in the landscape is to be recognized mainly by their groves, orchards and cultivated fields. The amount and distribution of heat and moisture at the various seasons of the year form the dominant factors in determining the character of the vegetation. Thus trees which are evergreen in west Java are deciduous in the east of the island, some dropping their leaves (e.g. Tetrameles nudiflora) at the very time they are in bloom or ripening their fruit. This and other contrasts are graphically described from personal observation by A. F. W. Schimper in his Pflanzen-Geographie auf physiologischer Grundlage (Jena, 1898). The abundance of epiphytes, orchids, pitcher-plants, mosses and fungi is a striking result of the prevalent humidity; and many trees and plants indeed, which in drier climates root in the soil, derive sufficient moisture from their stronger neighbours. Of orchids J. J. Smith records 562 species (100 genera), but the flowers of all except about a score are inconspicuous. This last fact is the more remarkable because, taken generally, the Javanese vegetation differs from that of many other tropical countries by being abundantly and often gorgeously floriferous. Many of the loftiest trees crown themselves with blossoms and require no assistance from the climbing plants that seek, as it were, to rival them in their display of colour. Shrubs, too, and herbaceous plants often give brilliant effects in the savannahs, the deserted clearings, the edges of the forest and the sides of the highways. The lantana, a verbenaceous alien introduced, it is said, from Jamaica by Lady Raffles, has made itself aggressively conspicuous in many parts of the island, more especially in the Preanger and middle Java, where it occupies areas of hundreds of acres.

The effect of mere altitude in the distribution of the flora was long ago emphasized by Friedrich Junghuhn, the Humboldt of Java, who divided the island into four vertical botanical zones—a division which has generally been accepted by his successors, though, like all such divisions, it is subject to many modifications and exceptions. The forest, or hot zone, extends to a height of 2000 ft. above the sea; the second, that of moderate heat, has its upper limit at about 4500; the third, or cool, zone reaches 7500; and the fourth, or coldest, comprises all that lies beyond. The lowest zone has, of course, the most extensive area; the second is only a fiftieth and the third a five-thousandth of the first; and the fourth is an insignificant remainder. The lowest is the region of the true tropical forest, of rice-fields and sugar-plantations, of coco-nut palms, cotton, sesamum, cinnamon and tobacco (though this last has a wide altitudinal range). Many parts of the coast (especially on the north) are fringed with mangrove (Rhizophora mucronata), &c., and species of Bruguiera; the downs have their characteristic flora—convolvulus and Spinifex squarrosus catching the eye for very different reasons. Farther inland along the seaboard appear the nipa dwarf palm (Nipa fruticans), the Alsbonia scholaris (the wood of which is lighter than cork), Cycadacea, tree-ferns, screw pines (Pandanus), &c. In west Java the gebang palm (Corypha gebanga) grows in clumps and belts not far from but never quite close to the coast; and in east Java a similar position is occupied by the lontar (Borassus flabelliformis), valuable for its timber, its sago and its sugar, and in former times for its leaves, which were used as a writing-material. The fresh-water lakes and ponds of this region are richly covered with Utricularia and various kinds of lotus (Nymphaea lotus, N. stellata, Nelumbium speciosum, &c.) interspersed with Pista stratiotes and other floating plants. Vast prairies are covered with the silvery alang-alang grass broken by bamboo thickets, clusters of trees and shrubs (Butea frondosa, Emblica officinalis, &c.) and islands of the taller erigedeh or glagah (Saccharum spontaneum). Alang-alang (Imperata arundinacea, Cyr. var. Bentham) grows from 1 to 4 ft. in height. It springs up wherever the ground is cleared of trees and is a perfect plague to the cultivator. It cannot hold its own, however, with the ananas, the kratok (Phaseolus lunatus) or the lantana; and, in the natural progress of events, the forest resumes its sway except where the natives encourage the young growth of the grass by annually setting the prairies on fire. The true forest, which occupies a great part of this region, changes its character as we proceed from west to east. In west Java it is a dense rain-forest in which the struggle of existence is maintained at high pressure by a host of lofty trees and parasitic plants in bewildering profusion. The preponderance of certain types is remarkable. Thus of the Moraceae there are in Java (and mostly here) seven genera with ninety-five species, eighty-three of which are Ficus (see S. H. Koorders and T. Valeton, “Boomsoorten op Java” in Bijdr. Mede. Dep. Landbower (1906). These include the so-called waringin, several kinds of figs planted as shade-trees in the parks of the nobles and officials. The Magnoliaceae and Anonaceae are both numerously represented. In middle Java the variety of trees is less, a large area being occupied by teak. In eastern Java the character of the forest is mainly determined by the abundance of the Casuarina or Chimoro (C. montana and C. Junghuhniana). Another species, C. equisetifolia, is planted in west Java as an ornamental tree. These trees are not crowded together and encumbered with the heavy parasitic growths of the rain-forest; but their tall stems are often covered with multitudes of small vermilion fungi. Wherever the local climate has sufficient humidity, the true rain-forest claims its own. The second of Junghuhn’s zones is the region of, more especially, tea, cinchona and coffee plantations, of maize and the sugar palm (areng). In the forest the trees are richly clad with ferns and enormous fungi; there is a profusion of underwood (Pavetta macrophylla Javanica and salicifolia; several species of Lasianthus, Boehmarias, Strobilanthus, &c.), of woody lianas and ratans, of tree ferns (especially Alsophila). Between the bushes the ground is covered with ferns, lycopods, tradescantias, Bignoniaceae, species of Aeschynanthus. Of the lianas the largest is Plectocomia elongata; one specimen of which was found to have a length of nearly 790 ft. One of the fungi, Telephora princeps, is more than a yard in diameter. The trees are of different species from those of the hot zone even when belonging to the same genus; and new types appear mostly in limited areas. The third zone, which consists mainly of the upper slopes of volcanic mountains, but also comprises several plateaus (the Dieng, parts of the Tengger, the Ijen) is a region of clouds and mists. There are a considerable number of lakes and swamps in several parts of the region, and these have a luxuriant environment of grasses, Cyperaceae, Characeae and similar forms. The taller trees of the region—oaks, chestnuts, various Lauraceae, and four or five species of Podocarpus—with some striking exceptions, Astronia spectabilis, &c., are less floriferous than those of the lower zones; but the shrubs (Rhododendron javanicum, Ardisia javanica, &c.), herbs and parasites more than make up for this defect. There is little cultivation, except in the Tengger, where the natives grow maize, rye and tobacco, and various European vegetables (cabbage, potatoes, &c.), with which they supply the lowland markets. In western Java one of the most striking features of the upper parts of this temperate region is what Schimper calls the “absolute dominion of mosses,” associated with the “elfin forest,” as he quaintly calls it, a perfect tangle of “low, thick, oblique or even horizontal stems,” almost choked to leaflessness by their grey and ghostly burden. Much of the lower vegetation begins to have a European aspect; violets, primulas, thalictrums, ranunculus, vacciniums, equisetums, rhododendrons (Rhod. retusum). The Primula imperialis, found only on the Pangerango, is a handsome species, prized by specialists. In the fourth or alpine zone occur such distinctly European forms as Artemisia vulgaris, Plantago major, Solanum nigrum, Stellaria media; and altogether the alpine flora contains representatives of no fewer than thirty-three families. A characteristic shrub is Anaphalis javanica, popularly called the Javanese edelweiss, which “often entirely excludes all other woody plants.” The tallest and noblest