Page:Voyage in search of La Perouse, volume 1 (Stockdale).djvu/309

] those forests. Among the number of shrubs, were several species of the dracæna. Among the large trees, I admired a solanum, certainly the highest species of that genus; those hitherto known to botanists, being only herbs or feeble shrubs. The leaves of this are oval, hard and very smooth.

That fine tree, the tectona grandis, so valuable for ship-building, grows at Carteret harbour. I also saw there different species of the guettarda, and a new species of hermandia.

Mosses and ferns were very numerous, and grew with the greatest luxuriance, in those humid situations.

The western shore of the island of Cocos is precipitous, and very much elevated above the level of the sea. The calcareous stones, of which it is composed, being much exposed to the injuries of the weather, are very friable. I found there the nutmeg-tree, which Rumphius has described, under the denomination of myristica mas (Rumph. Amb. vol. 2. tab. 5.) The fruit was then but young. It is more elongated than that of the species which is cultivated.

Some savage must certainly have perished among those rocks, for I found a human skeleton almost entire.

Near to that was a place where I saw the re- remains