Page:Through China with a camera.pdf/217

 bare stems of parasite plants, like cables and rigging flying adrift before the breeze. We noted a number of fine specimens of the camphor-tree, the largest about four feet in diameter, and rising to a great height, straight as an arrow, with a slight taper and devoid of branches, till it reached the free air above. Besides there were interminable ratan plants, and in a compar- atively open space we fell in with a splendid lily of great size and in full flower, the entire plant standing about twelve feet from the root. Orchids, too, were there in abundance, filling the air with their perfume on every side. From the summit of this hill we got a view of the central mountain chain. A Pepohoan here joined our party; he had travelled over the mountains from the other side of the island, and was now homeward bound. From him we learnt the existence of a fine harbour on the eastern shore, and he added that the tribes granted him a free pass over their territory on the payment of three bullocks. It was about four o'clock when we entered Lalung; this village stands on the banks of a broad river, now reduced to narrow dimensions and to be seen winding along some half mile from its proper banks, which rose about sixty feet above the dry channel of the stream. But during the rains, we were assured that the river swells to such a volume that it fills up this entire bed. This is evidently one of the great arteries of the drainage of the central mountains ; and if we take into account the great altitude of those mountains, and the force of the torrents which make their way over the narrow plain, carrying with them annually, immense quantities of debris that the sea continually throws back and deposits along the western shore, we shall get some insight into the way in which land is being built up and redeemed from the ocean on the west, independently of the volcanic action still at work in cer-