It is rare to see a single tree without its families of dependents of this description, and on one occasion I counted on a single prostrate stem no less than sixteen species of Capparis, Beaumontia, Bignonia, Ipomoea, and other genera, which, in its fall, it had brought along with it to the ground.

Those which are free from climbing plants have their higher branches and hollows occupied by ferns and orchids, of which latter the variety is endless in Ceylon, though the beauty of their flower is not equal to those of Brazil and other tropical countries.

In the many excursions which I made with Dr.
Gardner he added numerous species to those already known, including the exquisite _Saccolabium guttatum_, which we came upon in the vicinity of Bintenne, but which had before been discovered in Java and the mountains of northern India.

Its large groups of lilac flowers hung in rich festoons from the branches as we rode under them, and caused us many an involuntary halt to admire and secure the plants.
A rich harvest of botanical discovery still remains for the scientific explorer of the districts south and east of Adam's Peak, whence Dr.
Gardner's successor, Mr.Thwaites, has already brought some remarkable species.

Many of the Ceylon orchids, like those of South America, exhibit a grotesque similitude to various animals; and one, a _Dendrobium_., which the Singhalese cultivate in the palms near their dwelling, bears a name equivalent to the _White-pigeon flower,_ from the resemblance which its clusters present to a group of those birds in miniature clinging to the stem with wings at rest.
But of this order the most exquisite plant I have seen is the _Anaectochilus setaceus_, a terrestrial orchid which is to be found about the moist roots of the forest trees, and has drawn the attention of even the apathetic Singhalese, among whom its singular beauty has won for it the popular name of the Wanna Raja, or "King of the Forest." It is common in humid and shady places a few miles removed from the sea-coast; its flowers have no particular attraction, but its leaves are perhaps the most exquisitely formed in the vegetable kingdom; their colour resembles dark velvet, approaching to black, and reticulated over all the surface with veins of ruddy gold.[1] [Footnote 1: There is another small orchid bearing a slight resemblance to the wanna raja, which is often found growing along with it, called by the Singhalese iri raja, or "striped king." Its leaves are somewhat bronzed, but they are longer and narrower than those of the wanna raja; and, as its Singhalese name implies, it has two white stripes running through the length of each.