This Is The Case, However, To A Very Limited Extent; And
We Shall Presently See That, Although This Development Of
Subterranean fires is on so vast a scale - has piled up chains of
mountains ten or twelve thousand feet high
- Has broken up
continents and raised up islands from the ocean - yet it has all
the character of a recent action which has not yet succeeded in
obliterating the traces of a more ancient distribution of land
and water.
Contrasts of Vegetation. - Placed immediately upon the Equator and
surrounded by extensive oceans, it is not surprising that the
various islands of the Archipelago should be almost always
clothed with a forest vegetation from the level of the sea to the
summits of the loftiest mountains. This is the general rule.
Sumatra, New Guinea, Borneo, the Philippines and the Moluccas,
and the uncultivated parts of Java and Celebes, are all forest
countries, except a few small and unimportant tracts, due
perhaps, in some cases, to ancient cultivation or accidental
fires. To this, however, there is one important exception in the
island of Timor and all the smaller islands around it, in which
there is absolutely no forest such as exists in the other
islands, and this character extends in a lesser degree to Flores,
Sumbawa, Lombock, and Bali.
In Timor the most common trees are Eucalypti of several species,
also characteristic of Australia, with sandalwood, acacia, and
other sorts in less abundance. These are scattered over the
country more or less thickly, but, never so as to deserve the
name of a forest.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 15 of 419
Words from 3830 to 4091
of 114260
