Page:Voyage in search of La Perouse, volume 1 (Stockdale).djvu/312

288 it formed, by dashing from the high calcareous rocks, in which we observed vast grottoes, which served as retreats for large bats, of the species denominated vespertilio vampyrus.

Some wild bread-fruit trees grew in those places.

At a time when Carteret harbour was inundated with continual rain, I was astonished to see only the channel of a torrent without any water; but it appeared to me, that the rain did not extend far enough inland to fill it. Of this it was easy to be convinced, by the serenity of the sky towards the south-west, while at the anchoring-place, the rain fell without intermission. Carteret harbour forms a sort of basin, where the clouds, loaded with water, after passing over the high mountains of New Ireland, experience a calm which hinders the air from supporting them. Hence result those excessive rains, which render the anchoring-place far from desirable to navigators.

Among the little plants, which grow in the shade of the forests, I observed several species of the procris.

Besides the nutmeg-trees of which I have already spoken, nature hath furnished the inhabitants of New Ireland with the species of pepper, known to botanists, by the name of piper cubebe, which